Creative Intern Review

I was working at Soho Productions as a creative intern for my internship and I was able to work on some really big projects and learn some amazing new skills. It was the best job as I was able to combine my background in art and learn new coding skills and just everyday was one to look forward too, even during crunch periods.

After leaving my placement I really miss the studio as everyone made me feel like i had been there for years straight away. Everyone was happy to help and in return they asked for my help on areas they felt i had more experience on too. The studio had an amazing dynamic.

I was so lucky to have my manager as he was so supportive of everything I did in the studio. As soon as he learnt i'd like to look into an area i'd find myself working with a lead and learning all these new skills. All the success I had out of my placement was down to my extremely hard working manager who gave me the opportunities.

I was extremely busy everyday but this wasn't a problem, it's common in game development to have a lot of work. The best part was the work was manageable, I had a list of tasks with deadlines in most causes but I knew my abilities and was able to separate them out accordingly. Some days after we shipped the first title it was quite quiet in the studio but that picked up again really quickly and I did work a few crunch periods and weekends, but I was happy with it overall.

A lot. I worked my way up to this responsibility but I am proud to say there is work in the studio that I was solely responsible for particularly towards the end of my placement. It was all down to my management and project managers who were able to recommend me around the studio based on previous work.

My degree is computer games art and I learnt a lot more in my placement than what I learn on my degree. By that I mean my degree is very focused on just 3D modelling when there is so much more to games development, whilst i was on placement i did user interface design, technical art, games design, coding, front end development and just in short working in a professional team is the most valuable experience and you cannot learn that in university.

The office was great, everyone at the studio was friendly and supportive and wanted to get the product shipped and to a high standard. There is nothing better than working with people who take pride in their work.

At soho productions everything was great, I do feel however that we were quite separated from the rest of the Microsoft interns even those living in London and working at Victoria. It always felt very weird going to the Reading HQ and not knowing many people and the information about MACH schemes told to us being irrelevant.

I was able to learn amongst some of the best and most creative minds in the industry. I would have time out with some of the leads to go over art and technical aspects of the job and just in general I learnt a lot from everyone there.

After my placement finished in July 2013 I was immediately hired for the rest of the summer until September. I'm not sure what will happen after university but that extra bit of experience was fantastic.

The students in soho were some of my closest friends by the end of the year but we never really interacted with any other placement students. All social events were held mainly in Reading and on thursday nights. I remember there was one in London that I booked to go to and it got cancelled...

London is extremely expensive and we didn't go out . Just living costs were expensive enough there was no real way to make that stretch further.

London is very expensive I think I went on one night out in my whole year and never did it again. My pay went on rent and that was about it

In Soho we had a lot of work to get done so after work sometimes we would go somewhere but most nights we would just want to relax.