在他成长的岁月里, Jason Hutchins was led to believe a career in designing games seemed somewhat unattainable. “I would look at the game magazines in the grocery store when mom was shopping, 然后当我们回到家, I'd go draw the characters from the game magazine,杰森回忆道。. “In one of my art classes, I would turn that work in for art projects. I remember the teacher said, ‘Well, that's not art, that's garbage. That's video games, just a waste of time.’”

Resigned to life not creating video game art professionally, Jason decided to pursue a military career and enlisted in the United States Army. After completing his time in the military, he returned to his home state of Florida and learned about 满帆大学. Jason visited the campus for a tour, only to discover his childhood dreams could become reality.

“我偷偷溜去参加游戏美术之旅, and I was looking at all the gaming computers and the Wacom tablets and Z-Brush modeling and everything and thought, 等一下, 这是艺术吗?? Because I was told that's not art, what?’ So apparently that teacher was wrong, or all of the schools teaching game art and computer animation are completely wrong.”

Luckily, Jason quickly discerned it was his art teacher that was incorrect and enrolled in the 游戏艺术 满帆项目. 在节目中, Jason greatly enjoyed the individualistic approach to his education, something he hadn’t experienced before.

“I think it was the 3D general class, 第一堂课, (教练)会说, “我就是这么做的, 这是我的技巧, 如果你有别的技巧, as long as the end result is the same, 我不管你怎么去. That's all that matters is the thing that you made, does it look proper?’ That's when I knew I was in the right class,” says the grad.

Though he’d lent his talents to successful student projects – including 轻微交通事故的游戏 PC Gamer杂志’s best free PC game in June 2011 – Jason struggled to find work in the field post-graduation. He spent some time working with animator Ben Rush and L7 Studios on a project that would later be acquired by Pixar but still struggled to find his footing in the world of game art.

That’s when the perfect opportunity for the grad came into focus. Combining his skillset in 3D modeling and game art with his military background, Jason was hired by military contractor CAE to design 3D models for military training.

Working with a military contractor on classified projects, Jason found himself utilizing proprietary programs that he hadn’t encountered in his time at 满帆. Luckily, the influence of his studies was able to guide him even in programs he wasn’t familiar with. “[I had an instructor who said] ‘Don’t learn the program, learn the steps,’” says Jason. “这真的激励了我. 都是一样的, 我必须做一个模型, 我必须制作一个纹理, 我必须对纹理进行UV处理, 我得检查一下灯光, I have to check in the game…just exactly the same that we learned at 满帆.”

今天, as a Visual Database Engineer at CAE, Jason is modifying and designing consequential training modules for Air Force pilots and crew, 他引以为傲的工作.

“我对一架KC-135进行了改装, and so when [Airmen] get in the cockpit and they look out the window, 这是我做的. So it's just like when you play the game and you look on your screen and you go shoot the other guy or whatever, 有些人是这么做的. I do the same thing, but it's inside of a plane.”