Enjoying very much the videos on the get a job in the industry course.
I’m seeing repeatedly along the course the example of being a “tools programmer”.
Could someone put a concrete example of what a “tools” would be?
Would for example, scripting in Python Maya or Blender commands to duplicate assets along a curve, or apply rotations or things like that be relevant for it?
Or is it more outside Blender, I don’t know, some tool to for example take all the files on a folder, compress them and upload them to some backup folder on the cloud automatically? So something done with C# or something like that.
I think I got the answer on the video on “how your value is assesed by employers” ( 2_BV_JOB)
In that video a “tools programmer” role for Naught Dog is analyzed.
By the examples that they put, I think they mention quite complex tools, as in, mostly quite complex independent pieces software. In my view some sort of sofware engineer with experience building independent apps. No minor things.
The examples that they put were:
-Level Editor
-Art Prototype catalogue database
-Animation/Cinematic Editor
-MAterial/Shader Editor
-Plug-ins
-Build-Tools
-Data Messaging Tools
-Lighting Tools
And the languages that they asked experience for:
-Maya Plug-in API
-SQL
-OpenGL
…
Tom has great examples. But to put it in a more general statement, a Tools Programmer develops software that facilitates or improves the game development pipeline. This can also include developing the game engine itself.