Career Archives - The Creative Coder

Career, Programming

Getting a UI Developer Job

Nadya Primak

After sharing my post describing what a UI Developer is, I got some requests to write another post specifically about how to get a UI Developer job. It’s certainly not an obvious path. My first job out of college was working for my alma mater in the Art Department media lab, during which time all […]

Career, Tech Industry

Work Culture Toxicity in Tech

Nadya Primak

I have a confession to make: I was on Twitter over the winter holidays when I should have been spending time with my family. What was the trending topic that caught my eye, you might ask? Last minute Christmas gift ideas? Pictures of pets in Santa hats? No, but I wish I could say it […]

Career, Programming, Tech Industry

What is a UI Developer?

Nadya Primak

The world of technology is a complicated one. With titles like “rock star”, “ninja,” it can be hard to take job descriptions seriously. It doesn’t help that many hiring managers ask for ludicrous credentials. Is a UI Developer a real thing? Maybe they have job descriptions like this: Job descriptions for UI Developers can look […]

Career, Entreperneurship, Learning, Programming, Tech Industry

Foot in the Door Book Excerpt

Nadya Primak

Below is an excerpt from my book about my journey learning to code and teaching myself after graduating from college with an art degree and little idea of what I was qualified to do next. I had taking some coding classes but I didn’t think I’d get any opportunities to be creative if I chose […]

Career, Game Development

Why you Should Submit your Game to a Local Event

Nadya Primak

Last weekend I checked another item off my bucket list: sharing a game at a local development event. The event was District Arcade in Silver Spring, Maryland, and the game was one I talked about in a previous post: Grand Canyon Adventure. It has convinced me that if you are a game developer, you should […]

Career, Game Development, Tech Industry

Being a programmer vs a game developer. How much money is passion worth?

Nadya Primak

A week or so ago there was a thread on Twitter that caught my eye. It was a tweet asking people what they would pick: a job making 50K per year that they love or a job making 100K that they hate? Working for money versus passion is often the central question many people face […]

Career, Tech Industry

New Job Imposter Syndrome

Nadya Primak

I am writing this after just surviving my first week of a new job that gave me the worst imposter syndrome I’ve had since I first started working as a software engineer. To be clear, it had nothing to do with the job itself or how anyone treated me. In fact, I was pretty surprised […]

Career, Game Development, Tech Industry

What Happens to Women in the Game Industry

Nadya Primak

In light of the reports of sexual assault from game developers Nathalie Lawhead, Zoë Quinn, and Adelaide Gardner at the hands of male industry legends this week, I felt like I needed to make this post. I’m not going to be the first or the last person writing about this topic. But their stories and […]

Career, Tech Industry

Dealing with Work Transitions in Tech

Nadya Primak

My life has been full of work transitions lately, which has caused me to spend quite some time thinking about them. About a month ago the company I was working at was acquired. A few weeks prior to that I had a recruiter reach out to me about an exciting opportunity and I decided to […]

Career, Digital Art, Entreperneurship

Why I Don’t Make Art For a Living: How Capitalism Kills Creativity

Nadya Primak

I’ve been writing a lot about game development and coding so far on the blog, especially from a creative coder perspective. However today I am going to empathize the “creative” more than the “coder”. I initially created this blog with the help of a book called Renaissance Business by Emilie Wapnick. I discovered her after […]