We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Gaowen Fu a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Gaowen, thank you so much for taking the time to share your lessons learned with us and we’re sure your wisdom will help many. So, one question that comes up often and that we’re hoping you can shed some light on is keeping creativity alive over long stretches – how do you keep your creativity alive?
As a visual development artist, nurturing creativity and maintaining an unceasing curiosity are essential. I believe that the secret to sustaining creativity lies in cultivating the habit of constant observation and reflection. Be curious about everything and always be prepared to question why. This fuels the engine of creativity.
For visual artists working in the entertainment industry, in particular, I recommend immersing yourself in movies, anime, and TV series ( TONS of). This not only builds your visual library but also hones your sensitivity to creative ideas.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
Hey, I’m Gaowen Fu, Visual development artist from Blizzard. I joined Blizzard in 2022 and working for the SFD ( Story& Franchise Development) department, which is also know as the cinematic department.
I worked on pre-render cinematics, 2.5d animation, illustration etc for various Blizzard IPs, including World of Warcraft, Diablo, Overwatch, Hearthstone. It’s amazing to work with talented artists here and see how player reacts to the works.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
The most important quality is to be humble all the time, even a senior level artist can learn from a kid ‘s drawing.
This also leads to the most important skill, the ability to learn. As an artist you should always be hungry and eager to learn more. There are many different projects, some of them might from areas that you not familiar, some of them might need a style that you haven’t try before, so try to make learning your “passive ability”.
The third thing is to be adaptive, artists in our industry need to be able to handle projects with different styles, themes, categories etc. Unless you are very famous and your client are coming for your specific art style, don’t tie yourself up in the comfortable zone.
What was the most impactful thing your parents did for you?
I started in Industrial design when I was in college, but after first year and I get into digital painting, I decide to change my major to fine art and start my career in entertainment industry, my parents support me through all of this. Even though they don’t know much about this area and have no idea how the future of this can be. However they still support me, this make me stronger and confident when I pursue my early career.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.artstation.com/gaow
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gaowen_art/?hl=en
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gaowen-fu-8991b21b7/
Image Credits
Gaowen Fu Piotr Jabłoński
