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Team C: Art style

  • In my first and previous post in this game dev log entry, I had written that I wanted to do a game which was a collection of simple retro games. Unity released a new major release (2019.3) while I was putting the initial project together, and I…

  • Well, I'm making a game . I'm spending the next few weeks on making a small game to showcase the gamedev log feature on tsumea where any member can create a game entry and other members can post journal posts with art, music or just development…

  • Just a test #2. Still working on the new section.

  • So, I got a Commodore 64 when I was in the 4th grade. It came bundled with a Rolf Harris picture building program on casette tape which never loaded properly but from what I could tell by its box cover, you could build pictures from a selection…

  • Yes, the site looks very different and I've had to prematurely switch to this new theme that I'm working on for a few reasons, the main one is that changing certain aspects of the site to fit the new theme will affect how the old one looks for…

  • (this is just a test, please ignore this entry)

    Here is some of my old work.. the first pic is of a 3d model of a human head I was working on about 2 years ago in 3dsmax, using nurbs. If I had to do it again, I wouldn't model a head with…

Submitted by souri on
Forum

Initially, I was going to recommend continuing the glowing vector style of Defcon one, but we've got a team of artists who could do so much more than that.

I want to approach JohnN to see if he would be interested in the concept art (ships and everything mechanical) for this. Creatively wise, he's more than capable of it (his style is very retro, sleek, and streamlined, however I'd prefer things a bit more chunkier and modern for this).

http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/140608/starfighter-carrier-plus-fig…
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/060208/sci-fi-jumpjet
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/251106/ive-been-working-hard
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/270305/aircraft-concept
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/100904/spaceracer-concept-art
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/060104/quad-mech-concept-sketch

I was going to oversee the art direction to keep it coherent, and there are many and many space games to draw inspiration from. I'd recommend Eve Online as a big inspiration since it really is the most beautiful looking space game out there in terms of ship designs, the UI, and the vistas that you fly around in. I'd personally tone down the nebulas a bit though.

... personally, I think Sins of the Solar Empire has much better looking space scenes. Darker and just more appealing (although they do have a variety of space scenes with bright reds etc). Do a search for more screenshots as it looks great.

Other inspirations are Homeworld 1 and 2 (some awesome, awesome designs in there - do a search for the concept art for some of the ship designs, great stuff)

(This is linked off Doolwind's blog ;))

Submitted by ussmc on Mon, 01/06/09 - 8:34 PM Permalink

Awesome work JohnN! I like #8 and #9 as artillery ships. In regards to your other designs – I would say #1, #2, and #4 are the ships that don’t relate to the others.
Awesome drawings!

Submitted by Johnn on Wed, 17/06/09 - 2:01 AM Permalink

I decided to start some ideas on the opposing fleet. More angular and industrial in design. My intent is #1 a large scale artillery ship, #2 mid-sized troop or engineering ship and #3 as a fighter. I'll try to finish off a few more options for this fleet as my next task.

Submitted by mulletdulla on Wed, 17/06/09 - 9:25 PM Permalink

Absolutely love the work you're doing man, especially #1 and #3. They both have an awesome aesthetic and capture their purpose well. #2's silhouette I feel is too similar to #1 and may cause recognition issues.

Submitted by souri on Thu, 18/06/09 - 4:50 PM Permalink

Hey John, your concepts are looking awesome.

However, we really need to get some momentum going, and we could do with some finished concepts done. Do you reckon you could finalise two concepts so we can pass them onto our modellers?

Submitted by Johnn on Mon, 22/06/09 - 12:38 AM Permalink

Next installment!
In an effort to finalise some designs I've revisited the first fleet of ships and refined the thumbnails to a set of four ships that i am really happy with. I've included a second angle and some basic silhouettes with how I imagine they all might relate in size too.

Now might be a good time to put dibs in on who models what for this fleet?

What level of finish and/or types of working drawings do the 3d modellers want? I'm guessing some people might be happiest interpreting from the loose sketches and some others might want front/side/top and cross-section plans?

(right click and 'view image' to see pic larger. I have these sketches at an even larger size too if people want a larger copy for reference.)

Submitted by ussmc on Mon, 22/06/09 - 7:21 PM Permalink

Don't know what the other modellers think, but I'm happy to start working on them. I'll start modelling + texturing the small fighter, and will work on the others if required. Also don't know how many poly faces are required for each ship, but I can always reduce it. Sadly my monitor is down (meaning I can't work on them now), if it's still not working by next week - I'll buy another one. I'm on another computer typing this comment.

Submitted by souri on Mon, 22/06/09 - 7:58 PM Permalink

Hey guys, I'm out of action for the time being also. My HD in my laptop has decided to give up over the weekend, and I'm in the process of sorting out a replacement. I've emailed Roger to see where he is, and hopefully he could chime in if he is around, but I guess something around 1500-2000 polygons would be suitable, what does everyone think?

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 22/06/09 - 9:48 PM Permalink

ahhhh super sweet dude!

Really excited to see the progress here!

I'm really happy with the look/feel and silhouttes of each model they suite each purpose brilliantly.

However, the scale of the first ship i think is far too large in comparison to the others. This will make for harder identification and scaling so I think we sh

~ mulletdulla

Submitted by ussmc on Sun, 05/07/09 - 8:31 PM Permalink

The game engine that we’re using - Can it handle quadrangulate faces or just triangulate? Can it also handle ‘Combined Meshes’ but separated meaning it’s one mesh, but the vertices are not merged? Hope it makes sense. Apologies if this is stupid questions, I know nothing about game engines.

Thanks in advance.

Submitted by suggo on Tue, 07/07/09 - 11:14 AM Permalink

Using triangles is a must to avoid any graphical errors that could make sections of your model look incorrect in game. The beauty of the triangle is that it will always be flat no matter how awkwardly you try and place three points you will always have a flat surface. Using four points you will find that it is possible to create a surface with kinks or curves in it, this can sometimes result in surfaces curving in ways that you don't want them to and rendering results can vary. To be on the safe side and avoid these problems meshes should be 100% triangles.

It is possible that all surfaces are triangulated during the export process from whatever 3D package you are using.

For all the engine related info and exporters for all major 3D modeling packages check out:
http://www.garagegames.com/documentation/artist

Just out of curiosity, what 3D packages are people using?

Submitted by ussmc on Sun, 26/07/09 - 4:30 PM Permalink

I'm about to finish unwrapping UVs. How many texture files can each ship have? And what size?
Thanks in advance.

Submitted by souri on Fri, 31/07/09 - 1:56 PM Permalink

I don't think we'll be needing too much textures for these ships. I was thinking one 1024 x 1024 (or maBye larger) diffuse. Do we really need it bigger or any other maps?

Submitted by ussmc on Sat, 01/08/09 - 3:48 PM Permalink

One 1024 x 1024 it is. I haven't done a lot texturing, but I think we’ll be needing a bump map.

Posted by souri on
Forum

Initially, I was going to recommend continuing the glowing vector style of Defcon one, but we've got a team of artists who could do so much more than that.

I want to approach JohnN to see if he would be interested in the concept art (ships and everything mechanical) for this. Creatively wise, he's more than capable of it (his style is very retro, sleek, and streamlined, however I'd prefer things a bit more chunkier and modern for this).

http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/140608/starfighter-carrier-plus-fig…
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/060208/sci-fi-jumpjet
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/251106/ive-been-working-hard
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/270305/aircraft-concept
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/100904/spaceracer-concept-art
http://www.tsumea.com/journal/johnn/060104/quad-mech-concept-sketch

I was going to oversee the art direction to keep it coherent, and there are many and many space games to draw inspiration from. I'd recommend Eve Online as a big inspiration since it really is the most beautiful looking space game out there in terms of ship designs, the UI, and the vistas that you fly around in. I'd personally tone down the nebulas a bit though.

... personally, I think Sins of the Solar Empire has much better looking space scenes. Darker and just more appealing (although they do have a variety of space scenes with bright reds etc). Do a search for more screenshots as it looks great.

Other inspirations are Homeworld 1 and 2 (some awesome, awesome designs in there - do a search for the concept art for some of the ship designs, great stuff)

(This is linked off Doolwind's blog ;))


Submitted by ussmc on Mon, 01/06/09 - 8:34 PM Permalink

Awesome work JohnN! I like #8 and #9 as artillery ships. In regards to your other designs – I would say #1, #2, and #4 are the ships that don’t relate to the others.
Awesome drawings!

Submitted by Johnn on Wed, 17/06/09 - 2:01 AM Permalink

I decided to start some ideas on the opposing fleet. More angular and industrial in design. My intent is #1 a large scale artillery ship, #2 mid-sized troop or engineering ship and #3 as a fighter. I'll try to finish off a few more options for this fleet as my next task.

Submitted by mulletdulla on Wed, 17/06/09 - 9:25 PM Permalink

Absolutely love the work you're doing man, especially #1 and #3. They both have an awesome aesthetic and capture their purpose well. #2's silhouette I feel is too similar to #1 and may cause recognition issues.

Submitted by souri on Thu, 18/06/09 - 4:50 PM Permalink

Hey John, your concepts are looking awesome.

However, we really need to get some momentum going, and we could do with some finished concepts done. Do you reckon you could finalise two concepts so we can pass them onto our modellers?

Submitted by Johnn on Mon, 22/06/09 - 12:38 AM Permalink

Next installment!
In an effort to finalise some designs I've revisited the first fleet of ships and refined the thumbnails to a set of four ships that i am really happy with. I've included a second angle and some basic silhouettes with how I imagine they all might relate in size too.

Now might be a good time to put dibs in on who models what for this fleet?

What level of finish and/or types of working drawings do the 3d modellers want? I'm guessing some people might be happiest interpreting from the loose sketches and some others might want front/side/top and cross-section plans?

(right click and 'view image' to see pic larger. I have these sketches at an even larger size too if people want a larger copy for reference.)

Submitted by ussmc on Mon, 22/06/09 - 7:21 PM Permalink

Don't know what the other modellers think, but I'm happy to start working on them. I'll start modelling + texturing the small fighter, and will work on the others if required. Also don't know how many poly faces are required for each ship, but I can always reduce it. Sadly my monitor is down (meaning I can't work on them now), if it's still not working by next week - I'll buy another one. I'm on another computer typing this comment.

Submitted by souri on Mon, 22/06/09 - 7:58 PM Permalink

Hey guys, I'm out of action for the time being also. My HD in my laptop has decided to give up over the weekend, and I'm in the process of sorting out a replacement. I've emailed Roger to see where he is, and hopefully he could chime in if he is around, but I guess something around 1500-2000 polygons would be suitable, what does everyone think?

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 22/06/09 - 9:48 PM Permalink

ahhhh super sweet dude!

Really excited to see the progress here!

I'm really happy with the look/feel and silhouttes of each model they suite each purpose brilliantly.

However, the scale of the first ship i think is far too large in comparison to the others. This will make for harder identification and scaling so I think we sh

~ mulletdulla

Submitted by ussmc on Sun, 05/07/09 - 8:31 PM Permalink

The game engine that we’re using - Can it handle quadrangulate faces or just triangulate? Can it also handle ‘Combined Meshes’ but separated meaning it’s one mesh, but the vertices are not merged? Hope it makes sense. Apologies if this is stupid questions, I know nothing about game engines.

Thanks in advance.

Submitted by suggo on Tue, 07/07/09 - 11:14 AM Permalink

Using triangles is a must to avoid any graphical errors that could make sections of your model look incorrect in game. The beauty of the triangle is that it will always be flat no matter how awkwardly you try and place three points you will always have a flat surface. Using four points you will find that it is possible to create a surface with kinks or curves in it, this can sometimes result in surfaces curving in ways that you don't want them to and rendering results can vary. To be on the safe side and avoid these problems meshes should be 100% triangles.

It is possible that all surfaces are triangulated during the export process from whatever 3D package you are using.

For all the engine related info and exporters for all major 3D modeling packages check out:
http://www.garagegames.com/documentation/artist

Just out of curiosity, what 3D packages are people using?

Submitted by ussmc on Sun, 26/07/09 - 4:30 PM Permalink

I'm about to finish unwrapping UVs. How many texture files can each ship have? And what size?
Thanks in advance.

Submitted by souri on Fri, 31/07/09 - 1:56 PM Permalink

I don't think we'll be needing too much textures for these ships. I was thinking one 1024 x 1024 (or maBye larger) diffuse. Do we really need it bigger or any other maps?

Submitted by ussmc on Sat, 01/08/09 - 3:48 PM Permalink

One 1024 x 1024 it is. I haven't done a lot texturing, but I think we’ll be needing a bump map.