vrtgo Wrote:I was an art student in college, which makes me all but unemployable

Maybe I'm stupid for asking this, but why are you unemployable? Because you just do works of art? My plan is to get a bachelor's degree in 3D animation and then travel to Japan to find work with a game company of some sort, or even something else considering animation can cover a few different digital entertainment mediums (such as film and the aforementioned games). That sentence has me worried that I won't be employable, but I think it's just because of what you do specifically.

Welcome to the degree-holding, skilled, yet severely underpaid and misemployed (what the hell am I doing working as a cashier/restocker/delivery person??) club of art majors.

TheVinster Wrote:

vrtgo Wrote:I was an art student in college, which makes me all but unemployable

Maybe I'm stupid for asking this, but why are you unemployable? Because you just do works of art? My plan is to get a bachelor's degree in 3D animation and then travel to Japan to find work with a game company of some sort, or even something else considering animation can cover a few different digital entertainment mediums (such as film and the aforementioned games). That sentence has me worried that I won't be employable, but I think it's just because of what you do specifically.

Ah to be young and full of hope...

ocircle Wrote:Welcome to the degree-holding, skilled, yet severely underpaid and misemployed (what the hell am I doing working as a cashier/restocker/delivery person??) club of art majors.

This is what you get for apparently

Jarvik7 Wrote:... studying something they enjoy instead of spending 4 years in hell so that they can spend the rest of their lives doing a job they hate

I know you're supposed to have fun in life but there are moments when you just have to bite the bullet and do the reasonable thing. One of such moments is deciding your major, lots of people decide to go the "fun" or easy route and are severely disappointed afterwards. I see this often in my country where everyone wants to have a degree in something just for the sake of it and later they are surprised their skills have almost zero value on the market. I wouldn't have a problem with that since its everyones choice however such people are usually very demanding and are a big burden for already overwhelmed social system. No job is good enough for them, they have poor work ethics and quite frankly aren't as smart as they think they are.

I guess ocircle you have to complain to Jarvik7 about your job since you did what he proposed and you still ended up with job you hate

TheVinster Wrote:

vrtgo Wrote:I was an art student in college, which makes me all but unemployable

Maybe I'm stupid for asking this, but why are you unemployable? Because you just do works of art? My plan is to get a bachelor's degree in 3D animation and then travel to Japan to find work with a game company of some sort, or even something else considering animation can cover a few different digital entertainment mediums (such as film and the aforementioned games). That sentence has me worried that I won't be employable, but I think it's just because of what you do specifically.

Getting a good job working with 3D animation is very hard. The degree / qualification is essentially meaningless. You get employed based on your abilities that you show case in your demo reel. Only do the degree if the teacher is amazing and going to give you something that you can't learn on your own. Only pursue the field if you genuinely believe you have serious talent and are going to put some serious time in front of the screen honing your skills. It's a field that lots of people would dearly love to work in. You need some serious passion to be the one that gets the seat.

IMO, arts / humanities degrees are good for combining with other degrees to brighten up your semester, and for people that intend to become academics.

If you are going to uni, study something with substance or study for the passion of studying. If you can't feel your personal worth increasing as you progress through your degree... it's not. You should either attain real world skills or solid academic skills.

heromode Wrote:You get employed based on your abilities that you show case in your demo reel.

Everybody just loves shooting down my aspirations, but I'll just consider that a challenge. It's something that I want to do and the only way to achieve that goal is to reach it. See you in 3 years when I have my bachelor's. :/

I know a guy who did graphic design at uni and he's just gotten a job doing 3D animation working for WETA workshops (the people who worked on lord of the rings).

Nothing's impossible.

mezbup Wrote:I know a guy who did graphic design at uni and he's just gotten a job doing 3D animation working for WETA workshops (the people who worked on lord of the rings).

Nothing's impossible.

But do the same thing and come over and work for a Japanese studio.....I've never heard of that happening. Maybe freelance type stuff is possible.

Certifications. Collect them. Even if your degree is unmarketable, a pile of certifications can make you employable. Programming and accounting certifications come to mind. Even being a certified hair-stylist will bring home a decent income. Furthermore, you can self-study for most certifications, which eliminates the need to pay for an expensive university.

I don't hate my job, but I know that anyone can do my job.
And very little of what I've did in college is useful for it.
The only thing that seems to matter is that I'm older so employers don't have to feel nervous about hiring an 17 year old being in a shop with cigarettes and beer.

I'd love to have a job relevant to my passions and expertise. However, part of being an adult means taking on whatever you can to stay afloat, even if it isn't fun or interesting or related to what you think you want to do in the next 5 years.

TheVinster Wrote:Everybody just loves shooting down my aspirations, but I'll just consider that a challenge. It's something that I want to do and the only way to achieve that goal is to reach it. See you in 3 years when I have my bachelor's. :/

FYI, one of my college friends is going to Japan to try and get a job with a Japanese game development studio (I think more on the design side than art side though). He used to work at EA and is at a language institute for a few months to brush up on his Japanese. If he's successful, I'll let you know how he went about it.

hmm i've always and still am, studying something that will be able to land me a job after post-secondary school is finished. Something related to chemistry-pharmaceuticals. I usual like games+languages. But getting jobs in those things aren't likely. Plus in sciences i prefer chemistry over biology any day. But i'd rather be studying for 4-6 years in something that will land be a good job later on in my life. (only 20 right about now). Alot of other people i know have done something that is "enjoyable" to them. But it can cost them jobs in the future for the program that they have choose to pursue.

15 months of ALT work was enough for me- I loved the breaks and free time to study during the day, but it's not good for the resume (I limited myself to 1.5 yrs when I started). I'm back in Australia again looking for work back in IT to try and salvage my resume.

I think being an ALT is a good means to an end- it enables you to go to the country and have a lot of free time to do what you want. It's easy to get into a comfortable lifestyle and not really do much- I met ALTs who had been doing the same job for 5, 10, 15+ years. Some people make it work (like a mate of mine who's wife is a high school English teacher) while others just flounder on... and as a side note- the pay really isn't bad for what you do. Interac paid me 255k/month (which I hear is on the high side for ALTs) and that was plenty to live on and save. I partied a bit too and still ended up saving over $5k in my 15 months- someone who was more frugal could easily save 2 or 3 times that as I moved house as well (talk about pricey). The problem I see coming is that wages are just going to get driven lower and lower- I heard about a company near Fukuoka paying their ALTs 180k/month. There is an abundance of teachers and not enough positions.

I was in the same boat you are in. Teaching English, going nowhere. Now I'm in a Japanese company translating, going nowhere. If you're like me, then employment, having a professional career, is not something that drives me. If it was, I wouldn't have come here, I wouldn't have stayed here, I wouldn't be here. That's okay, we can't all be on the fast track to millions, working 80 hours a week, smoking cigars, kicking homeless people. But I wish I got out of here when I was younger. It's the other stuff, familyl, friends, hobbies, not being surrounded by negative, narrow people all the time, that I want now, and I can't have. It's funny, but the thing that motivates me to study Japanese now is the thought of getting out of here and using it in my own country.
Bottom line: Get out before you get stuck.

You can't have hobbies in japan? Japan is the hobbyist capital of the world!

Mennon: It sounds like you have an interesting story to tell, and I for one would love to read it. Do you have a blog? If not, you should start one, or let us know about it on this thread- maybe you'll make even a single person think twice before getting maniacal about this Japanese stuff. Maybe it'll be me. Type away, brother.

I admit, I am interested too. Please divulge your personal life to the internet

I have a blog, but it's not really about japan, though there is the odd rant in there.
http://lessmoo.blogspot.com/
Just something I do to stay positive and motivated.

@Mennon - yeah, I'm aiming so hard for the translating work right now but I have a vague sense that it really depends on WHAT you translate and who you work for. Enlighten us.

captal Wrote:15 months of ALT work was enough for me- I loved the breaks and free time to study during the day, but it's not good for the resume (I limited myself to 1.5 yrs when I started). I'm back in Australia again looking for work back in IT to try and salvage my resume.

This is what worries me the most, the resume. Will be going into my fourth year soon. If I stay for five there will probably be no escape. I really need to make this my last year, it's just so easy to get comfortable here and loose sight of the bigger picture.

I'm not terribly worried about the resume. I'm doing three years here with a year and a half left to go. Been working on graduate programs in international marketing and project management and going to leave with at least 2kyuu in the bag and working on 1kyuu.

I went back to Oz after four years, and if I was lucky enough to get an interview, they all dissed my time in Japan. If I could go back, I would lie my ass off and say I did one year in Japan after uni, had my fun, and then get a friend to vouch for me at another job in Oz or whatever it took. It was definately a disadvantage. If you don't want to lie about not being in japan, lie about the job you did. Not taching, more like working as a liason for a trading company. Who cares? Get the job.
I translate reports, manuals, and things like that. In Aichi everything is going to be technical, industrial. In Tokyo it might be more business based work. I'm in-house, whcih is nice and safe, but freelance is the way to go in the future.
I was lucky. I knew someone and I got this job before I was really qualified. Get your level 2, and then meet foreigners who don't teach but do other stuff. Go to events held by your consulate or stuff like that.