Kobalt Kiwi So Far

I’m Kit (Christopher by birth and Kiwi to some), I’m a 19 year old art student now studying Game Art Design at De Montfort University. I did a Foundation Year in Art and Design at the Arts University College at Bournemouth before that I lived in rural Hampshire unable to get to a town or settlement with any form of ease.

The traditional forms of art taught on Game Art at DMU grabbed me; being taught the skills that can be taken into an industry always seemed like what art at school, college and foundation should have been. When asked what my dream job would be I find it difficult to answer as I don’t only want to work on characters or environments or vehicles and I don’t want to only work in 2D or in 3D. Furthermore the start of the course has changed my ideas quite drastically as to what I enjoy doing, I also want to get the most out of the course so am trying to think about now and stay in the present to improve my skills as much as possible. Having said that I would love to be able to understand what a client wants and go out create some concepts and then model from my own concepts; despite that Character Artist as a job highly appeals to me and the skills required are some that I feel I can strive to achieve throughout this course. Working as a team and collaborating work although strenuous at times is something really I enjoy because of the interaction and pool of ideas.

Cliche and pretentious as it sounds the two worlds of Art and Games have been central to my life almost since I can remember. From a very early age I watched my brother tinkering with computers and exploring the technical and scientific side of everything; me being a typical irritating younger sibling wanted to do what he was doing and know what he knew and how he knew it. I wasn’t permitted to test my understanding of computers with components for the chances of me breaking it were almost certain. This is were Half-Life comes into play, the Valve game released when I was 5; I can’t say for certain when I started playing it as that's all merely fuzzy memories. I can however say that, according to my memory, we played endlessly. I have maintained my initial interest in technology and electronics although it has remained as an interest.

Science and technology only interested me so far. I have always been transfixed with art, but it was always accepted in the back of my mind as a hobby. I dabbled in modding games and modeling between the ages of 13 and 15 but never thought it would amount to anything. Don’t get me wrong, I dreamt it would! Realism just kicked those ideas right out of my waking thoughts. If I asked 14 year old Kit what he thought I’d be doing right now he would likely think I would be in my second year of studying Anthropology.

Instead I’m finally being properly artistically educated. I found the emotional/conceptual thought processes seen in “fine art” style courses easy to comprehend and understand and I’ve never wanted to be taught how to question or make a statement. One of the main reasons being, when you question too far there is no meaning... to anything. And making statements, well why would anyone care what I have to say, my statements mean nothing to those who hold opposing or differing views. Art is a one way form of communication which has always seemed fairly permanent to me where opinions and feelings are far from permanent. I try not to shout my opinions in the faces of those around me for they likely don’t agree. Instead a dialogue whereby you can show how and why you disagree suits the topic of opinion and feeling to a far greater extent, as a dialogue allows your opinions to evolve and become more refined.

This has gone rather off track, and sounds quite hypocritical as after all this is going on a blog, commonly a one way mode of communication...

Aside from games and art, music is a continuous undercurrent to my life. “Darkwave” and “Deathrock”, two genres which evolved from the 80s post punk and new wave era are at the center of the music I listen to. Perhaps as a result of these musical leanings and my interest in cultures and anthropology,  fashion is definitely an interest of mine. I am currently halfway through making a coat having designed it and made the patterns myself.

Don’t think theres anything else to know...