Production Art

Production Art

Once the design  is more fixed production art is required so that the design can be given to modellers, texturers and animators to be produced and put into the game(or created to be animated rendered and integrated into a film sequence say.)

Production art could include orthographic views (front side top, 3/4 front and 3/4 back) often called "turns" .  these are the plans for the character or creature. Sometimes skilled sculptors only need one or two views to create a model of a design, but generally all of the visible form needs to be described- particularly if you won't be around for the sculptor to ask what you had in mind for bits you didn't have a drawing of.

When you are drawing the different views the aim is to try as much as possible to make the views match up or line up. Which can be tricky with curved things or radial symmetry or lots of legs like a spider- drawing a spider from the top is ok drawing from the side or front to match the top can be tricky.) When doing things with pencil and paper its handy to do the roughs on graph paper sometimes. These days of course people would do a rough model in 3d- even one made up of cubes cylinders and spheres and extruded shape- and cheat(Hooray). If an object is symmetrical you can save time by doing half and flipping the drawing and drawing the reverse side using the flipped outline. Its also good to have in mind which of the views is your "hero" view . So what I mean is a key, more accurate and reliable view to refer to if for some reason you've made mistakes in other views- so for something like a dragon that would be a side on view because its an easy view or draw and shows how everything is laid out- whereas the front view might have a lot of foreshortening(like the head),and  is tricky. Sometimes people will 'remove' an arm or legs on a turn and put them next to where they are attached if there is important detail on the body that needs to be seen in a drawing.

With things like the folds in clothing (I guess you call it drapery) its important to try and get the major forms/folds  lining up and to draw them so they look like cloth (and for extra points the type of clothits meant to be).  However  you should keep in mind that for a lot of the cloth detail the sculptor  will probably create their own based off your plans- so bear it in mind before you work out that drapery and project every minute curve and fold across 3 views and go mad or blind or both. 

The degree of detail in the drawings  is greater when the work is to be sent outside the company for others to do, because the work is to be done without direct supervision, and in general  the idea is for the people to do the work not spend time asking what needs to be done.

Types of Design Art

Story or development art.

Exploratory- exploration of idea at the start of a project to define the look or think of what might be possible. Can be rougher of more varied in the search for solutions while trying to nail down what or who the characters are

Can be used to inspire

Mood pieces that match environment or character with a the story, or show atmosphere or drama to sell the project..

Thumbnails

 Thumbnails are small quick sketches which convey the idea of the character of creature. Thumbnails are great because normally they have a lot of life- and overall gesture to their action- because of the scale you normally do them. Sometimes theres a really beauty of line or expression you get thats very hard to get in a fully realised drawing.  The down side is they suggest so much but nothing is too worked out or 'nailed down'(I think the saying is - they promise the world but deliver nothing)- sometimes it's hard to draw through the smog of suggestion you created to capture the true lines you were after. I f you are wanting to refine your thumbnails using pencil and paper you could use a lightbox, or better yet a photocopier to blow up the thumbnails bigger and then trace through and clean them up. On computer though you'd just add a new layer in photoshop and draw over the top(and maybe reduce the opacity of your thumbnail layer so you can see better. I often do my roughs or thumbnails on computer in a cloudy hazy brush and then sharpen it and darken the lines and add shadows(or I just use a sharp line like a pencil and then add shadows etc.

Silhouettes,

Roughs in line or greyscale, or in  colour if you are tricky..

The great thing about doing roughs or putting ideas down in pencil or pen on paper  is that it forces you to think more about what you are drawing or what you want- more at least than a computer. There are a lot of techniques you see on computer where they use a semi random -kind of ink blot style of creativity. People will create an odd and interesting shape with funny or random or custom brush strokes and then go in and try to make sense of the design or try to refine it. the good thing about this is you can get some great interesting shapes and wacky spun out looking designs quickly-except they probably make no sense in a design sense- or its a struggle to make them resolve into a 3d shape. Why do they need to be a realisable 3d shape - because for a game or film- someone needs to make the design into a 3d shape. I f the drawing is to stay a drawing then it doesn't matter and probably the mood or impression is the key thing you are after.

When you are drawing sometimes changing your medium canchange the way you approach drawing and give you different shapes and designs- for free.

When you cleaning up roughs the sort of things you might do is introduce proper perspective and correct anything that doesn't follow the perspective of the view. You might lay a basic grid over or under the drawing- or even just some "eyeballed" converging perspective lines and use that to  make all of the drawing 'agree'. Particularly tricky things like ellipses and concentric ellipse shapes are cleaned up either with templates, or with an ellipse tool in photoshop, or by aligning a quick 3d model in photoshop or a 3d package and tracing over that. Ellipses are the shapes circles and circular cross section forms take on when seen in perspective(sort of like a squashed circle). Ellipses are located in perspective drawings by placing them in a square the same size, and oriented by lining up their minor axis with a perspective line to the horizon(major axis is a little offset from the centre of the perspective square the ellipse sits in).

When you are cleaning up or fixing drawings (or even when  you do them in the first place) its useful to flip the paper (or your computer image)and look at the  reverse image.  Adding in a centre line(like a moulded 'part' line) to the character or creature you are drawing can help with the placement of symmetrical features and can help when you are drawing curved shapes. (Particularly for eyes and determining the visibility of  'far' shoulders)

In the long term its a good thing to keep a sketchbook of roughs or at least ideas book. Even doing a few thumbnails or roughs on paper can be good preparation before hitting the computer- again because it focusses you on what you want to achieve. Even animator who work on computer will do a bunch of small rough images of the poses and attitudes, and shapes  they want to hit before starting on the computer proper.

Refining a design.

Variations might be developed for details such as colouration texture, or variations of accessories.

Sometimes when the basis of the character or creature is defined a common or duplicated base drawing is used and the different options or variations painted on top to save drawing the character again- this is where computers are handy. This make things quicker  but has the danger of producing variations for the sake of variations.

A base drawing of a generic character or a standardised human or game character  is used  when creating clothing or amour variations for customisable characters. Sometimes in these cases a bases predrawn stock human figure is the starting point,- sometimes in a game its the rendered stock human model that you  then "decorate".

Different States.

If a character has different states in a game or through a story  these will need to be visualised like damaged or powered up states. The more extreme example is the case of a boss type creature which might change or present in a number of way in a fights.

Research

Research-

Research things related to the ideas. Learning about environments a creature might live in help you think what a creature in a related environment might need. Understanding the principles or why an object is shaped the way it is or an animal adapted the way it has

Different types of locomotion, communication,- types of animal defenses or weaponry. Even mechanical things could have an organic equivalent.

The greater the pool of ideas or things to draw from the more you can think of interesting connections or using an idea in a new,interesting situation. This is key. If you spend your time practising to draw without giving yourself fuel to draw from if imagination is your objective, or if you only look at what others have done for inspiration, you are using something that has already been diluted and filtered.

The best source of reference and ideas is the world around you. In the case of animals or creatures  actually seeing the real thing is massively helpful- at once you can see the creature- you can see how the shape changes as the creature moves and turns- you see the behaviour, and you get a feel for what its about- the feeling. Often there are a lot of things about the form of an animal that are easy to spot in the real thing are difficult to figure from disparate photos or anatomical drawings. Sometimes it helps to look at anatomical drawings first so you know what things you are unsure about and to look for when you see the real thing.

Second to the real world I think are good books  with big clear detailed pictures specialised on the topic. Often you can get really great reference books on different environments for not much money- which is awful for the book creators but great for us.

Third on the list is searching the web.you can find good reference on the web but remember that everyone else might be using it too. There are some pay sites which sell sets of photos,- but what I do is whenever I'm in a city with a zoo I go to the zoo and take lots of photos.

When you are working on a game or film you also need to find out what the rules of the fantasy universe are that you are working in.  Sometimes these will be detailed in an art "bible" that someone has produced , or you can learn from  the story  how things work.  Knowing this stuff will help you create things that fit in to the world or universe,- or look like they belong.  In the case of games this sort of  consistency helps stop the player getting confused and keeps them  playing- because you want them to be drawn into the world not snapped out of it by thinking about how the art doesn't sit together or make sense. Basically if you make up rules about how the world works (even if they are magical fantastical rules- then you should try to be consistent.

Creatures

 Researching animals- the specific- try animals from similar environment to see what sort of adaptations are made(different animals often make similar adaptations/bodyforms- or solutions to the same problem).-

Researching details to help sell the ideas -Eyes feet- hands- skin types /- how it folds or sags- textures and types of patterning. Faces hands and feet generally say a lot about a creature and how it lives.

Finding out what has been tried before or what has been done before by others can be useful, particularly in terms of knowing what not to do in order to create a unique take on things. Unfortunately if you take only this approach- and  decide to do what the others aren't  it dooms you create something identical to what all the other people employing the same approach will do- strangely.

Unfortunately also the sort of creatures or character you might design are described in terms of reference to a combination of pre existing designs. However we are focussed on fun and trying to go where no man has gone before.

Clothing and Accessory thoughts

Clothing/costume.   

Form follows function.  Character have a specific function or a job,

What is the environment- hot/cold, wet, high pressure, low oxygen, irradiated, amount of light /visibilty- affects clothing. How do they get in and out of clothing themselves- are they assisted., do they use gloves- ergonomic considerations of the clothing,

Do they need to blend in to the environment or stand out. If they need to stand out- if they are on different environments/backgrounds- do they get colour costume change or do you need to pick colours that sit well on different environments.

Flowing robes and capes  and dresses can present problems when they are realised in a game environment- mainly in the interaction or collisio with the body of the character and in obtaining a believable deformation or cloth effect. Often it's a visual compromise that must be reached.

ornamentation/decorations,

Accessories or tools or weapon. Signature accessories.

When a character has tools or weapons they carry its important to place them in areas for ease of access and so they don't interfere with the characters movements, or potentially create difficulties for characters next to them, or create difficulties when the character falls under procedural control(like physics). There's a whole field of ergonomics you could study- but basically if you imagine its you carrying whatever it is and then think of the easiest place to grab something from- like your chest- upper arms- outside your thighs- your waist. In games its easiest if things are attached to one rigid part only and not spanning across two parts.  The bulk of things at the tops of thighs near where they join the hips are a particular area to allow free movement for.  The arrangement and articulation of armour particularly at the shoulders needs careful attention to ensure it allows the movement the character needs- or that the animation setup will allow for any specialised movement.

When a character is carrying something heavy it is natural for them to adjust their posture to maintain balance. Having a character demonstrate the weight of objects like this is great for making world believable. Often though characters have giant swords that they wave about which seemingly weigh nothing which is fine in a cartoony game but not so good for a realistic type game. Large swords and guns look cool but can be a problem to animate and can limit the range of movement of characters- in particular hold it so it does not poke through the ground or themselves or their neighbour, or get in the way of an Oscar winning performance  when they are falling dead.

In a realistic game the answer for large weapons or objects is to wield them with two hands- however this can reduce the reach of the player or his weapon if he is to keep both hands on the sword or object.

The advantage  if large swords or guns and the like is they look good and imply the character is heroically strong to wield them, and allow the character to strike opponent at a greater distance- which can speed up combat and make it easier to target many enemies or large enemies.

A consideration for characters with guns or weapons potentially is how they might restrict the pivoting movement or rotations the character uses to target baddies(or goodies)- particularly if the animation control for the pivot is programmatic. Of course there could be specific key poses or blends the programming might use to avoid these issues but its safest to minimise them i the first place.

Dude looks like a Lady

Distinctions of Sex

Width height of waist trunk- breadth of chest- to hips, 

Male  heavyness build male/a more rugged skeleton- female more slender rounded.

Female head smaller, forehead smoother/rounder, much less brow ridges, collarbones shorter more downward, females longer trunk(mostly stylised with long legs ). 

Female elvis shorter wider and deeper- can have more tilt, 

Hip joints a bit further apart. 

Female buttocks reach lower level. Female humerus shorter than male.Carrying angle greater. 

Thighs more angled to knees. Elbows more hyperextension.

The Little People

If the character is more stylised or cartoony it is important to consider what actions the character needs to perform- if they had cute tiny arms and a big head or round body it presents problems when the character reach or tries to scratch its head or hold something with both hands. Fortunately cartoony characters can have bodies that deform or flex in a similarly cartoony style. On the positive side again- the way the character meets the challenge of its short arms etc can be part of its character or charm.

Short stubby legs- particularly combined with long feet can be a problem when the character attempts to walk(consider how hard it is when you have flippers on your feet. Hopping however is fine.

The Eyes have it.

The size of the eyes is a good visual cue to the size/scale or age of a creature or character. The few creatures with relatively large eyes  are generally adapted to see in low light conditions- in humans the eyes a the same size and dont really grow as such- so in a child's face they appear large and in the adult- everything has grown around them and they appear smaller. Generally childlike or human baby proportions are like a pre programmed formula for cuteness or youth.