Nick Carpenter (Blizzard VP of Art and Cinematic Development) posted a call for a Storyboard Artist with film experience.
You must be able to relocate to Irvine, CA. The project the Storyboard Artist will work on is unknown. Storyboard. Film experience. At a first glance one might quickly think: Warcraft film. However, there is much more Blizzard Entertainment is working on.
Blizzplanet: Speculation-mode On
We absolutely don’t know what this position is for. That clear, I can think of few projects that might fit the bill.
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Warcraft film: VFX supervisor Bill Westenhofer joined recently. A storyboard artist at this point makes sense.
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Next-Gen MMO: Lot of “if”s here. If the Next-Gen MMO was to be announced this BlizzCon (November 8-9), if they were to unveil a cinematic teaser, and if they haven’t started working on the cinematic basics — they might need a storyboard artist for the Next-Gen MMO team. Can Blizzard pull that off in less than 6 months? Too Challenging.
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StarCraft: Ghost: It’s just a matter of when it will be announced, you know it. I can hear some fans pop the argument: “Oh but [x] team is busy on [y] project — it’s not happening any time soon.” So I will pop the argument-slapper: “.. but, a new team was created out of the blue to develop Hearthstone!” Any new teams might be created to handle new games at any time. Or teams we don’t know yet exist might be working on a game as we speak? — [plays Twilight Zone music theme]
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Hearthstone: Hmm, why not. It’s going into beta in a few weeks from now. I have all Blizzard PC games, and I have never seen a Blizzard game without a cinematic intro.
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StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void: It’s been a month and a half since Heart of the Swarm launched. What are the chances Legacy of the Void is already in development? Did you see how many cinematics and cutscenes Heart of the Swarm had? Crazy and awesome, right?
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World of Warcraft expansion: It’s no secret Blizzard aims to ship WoW expansions faster — within the 16 months window. Mists of Pandaria shipped on September 25, 2012. It’s been 7 months since it went live. By November, it will be 13 months and a half since MOP went live. Beta tests last around 6 months. Thus, there is a mismatch there for the 16th month shipping milestone. Either way, cinematic team might begin work any time. Hiring a Storyboard artist makes sense here too.
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Short film: The Diablo III: Wrath short was short of awesome. Blizzard might show a short based on any of the current and upcoming IPs.
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Diablo III expansion: It’s been basically a year (May 12) since Diablo III went live. By BlizzCon (Nov 7-8) it will be 18 months. Nice timing for an expansion announcement. Add a few months before beta starts, plus at least six months of beta testing. Plenty of time for cinematic work.
