Travel drawing

So as I sat through the 3 hr plane ride and had no luck with drawing out of my head, I decided to draw from a reference of my friend. I must admit, I've never actually drawn a realistic portrait with a smile before, and it was fairly difficult, but I think it turned out ok :)

Spiked Collum breakdown

Here is a small breakdown of my favorite piece from my modular kit

The Library of Lost Souls Walkthrough

The video walkthrough of The Library of Lost Souls. :) Watch the HD version 

Digital Painting Practice. WIPS

I am fairly unexperienced with digital painting, even though I've come to enjoy it. The very first digital painting I've ever done was for my the box art of my board game "Marmora". I'm trying to experiment with brushes, and trying to not use fancy customized ones like many artists rely on. I like to keep it simple.

With these WIPS, I'm using only a soft round brush. I'm still trying to figure out how to properly define edges and give a soft look, but not make the image look blurred and smeared. I intend on finishing the dark rabbit :)

25 min process so far

30 minute process so far

Some quick sketches

As I transition myself into a game artist, I've been trying to draw more realistically to prepare myself for the industry. 

The other day, a friend told me that I should try to draw something cute for once. This is what turned up.

Progression of "The Library of Lost Souls"

Here's the history of the level and it's developing stages to get to the final finished look.

Beginning stage: Textures just laid in, not fully completed yet. Fog added. Dry atmosphere. No obvious lighting has been added yet. Still not really comfortable with Maya and UDK yet.

Middle stage: Some textures have been fixed. Spot lights set as place holders for lighting sources. Light color palette has been decided with contrasting colors of blues and yellows. 

There is a bit more life, but the library is still dead.

Final Stage: Reworking and setdressing! 

Books and props are placed, each placed in varying spots to make the level look less modular and blocky. Light maps have been added and textures have been fixed. Deeper colors have been added to go with the candles. A darker fog has been added to give a more eerie look. Chaos is flying everywhere. Papers, papers everywhere!

"Marmora" Physical version

A bit overdo, but here it is! The physical game of "Marmora"

I loved airbrushing and painting little details on this thing, and it looks almost as I hoped it would.

Library of Lost Souls

The Library of Souls is finally finished! After 3 months of being introduced to Maya and UDK and learning how to make things work, my version of the library level is done.

WIP and Speed paint

35 minutes speed paint. Trying to practice more with digital painting.

Work in Progress. Trying to get the anatomy down and then add a cool costume.

Marmora's game trailer,

The trailer for my game, "Marmora." I hand drew the animations in photoshop. 

Early thumbnail ideas for Marmora's commercial

"Marmora" print and play

Print and play version of "Marmora" is finally done :)

Download here:    rules/instructions          game pieces
                           
         

Art of "Marmora"

This is the box art for my board game, "Marmora." I still have some work to do on it before tomorrow when I send it to a company. It shall be a late night for me. 

Doodle Doodle

A new 30 minute portrait sketch. :) 

"Marmora" playtests

Play tested "Marmora" with multiple people. 

I had the boys play test against each other during the night. Both seemed to enjoy the strategy parts of the game, waiting until the right moment to play certain trap cards. During our Game Design club, I got some good advice from some of the upperclassmen. My game at that point, still needed to be shortened quite a bit, which made it more difficult to play. There were also some cards that were broken, either being too powerful or not powerful enough. Though they said the game was fun and had a good time "trolling" each other, there was a bunch of small details that I needed to fix. When I made the updated printed board and cards, I realized that there was still a few problems with the cards, even after I altered them a bit. The creature pieces were more balanced, and I gave more opportunities to use strategy to win the game I think after I fix these next few problems involving the cards and the board, then the game should be good to go :)

Theme and Concept Statement for "Marmora"

"Marmora"

Concept Statement: "Gather your savior, or your enemies will"
"Fight for your survival, or freeze"

Theme: The quest for power

This theme matches my board game because of the overall goal in my game. There are 2 kingdoms that are stuck in a never-ending winter. Magical marbles at the center of the board hold the power to provide necessary warmth for each kingdom. The kingdom that is able to claim all of the needed amount of marbles will live in warmth and comfort while the other kingdom suffers through the bitter winter curse. For a player to win the game, they must send their three fantasy creatures to fetch the marbles and return to their kingdom  However, each player has opportunities to control the opponents creatures, as well as benefit their own. Depending on an even or odd roll of the dice, depends if they draw a "Trap" or "Enchant" card. A trap card gives the player power to disable, set back, or damage one of the opponent's creatures. An enchant card helps the player's own creatures by restoring health points to their creatures, moving their creatures forward, or temporary immunity. Each player has the option to either play a card immediately or to hold it and play it later, giving multiple opportunities to "troll" and control their opponent. This is why the "quest for power" theme fits the game.

A great example of a book with "Power" as a theme is 1984. With the constant surveillance among the community, nobody dares do anything against "Big brother" in fear that they will meet a terrible fate. The community has an arranged schedule and little freedom to do anything that they want to do. When the main character has a love affair with someone he's not supposed to,  he is sent to meet his fate. The "party" controls him by pairing him with a particular torture that applies only to him. In my game, the trap cards apply to certain creatures, landing on certain spots, and being in a certain location. The players are able to wait until their opponent falls under one of those situations, and then attack.

 In this impacting movie, "power" is to kill. Nazis begin their control over the Jews from the beginning of the film, tearing them apart from family members and then stripping them till they are left with nothing. Lined up like animals for slaughter, they have no control over their fate. The Nazis will kill Jews in front of others, setting a constant fear into the remaining Jews and the Nazis have a significant power from this. With the ability to kill off any Jew at any time, the Nazis have a constant power."Marmora" has a similar power aspect, with each player only knowing their own trap cards, can kill off or attack an opponents creature without the opponent sensing anything coming.

The color scheme for my "Marmora" game is fairly simple. I wanted colors that were close to each other and represented winter or coldness. The red marble is the main contrast with these colors since it represents the only warmth in the game. 

Here is an example of what my game board will look like. 

Self Portraits: a half year's difference

A late night post :)

So I was looking through my old artwork and was comparing it to my new artwork from this recent summer and semester, and I'm happy to see a big improvement in just half a year. Amazing what a bit of continuous practice and art school can do to you  Woot. ^_^

 Self portrait from this semester. About 45 minutes

self portrait from last semester. About 2 hours (I don't even know why it took so long)

Experimental pen piece

My most recent sketch piece. Thought I would experiment with 3D portrayal and 2D elements (the hair) with the line work. I'm not a fan of how the mouth or teeth came out. Slowly, my portraits are becoming more anatomically correct though :)

A more in depth analysis of "Joust"

On a deeper analysis of "Joust," I found that the game doesn't prove much of a challenge for players.

•       The goal of the game is simple: to get score cards that equal to 6 before the other player. This can be accomplished through a combination of mainly luck, and some strategic thinking. 
•      The space in this game is constricting. The player is only allowed to move forward in action, and the players move in opposing directions.
•      The core mechanic of this game isn't too well developed. The game simply revolves around a chance of drawing cards, seeing who has the higher number and then that person gets a score card. Not very interesting at all.
•      As for operative actions, there really are few to none. When the players cross paths, they then see who gets a hit. This is the only interaction in the game. Nothing gives the players more options to move differently across the board other than what their card says.
•      Resultant actions- Since there is only one operative action, there is no variety of resultant actions. Since the player is restricted to only being able to be strategic with how they place their cards in their stacks, they don't have the opportunity to choose how to move or play in any other way. So when it comes to having the game being affected in accordance to how the player uses operational action to achieve a goal, this game is fairly flawed.
•       There really is no skill when it comes to "Joust." About halfway through the game, you realize that you can put your higher number cards in the bottom of your stack so that your chances of getting a higher number will be greater when the two players meet, but that's about it.
•       Chance is the main element of the game, leaving very little opportunity for the players to use any skill of mind to help them win against their opponent. 

Overall, this game could have been invented by a person with the brain of a 5 year old.,(This specific version at least) and is targeted to be played by that age group.

Print and Play game: Joust

My friend and I decided to play a print and play version of the game, Joust. The rules seemed to be simple enough:

- each player has their own set of cards with numbers up to 6

-Each player orders their own cards in whichever way that they please, without the other playing seeing

-Each player has a knight on opposite sides of the boards

-The players then draw their cards, and move their knight forward accordingly.

-On the move that the players cross paths, the player with the higher number has scored a "hit" and gets 2 points. If both players draw the same number, they each get one 1 point.

-The first person to get 6 points wins.

Though the game had simple rules and seemed fun before we played, we both were disappointed in the game once we got into it. It turned out to be fairly boring and much too quick to play.  

Rain

My newly finished watercolor piece. I love practicing watercolor when I have some spare time. It allows me to be more conceptual and abstract with my painting.

Assassin's Creed Trailer Project

My trailer project :) In this project, we were given close to an hour's worth of Assassin's Creed's clips and our job was to create a story out of pieces of those clips. We then would have to accompany music to the trailer to compliment the mood and story. Initially, I wanted the trailer to be serious, but I eventually decided to twist it into something somewhat comical. Quality is normally 720p, but it's not displaying that way. Sorry :/

Video Game Music

Along with having a love for games, I've always had a deep passion about music. Having been a pianist for the majority of my life, I hope to compose and create my own music for my final thesis at Ringling. Aside that, I always find myself drawn to the music in video games, movies, exc. I love to collect soundtracks and I tend to pay more attention to the music in games more than I do the gameplay at times. A soundtrack can impact a game so much, whether it be creating the mood or simply complimenting the gameplay. Here are some of my favorite songs from my favorite game soundtracks.

Heavy Rain as a whole has a beautiful soundtrack. Definitely take a look at the other songs in the score as well. I've played this piece on piano before and I absolutely love it.

Nier. Though I have never played this game, the soundtrack is beautiful.

Catherine. I have not played this game mainly because I am awful at puzzle games, but I love the music in the game. This piece is also fun to play as well.

Summer Art/Process sketches

These are just some quick sketches that were done over the summer to help me practice with the planes/anatomy of faces, along with some other art stuff.

A self portrait sketch

A cartoon interpretation of myself

A gestural sketch drawing of a tiger 

A sculpture of a critter that was made during the summer. Definitely not a favorite of mine. 

My character for Traditional Animation. 

Early sketches for Spike's development

                   Here are the video's for Spike's jump/dance, and his final walk cycle.