Me Too. I started programming with DirectX and C++, learning mostly from tutorials and examples from different places on the internet, and some other tools and languages this year (FYI, I'm 14 right now). And right now I'm working on a (or something similar enough to, or able to speed up any DX 9 Apps I might want to make) Game Engine. And yes of course, I'm still learning what a game engine should be like and how it should be made. Right now I'm still struggling with Mesh Animation, Particle FX (might have made a small mistake somewhere) and the more advanced concepts of 3D transformation, Physics and Mathematics. I also use OpenGL (and I've actually made a 3D app for someone, and gotten paid about $150 in US currency). And I work on an FPS game in Unity3D (Using a tutorial) from time to time.

I am regularly ( sp ?? ) ignored by companies even if i have a degree in engeneering electrhonics and have been coding program for 20+ years.

The shift in the industry is totally Unity driven, i'd say that someone with a fair amount of Unity and c# experience might get a better job than someone with a degree , i regreted wasting time and money on my education, sad but true

Ummm, you have probably already been asked this but... Have you tried becoming an Indie developer? Or learning how to use Unity3D and any of its associated scripts (seriously its not that hard!).

A short story of my own:

I began in Python with my schooling, surprisingly my intro course was heavily graphics and gaming based (I'm a mechanical engineer anyway; computer graphics is my hobby). We used a nifty package to do the graphics, so creating 2D games was pretty simple. From there, I worked on software rendering for a while in Java and then C++, before reaching it's limits after about one year of software rendering of 3D geometry, and switched over to openGL. I enjoyed this decision I made; I learned a lot of the mathematics and theory behind most basic techniques in computer graphics, and I tend to do CPU techniques when I learn something new before porting it over to the GPU. ALso, the books I have built up have definitely led to a beautiful, compact library that I can constantly reference when working. Currently I'm working on a voxel terrain engine in C++ and openGL! :)

Not considering my first python course (which did not teach much of anything to do with computer graphics), I am completely self-taught. I feel like I get more out of it that way; I'm not forced to learn it; I learn what I want when I want!! I do hope to get to learn how to read others' code...and maybe a little bit of team experience when it comes to coding...but I don't regret any decision to keep this to a hobby.

--ST

Cool stories. I will try to be brief.

I am a self-taught programmer. In 2006, I got my first programming job, as a game programmer. I mostly worked on tools and gameplay programming. Toward the end of that job (the company unfortunately folded in 2009), I dipped my toe into some basic graphics programming (wrote a fairly nifty water shader for an XBox 360 game we were working on).

In 2009, I landed a job at a company that makes training simulators. My job title is Graphics Programmer, but in practice I do a lot of programming that is only peripherally related to graphics. I've spent a lot of time, for example, writing UI code for our level editor (dragging and dropping items into the scene, picking, rotating and moving objects, etc.). Obviously, there is some 3D math involved with picking and manipulating models, but it is not what most people would call "graphics programming" per se. I was merely chosen for those tasks because no one else in the company really had the skill set for it.

As far as actual graphics programming is concerned, we use OpenSceneGraph, and so there is constantly this layer between our code and OpenGL. However, I have found it extremely important to know OpenGL in order to get effective use out of OpenSceneGraph. My colleague and I have been able to somewhat modernize the visuals for our product, adding in things like normal mapping and deferred shading. However, my colleague and I are at about the same level, in terms of experience with graphics programming, and so neither has the benefit that Hodgman had of learning from someone vastly more experienced than ourselves -- a benefit of which I am tremendously envious!

Then again, I have learned so much from Hodgman's own blog, and for that I am very thankful. =D

I never did obtain a degree, but I started going to school for Physics in 2010 and I'm a little more than halfway through now.

Edit: I meant MJP's blog. I learn a lot from both of them on the message board, though.

This is an EPIC thread! Really cool hearing everyone's background.

Anyway, got my start in programming back around '94 when my family got our first PC. I had decided I wanted to go through *every* file in Windows 3.11 and double-click on it to see what it did. Stumbled upon something called "QBasic". Looked somewhat familiar from the Commodore64 days, and a quickly started finding code for it on the internet. Within a few short weeks, I was coding my own text adventure games.

Next up a bought some books on C++ game programming and started messing around with the old Mode 13h and 2D graphics. Even bought some 3D books (like the Andre LaMothe series) but honestly this was WAY over my head as a teenager. While still in high school I ended up taking a "graphics programming" class at a local University. This is when I learned Java, and did mostly some simple 2D games. Later I wrote a software renderer in Java but didn't do much with it aside from the obligatory spinning cube.

Ended up starting study in Computer Science, but I only made it through one year and decided it was too cold for me and I wanted to be more creative. So I came back and went to art school, taking a major in Interactive Computer Art. We did some basic programming, but I wouldn't say I learned programming at school. I did learn a lot about art, 3d modelling, photoshop, etc. and that has definitely helped me. But most of what I've learned was on my own. Things like hacking on the NintendoDS and cobbling together homebrew games. So much fun.

While I was still in college I managed to get a game dev job programming on Flash games. I got the job mainly based on all the little demo games I had put together over the past years (mostly from school projects). Quickly landed some big contracts from brands you would have heard of. Built a portfolio fairly quickly and really beefed up my skills working on production code. Later, I became a freelancer and worked from home but still cranking out cool 2D games. Did this probably for 5-6 years straight. Unfortunately, the amount of work for Flash programmers has falling off a lot in the past years, and it's not really something worth pursuing anyone.

However, my real passion has always been in 3D. All the 2D stuff I just got thrown into and kept doing cause I was good at it and I had an "in". But on my spare time I would always mess around with various 3D engines and software. Began learning C++ again, this took some time. Was getting tired with these "all-in-one" game engines, so I kept exploring things like OGRE. For a while I was just afraid of DX/GL but I knew it would hold me back if I didn't learn them. Eventually decided that I was going to have to get better at the low-level stuff if I was going to master my trade. So here I am. Learning as much as I can about 3D math, Win32, game engines, etc, Hopefully the journey will be worth it.

Currently I am in the early stages of development on a Direct3D11-based render engine.