Artistic Development
Though I was our teams Project Lead, programmer and Manager. I worked on all aspects of our game. Before I found I had a passion for programming I liked to draw and produce art pieces, and I wanted to have a go in this project as well. With the inspiration I had going in working on a project I envisioned, I wanted to help produce some of the early concept art and really cultivate this project into what I wanted. Our artists had a hard time coming out their shells and I thought a strong start with concepting might inspire them to make more.
When I began working on my art pieces, we already had had time to discuss main mechanics and very early on we knew we wanted grenades, wand and had decided on a style. With that I set off to work producing some concept art for grenades and a more unique wand I wanted to see. To start with, as with any art project, I wanted to get inspired normally I would spend some time looking at Pinterest or color pallets but going in a had a strong image in mind, so I set to work using key prompts with Chat GTP image generation tool. Then with some great reference points I got to making my art.
These pieces were very quickly made, concepted and finished so I didn't really have a good opportunity to really delve into the prosses of concepting a full world and more of its parts. But I thought they would help the artist moving forward. I Still really love these pieces, and I think they still do a great job of showing my style in an informative format and leave lots to be reflected on for the rest of the team.
Further into the project, as testing deadlines loomed and prototypes were needed, I decided to take on 3D modelling in Blender. While my past modelling experience was limited, I was somewhat familiar with the basics. However, this time the stakes were higher as I needed fully completed assets this meant they had to be Textured and optimized.
Despite my best efforts, I managed to produce only two finished models for the project, complete with fully textured assets. While I was proud of these contributions, they highlighted the challenges of balancing learning on the fly and time constraints. My other contributions, such as the crowns, were completed using Unity materials. Unfortunately, these were not as polished as the other assets, which had been UV-mapped effectively and textured using Substance Painter.
Although my pieces were quite small, I feel my understating of the tools have greatly improved and developed a large way despite the time I spent. The chandelier alone needed me to work with array modifiers, Reference images, Bezier curves and tackling the beast that was Uv remapping and organizing. My learning has progressed a long way due to my group mates lending me knowledge and experience. I now feel confident moving forward that I can make more polished assets be this for use as placeholders or finished assets.