Minecraft me and stufffor a 4j studios interview...

Hello,

Yesterday I was lucky to be contacted by 4J studios to ask me if I would like to come up for an interview..

my answer was a rather resounding, yes!

So, I decided to prepare myself quickly for 3D pixel art by going over what I had done in 4th year...

3D pixel art

But, since I havent played around in maya I decided it would be fun doing a quick texture for steve and making him me...

(modelling/rigging wasn't by me)

me

texture

Also, a little tiny card game update for you...

this is the new item picture for the consumable, "tidal wave" still not 100% but think its a great deal better than the old one.

Honours project & Presentation : timeline progress for presentation & a sketch

Hello, we have a looooooong post for today, but i have alot of pictures for you to look at so lets have a blast..

So Presentation day (again) so I have been getting my slides or atleast what i want to say together.

So basicaly since my project idea has changed I want to explain why,

Sor right off the bat, the general consensus of my showcase didnt come across well enough, like what i talked about in an earlier post me and ryan discussed a more final and coherent way to showcase my showcase and to do this we discussed an idea envolving a timeline of the styles and there introduction not showing dates or anything like that.

The more I thought about it the more i liked the idea and that in a way I was doing it subconsiously, My critical framework broke down images of pixel art and placed them into 3 different "styles" of pixel art.

I also mentioned in my previous presentations that i feel the most valuable part to pixel art is that it ages better than its 3D "realistic" counterparts, the reason for this to me is that pixel art borrows or works in the same way of its traditional art abstract relatives.

For example:

Proteus (2013) a pixel art/3D game about exploring a new world. People who play the game become immersed in the world for hours on end despite what can be considered as its abstract blocky looks.

Skyrim (2012) a realistic fantasy game about exploration (of sorts) this game has heavy praise of it graphic fidelity and realism (well despite the dragons and all the other mystical creatures) people become immersed in the realistic world for hours.

The problem with realism to me and many peers is that since its so focused on realistic graphics that it becomes the foundation behind the reason why you get immersed in the experiance, but 5-10 years from now the realistic graphics will move on to bigger better and more HD places leaving skyrim looking a bit worse for wear as its mascara begins to run.

Let me show this happening in visuals, Battlefield. I chose this franchise as its one of my favourites and one which i have played and loved from the baginning in 2002.

Battlefield 1942 (2002)

2 year old me: "Wow, Look at those graphics thats some realistic brown going on there"

Disclaimer: i may not have said it but something along those lines definately crossed my mind.

Battlefield 2 (2005)

15 year old me: " Holy S*** its like being outside and holding a gun in real life"

Disclaimer: sorry for the language, teenage hormones and all that.

Battlefield 2 was also the first game that i ever experianced that my PC  at the time wasnt able to run at full specs yet i was still blown away by it.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (2010)

I remember seeing this being shown and was amazed the new frostbite engine dice created for this was intense, on its highest settings it still looks pretty good...

... Until you play this...

Battlefield 3 (2012)

The most recent battlefield game, and considered one of the most realistic modern warfare games ever created and has the ability to bring a gaming rig to its knees.

look back 7 years ago and what looked pretty then looks horrible now...

and that change has an effect on an aesthetic level atleast.. its missing its realism that it touted before and more importantly what you remember it looking, in away its the negative impact of nostalgia than that of what pixel art has, and i think thats due to the abstract art side at play.

So where was I...

Ah yes, timeline...

So in my timeline of pixel art styles (working title) Im going to show you that pixel art holds on by showing you all the styles as they are introduced.

as this was a brand new idea i thought i should conceptualise it with existing images of games that used the style,

As you may be aware thats the image i posted up in the post before,

But using my critical framework (which is now in need of an update) i listed the different styles of pixel art as i named them ( i couldnt find anything that has done it before yet )

• Vintage - the really old stuff black and white made up of simple blocks occasionaly a third coulour is used usually green.

• Classic - The colour palette and the resolution has increased however detail is at minimum colour is flat no shading etc

• Retro - This is one of the styles we think of when we think of games, the 8 bit era of games more pixels have been added along with a much larger colour palette giving you more detail yet still not enough for things like a full face on characters where certain features may have to be increased to hide the lack of others mario is a good example of this
• Old School - Often mistaken as retro/8-bit but old school represents the 16-bit era which is a noticeable increase in pixel density and colour gives it a sharper and more detailed look as characters begin to take more shape as the detail is increased enough

~ Introduction of the polygon ~

• Classic/Modern - a contradictory name for a style i hear you mutter, well the reason i called it this is that it uses all the same restrictions as classic the resolution restriction and colour limit remains intact yet the choices of what colour the limits are are completely upto the artist in question.

Example of a Classic/Modern style:

Passage(2007)

• Stylised - Probably the most common of pixel art styles mostly pioneered by Paul Robertson, the artist is free to use what size of resolution is used but usually no bigger than 128x128 is used, but can be expanded after. The pixel art is probably quite similar in appearance with the likes of cartoon drawings. this also gives an artist to throw in his/her own uniqueness to his/her art.

Example of stylised: 

Kings of Power 4 Billion % Paul Robertson

3D Pixel Art

Voxol - 3D cubes

3D Dot Game Heroes

Simplistic - Simple 3D geometry with pixel art textures

Minecraft

Hybrid - 2D sprites simple 3D geometry or 3D post manipulated

 

             Bit.Trip Runner                                                                                      Fez

These are the primary styles in my eyes but there can be overlap.

So lastly...

Thinking of a way to represent my timeline in a cool way, i thought a part of it can be told using a short animation /story (maybe even the full thing but we shall see...

I had the idea of something mining out a cube to represent the "polygon"... that led to me drawing up a concept image of a dwarf, I have a fascination with dwarves im unsure of why probably stems from my childhood.

Its been a while since i have drawen something so high rez haha...

but i think hes cool.

What do you all think, about EEEEEVERYTHING, like the sound of it or got any questions leave a comment and al get back to you :)

David M

Critical Framework: Fez Part.6

Critical Evaluation - Fez (2012)

3D environment, 2D characters

Resolution - Environment : N/A, Characters : 16x16

Colour:

Bright, colourful, contrasting colours

Outline: N/A

Anti - Ailising : Used

Shading: Cell Shaded

style : 3D Stylised

Platform : Game

Concept Development: Fez notes, 3D Dot Game Heroes Editor

Hello,

Well today I got my new 360 ( which i got because i a. really wanted one and b. i can justify it because it has alot of pixel art based games in the indie market and also always wanted to have a shot with fez)

So I decided to play fez and take notes on its looks and trying to see how the environment is made. first off, my initial response was the somewhat limited response of "wow!" I think its the cleanliness and crisp colours the characters are rather simple in their design but suit the pixel style.

10 minutes in the game gives you a fez this fez has the power to unlock the third dimensions, You would never have thought this game was 3D until this point, it looks like a well polished 2D game beforehand.

Now on the technicality side of things, you may have remembered the fez block i did a couple of posts back and how I wasn't sure in how the geometry was done, if it was modelled or just using a bump/normal map to give the illusion. In close inspection it would appear that most if not all the geometry is modeled.

Thats how far I got before having to go make dinner but I will keep updating this posts when I make more notes.

After, coming back from dinner I had a look into 3D dot game heroes as Alastair reminded me that it had a Voxol editor to create characters in game.

here it is on show:

This was a rather poor attempt at trying to do a voxol version as my profile pic.

what have I learned?

Well most importantly that doing voxol art is a whole new kettle of fish than pixel art and if I want to do any more on that then i would need to look into tutorials. Unfortunately I do not think I have the time with us now on our 7th week. 

Other than that Its been rather quiet been trying to do more personal proposal stuff but I feel like im stuck in a rutt with that. Need to find my motivation that has seemed to have dwindled off recently hoping that either lynn, robin or Ryan will get back to my email about a meeting this week so I can hopefully settle my nerves about my position.

Thats me for now,

David M