Final Scene wip3

Some more progress on the scene, trying to detail everything out, thinking its looking a little boring at the moment need to add some crew aboard, some fires and water crashing up the side of the boat, just not really sure where i want all this going on but it definitely needs to be added to liven the scene up.

Final scene wip 2

Some progress with the final painting adding some colours, pretty liking the direction so far.

Guest Talk- Shaun Mooney and final painting progress

Guest Talk-Shaun Mooney

For today's lesson at Futureworks we had a guest lecture from a guy called Shaun Mooney who is a professional concept artist working within the games industry who's worked for TT and Atomhawk in the past. He was brought in to talk to us about himself, what he’s done since he finished university on his games design course at Preston and what he’s done to make a professional career; he also went through his work process which I will talk about after. Firstly he talked about himself then he began to show his work, he sectioned his work up into 3 categories design, illustrations and mood's he talked about each of these areas in depth such as design is purely the process of designing something weather that might be a character, weapon or a environment, something that’s done fairly quick to a presentable state which shows different design variations and ideas. Illustrations are something where the design has already been finalised and its just to make a nice image to show textures and the form of the concept so this can be passed on to a 3d artist to make your concept ready for the game engine. Finally is mood, where quick ideas and concepts are made to get a 'mood' across for an environment or area of a game, this could be colour or black and white as long as they get the mood across that you intended.

Next Shaun went through a tutorial and shown his process of creating concepts to final rendered designs with his usual workflow which he applies to most areas of concept art. For this tutorial he shown us how he designs weapons, the first step is throwing out several black thumbnail silhouettes which are done quickly with a hard brush adding and erasing parts until he is happy with the design, below are a few weapon thumbnails i drawn up myself which I may further develop in my free time.

The next step was to then choose a design that is preferred to work up to final concept, below is an image of his basic process after the thumbnail selection, what is great with this way of working is that it is so fast you could knock out a few of these in a day which the art lead could take a look at and even approve the concept to final or 3d. Mooney also shown us tons of shortcuts and tricks in Photoshop which we could use to improve our work flow and speed which was a big bonus and definitely helped to get the idea across that speed is key in games industry, which is what he drilled into us in the lecture, speed is everything to get ideas across quickly and efficiently, he even recommended the use of photographs in concepts, kind of like a matte painting using these images to aid you in your designs, to paint over them and get the idea across quickly which was the best and most valuable lesson of the day. It was a great lecture and i learnt a ton! Shaun Mooney is a great artist, what he’s doing know is where i aspire to be, to get a career in the games industry, hopefully one day the time and effort i put into my work will pay of.

Here a link to Shaun’s portfolio for more of his work:

http://smooneyconceptart.blogspot.co.uk/

(Image by Shaun Mooney)

Painting Progress

And here is a little progress on the final painting, I’ve fleshed a few things out a bit more on my break at uni so not had much time but thought id post it anyway, I’ve also chopped the dragons head out of my previous illustration and re-jigged it and opened it mouth to get an idea of how it’s going to look, the rest of the scene needs to be done then and add some colour.

Final painted scene (wip1)

Finally Ive chosen to work on this thumbnail idea, Ive started to develop and add some detail in the foreground already. Although this isn't to difficult i think it will still have a good outcome and is more achievable than what i was aiming for before with crazy perspective and wide field of view, instead Ive gone with a much taller canvas. This is what i have so far i want to detail whats there at the moment such as the boat and the dragon and then start adding in more detail like small fires other characters in the mid-ground running for cover, some of the crew manning the cannons and aiming them at the dragon so i think there will be enough detail and story information to tell whats going on and whats going to happen, there's a lot of work that needs to be done though so i just need to crack on.

More thumbs..

 This image is a render taken from 3ds max using the biped features to create a character and a base for the dragon and using the 3d model of the boat i had already made. Renders were then taken using a camera to get the position and the field of view, at first i was really happy with the outcome but coming back to it i don't like how things are too over stretched because of the intense field of view camera, i prefer a much more simple approach looking back at my older thumbnails so i began to do a few more sketches as i wasn't completely satisfied.

Here is another quick idea of the dragon clambering onto the side of the boat, i like the pose of the character because most of him will be visible which is what i want but i wouldn't like the overall view of the scene if i developed it. 

Here is one more thumbnail i created from a 3d render, so far this is one of my favourite because you can really see the size scale of the dragon clambering over the boat, i could draw the fleeing crew running for cover on the deck below witch would add to the action and show a sense of scale.

More quick thumbnail ideas

Forgot to post a few more quick thumbnail idea (might be a little hard to see) basically im just trying to figure out how im going to be able to get both the dragon and the character seen well, while making the dragon looking much more powerfull and large. At the moment i still dont think i can get this across properly so i will need to try different ideas to see if i can find something better to start with.

Maskelyne and dragon final scene idea 1

Its time for me to move and start the final scene where Maskelyne battles the dragon on his boat.
Here's my first initial idea of the dragon landing on the control area at the back of the boat, crashing through parts of the boat, and in the foreground Maskelyne with his blunderbuss ready to fire at the dragon. I want to do a few more thumbnail ideas as I'm not entirely sure on this idea, i might do a more wide screen landscape or portrait view to show of the scene more, showing the crew running in fear, and possibly the dragon much bigger to really show how powerful it looks compared to Maskelyne.

'The Mistress' Final.. i think!

I think this is the final concept now for the boat design, i went in and done some more close up shots of the bathysphere that gets lowered deep into the see by the crane winch, i wanted it to look quite rusty and weathered because of the briny sea water corroding the metal. There is also a drawing of the rotatable cannons which can be found on the boats deck, these can be rotated 360 degrees and move up and down to aim at targets. Ive also drawn a side and top orthographic view so its clear to see the layout and more areas of the boat such as the propellers and the rear steam chimney without perspective.

'The Mistress' wip 4

Pretty much final concept for the boat now, I've decided to get rid of the back perspective it doesn't seem that informative. What i plan to do instead is do a few orthographic drawings of the boat to accompany the concept, ill also do a close up of the bathysphere and possibly the rotatable cannons on deck. For some reason the 3ds max file isn't opening on my laptop, it might be because i saved it in class with a newer version so ill have to wait untill Monday till i can take some more renders and work over those to finish the piece off.

'The Mistress' wip 3

Some more progress on the boat concept, finally getting there now on the front perspective.

'The Mistress' wip 2

Here's a bit more progress on the boat concept, still need to add more detail and add some colour and textures onto the rear control area and the bathysphere.

'The Mistress' wip 1

Not had much time to work on this, hopefully ill get it finished by the end of the week. Here's my first pass anyway just testing out some colour schemes and textures. Quite happy with the overall rusty look on the hull of the ship, although i see Maskelyne as quite a posh looking character, how he is described on this boat is that he looks and wears exactly the same as his crew with battered clothing so i don't imagine this boat as a royal looking ship but something that serves its purpose and has done in the past well. So hopefully ill be updating the progress with this soon, i want to also do some different views, like orthographic drawings and close up detail shots.

'The Mistress' 3D model

Here's the basic 3d model i made in class time today. I took inspiration and referenced images from the mood board and took ideas from the thumbnails. I'm pretty happy with the overall design of the boat it just needs a lot of texture work and painting to add in more detail. I also want the the boat to look quite roughed up, i imagine its not so looked after but purely just for gathering treasure deep out into the sea. Although i do want it to look like it was quite a nice ship once it was made but it has been battered from the multiple adventures its been through. Next i will start adding colour, adding textures and detail.

'The Mistress' Thumbnail set 1

Here are a few initial thumbnail concepts, I’m not sure if I like a much chunkier and compact boat like concept 1 and 6 or if I like the longer design like in 2 and 3. One part of the designs I particularly like is having the control room at the rear of the ship instead of the centre or at the front, this leaves more room for cranes, the bathysphere and other equipment. I’m finding it a little difficult to say I like one design at the moment as I’m having trouble trying to visualise the whole ship in 3d space and how it will function and what goes where, also the scale of things. Next ill either do some more thumbnails or jump straight into 3d and block out some quick parts, such as different ships bases, the crane etc and make a few different ships using the mood board and these thumbnails as inspiration, this way I can quickly bash different parts together or remove and change components to come up with the design I like the most in 3d space making it easy to visualise the final design.

'The Mistress' Referances

I’m now moving onto designing the boat that is in the scene called 'The Mistress'. In the book I get the idea that the book isn’t a pristine fancy boat but more something that serves purely to collect trove (Treasure) from the bottom of the ocean. It does this by lowering a large metal cylinder called a Bathysphere using a crane to the ocean floor where deep sea divers can go and find trove. The boat is also heavily equipped with cannons which I can image rotate 360 degrees on the boats deck for full manoeuvrability to face the dragon when it comes into the story. Here are the references I have gathered to try and inspire my designs and come up with some thumbnails ready to create a basic 3d model to paint over. I mostly looked at war steamboats and large oil boats; I also looked at cranes and other various images that would help me in my process.

Maskelyne final design

Here's how far Ive got with the back view, think i need to shrink it down a little looks a bit big. Going to move on now though once i have some time ill come back to it if needed.