LogInGame Art Brain CEO Christian Stephan Retzlaff told us how the company was founded, spoke about their working organization and approach to education, and explained how to quickly build a common understanding with new clients.
Introduction
My Name is Christian Stephan Retzlaff, and I am the Founder and CEO of Game Art Brain. I studied Animation and Visual Communication and was working in several lead positions in the mobile gaming industry.
But why did I open an art outsourcing studio in Europe? There are many reasons, of which I am going to name some. In the mentioned lead positions, I had a lot to do with art outsourcing studios. I always felt not treated right as a client. First, there was always one Business Development Manager, if asked to be connected to the lead artist, the answer was always that the BDM is the only one to speak English. But this BDM had not the slightest clue of art and was supposed to translate complicated matters to the actual artist. And especially in 3D, many technical issues arose.
Secondly, the moment you felt like it was running smoothly, the arthouse assigned some interns or at least not the same skilled team members who did the initial test. So the quality dropped low and everything took a lot of raging calls and furious emails to get back on track.
Another reason was that I had tasty job offers for EA and Rovio and could not travel because of my family situation. All these reasons combined made me think about my own little venture. I felt I could address all these issues easily and make things better. So the goal was to be a qualitative art boutique for exclusive clients and treat them this way, work on a variety of games and gain together with the team experience in all sort of styles and genres, and stay in one place but work for the world.
Beginning with a couple of small clients, Game Art Brain has pushed within the past 5 years through to being a global player with more than 150 clients all over the world. Working on video games and Web3 projects with studios like Immutable, Gungho, NetEase, Smilegate, Funplus, Deep Silver, ECOMI and Chimera, just to name a few.
Game Art Brain's Work Organization
The workflow/pipeline at GAB is quite straightforward. Usually, the whole process starts with the client's brief and benchmark work to first establish a rough timeline and pricing for the project. As we receive more details, we refine these numbers, get the OK from the client and dive into the work!
Game Art Brain consists of four distinct teams: the production team, the 2D team, the 3D team, and the management team. The production team is responsible for client communication, project management, and business development. The 2D and 3D teams are led by a single lead artist and work on the creative aspects of the game development process. The tech artist oversees the work of the art teams and identifies any technical errors that may arise. The management team is responsible for all financial and staffing matters.
A project to name is Gods Unchained by Immutable. We are working on this game already since 5 years and are creating 3d assets, UI, marketing art, concept art and more than 150 card illustrations.
One of Game Art Brain’s biggest achievements on that game was the creation of the illustration of “Hyperion”. While the card was undergoing auction, it managed to successfully become the worlds most valuable card in a TCG for a brief period of time, before being overtaken by the Magic: The Gathering card, Black Lotus and after that by the Gods Unchained card “Citadel of the Gods” which sold for 42 ETH ($76,000). Our illustration Hyperion was officially bid back in 2019 for 137.8 Ether ($62,000 USD at the time).
Working With New Clients
Our frame work is to have as much information about the project as possible with some emailing back and forth on getting all the details, and then to jump into a call with the client. We have found that having a conversation with a new client in the beginning stages helps to build common understanding faster than through long email chains. This also gives the client more reassurances and builds trust by meeting the people directly who will be responsible for their project and delivery.
Approach to Education
When it comes to educating our artists and making sure they are performing at the industry level, we have a few different methods. We have slack channels devoted to posting different workflows methods that we come across, so that all the artists can learn something new and implement a certain method in their next project. We have an Art Direction QnAs on Fridays for the artists to bring along their work and get direct live feedback. We are also developing some learning sessions/ tutorials on reoccurring topics that we encounter in projects to help refine our workflows and skillsets.
Conclusion
For artists willing to jump into the ring and join our team, some skills to have would be very versatile. We never know what new challenge comes around the corner. Each client request has different requirements. The style always changes and the workflow needs to constantly be adjusted. This is why an artist joining us should also be very agile and be able to adjust his working methods or stylistic approaches.
And lastly, we do look for people who are open, honest, and love their work! If people are open to feedback, clear in stating their opinions/ ideas and can show their passion for creating some wicked art, then they are a good fit for the team!