Workfree Connect: With Tomas Sackmann

We sat down for a Google hangout with the Argentinian freelance extraordinaire Tomas Sackmann. He’s designed music festivals in Dubai, created characters for the likes of Stranger Things, She-Hulk, Black Panther, all the while operating in multiple time zones from the Middle East to Vancouver to Singapore where he’s now taking on the gaming industry at Tencent. Tomas gave us a deep dive into 3D design, what character creation actually means, how good communication can be a creative act as a freelancer. A firm believer that all experience is valuable, Tomas will inspire you to seize those freelance opportunities. Enjoy

Hey Tomas, introduce yourself, where are you and what are you working on?

I’ve just moved with my family to Singapore, I’m working for Tencent -they’re a Chinese tech company that are really big in the gaming industry. They own half of Epic Games, they own Riot Games,  amongst other game studios around the world.  I came here to work in the Infinite Creative Team. On top of that, I'm a co-founder of ACONCAWA Studios in Dubai with my partner, Francesco Iorio.  I’m a 3D artist and currently focused on creating characters and assets for film, game or cinematics. I also used to teach tutorials and mentor people around character art.

Ok wow! How would you describe your job to a 10 year old? Break it down for  us and any budding freelance 3D artists out there.

I create a 3D model of a character on the computer.  There is a lot of software that I use to make this happen, it’s a mixture of creative and technical work. Creatively it’s like sculpting a piece of clay to create a character, then there is a technical side where we need to take that sculpture and make it workable for whatever the output is that we need to achieve.

So, in film there are 3 steps for my process.  Usually we need to create something that is called a topology which is kind of like the outside structure of the skin for the model. That needs to be done in a way that needs to be able to be animated.  Then on top of that, we work in something that is called texturing where we paint on top of the character to make it look a certain way. Then we shade to add the material properties of everything.  We get really specific to determine all the physical parameters of the material. In film and games there are usually big pipelines and extensive chains of production where I'm the modeller and someone else takes the texturing etc. 

One of the most important things of what we do as a 3D artist is replicate reality or create a new reality like Avatar. We want to find beauty in the imperfections and avoid things being too perfect. 

How did your career kick off? You work in such a specialised space now, was that always the case?

I studied industrial design in Argentina, then a friend of mine heard of a job opportunity in Dubai, I went for it not really knowing much about it. It was different from what I'm doing now, but kick-started my work as a technical project manager and designer.  The clients were big like Adidas and Heineken. We did restaurant builds, created events, and I worked on 3D.  While working in the experiential agencies, I met Dimitar Dimitrov, he was an amazing 3D designer studying character creation for film. I wanted to level up my 3D ability with a summer school which was more like a full on full time online course! Fast forward to 2019 when COVID hit my clients were Dubai airports and events in AbuDhabi and my freelance life started.  After I completed my studies I got a job with Digital Domain, a massive visual effects company based in Vancouver, Canada.

When you chose to go freelance, what were you offering, how did you get work?

I was really mixing this and that. Initially, the main work was 3D design for events in Saudi and Dubai, festivals, that kind of thing with old clients I’d worked for whilst finishing off my studies. I couldn't handle all the work myself so I began outsourcing, I was doing some projects with four or five freelancers. Even with the move to Canada, instead of stopping my freelance work, I kept going. I had to do many things at the same time, move with all my family and my two months old daughter from Dubai to Vancouver whilst there were still COVID restrictions and started to do some freelance work on character creation.

Getting the work was something that came pretty naturally based on previous employers and clients in different fields or contacts from them. Networking is so important. Doing good work and communicating properly with your clients is essential- you never know when that person will hire you again.

What challenges did you come up against and how did you solve them? 

When Francisco and I set up our own studio - ACONCAWA. We found that in very specialised work finding other freelancers was hard. The quality control was not there, the rates end up being really low and in a lot of cases it doesn't work compared to dealing directly with the client. Fran is in charge now but we rely heavily on people we trust, mostly people we’ve worked with before. 

The websites for freelancers didn't give me quality, it wasn’t a smooth process, so I started building communities within the field, doing my own spreadsheets with contacts of my designers, where their speciality is. It was a lot of manual work. This is what I hope to get from Workfree.  I think it would be amazing to have all our communities of designers on one platform. It would be super helpful, especially searching by speciality or specific skill set, something I haven’t found anywhere else.

Also, with the two kids it's difficult to balance work and life, right? That’s another challenge. Our move to Singapore was a family decision. Being in the middle of Asia, means we can travel around and experience a lot of things as a family whilst also a professional upgrade into gaming. 

The first months in Vancouver, I was still dealing with projects in Dubai. The time difference was crazy, it’s a real challenge  working a lot of hours on different projects in different time zones.. We did a project for Coca-Cola, I was in  Vancouver, Fran and some of the team in Dubai, we had an artist in Argentina and an artist in Japan and our client was in London. It felt like the entire world in one project and you know what it worked out really well, with a really good result. 

What do you think led to that success?

Communication skills and polishing up our workflow.. It’s tricky though, English is my second language, right? It's always a bit of a barrier. Sometimes you have really talented artists or designers, but they don't have the ability to communicate in another language.

I prefer working with someone that is not so talented but can communicate better because a lot of times the work that we do is really fast paced and is really back and forward. Keeping that communication flowing between my team and the client is crucial. 

Organization of the process and scheduling is key. And the other key pillar is having talented people.

You can do all the things,  but if the people working are not on the level that you need, it's not going to work.

I think that's something that all freelancers end up with, these other responsibilities, the admin, the networking -  sometimes it works for people and sometimes it doesn't.  The way we work is evolving. With Workfree there’s the potential to get the best of everything. The idea that you can use the platform to get great work and to give great work and work with great people.

What does success look like for you in 2024?

My main challenge at the moment is to determine what is success for myself career-wise, I’ve shifted into the gaming industry at a great company in a new city. At the same time, I want to be the best father I can, the way my parents were. Working in different fields is the only way forward. That’s why being a freelancer is amazing because you have experience working in different stuff. It always adds up. The path is not a straight line, but I believe any experience is good.