This was my first sprint for CAGD 495, our Advanced Game Development class, and what a fun week it has been.
I have learned a lot and worked very hard, mistakes were made but overall I have a positive outlook on our game.
First I got to working as a concept artist. As one of the three artists on my team it was important to understand that I wouldn't be very useful right out the gates, so it's good that our producer understood to put us on things like previsualization.
While 3D artists technically shouldn't do their own concepts, we are only a team of ten and need to wear different hats, I happen to be one of the luckier artists where I've been designated specifically for characters.
I quickly had to do lots of research before starting any work. This game is heavily inspired by anime, which is an art style that I admire more than I practice. I quickly absorbed lots of content and tips for both 2D and 3D anime characters.
These are the two concepts I was tasked with making at the beginning of the sprint. I knocked them out quickly, and in the future I think I should tackle 1 point cards like this much sooner. I put these ones off as I was a little overwhelmed with the task of learning this art style. I threw away lots of concepts. Eventually I had to bite the bullet and just accept what I produced to move cards down the line. In a school setting its more important that I manage my expectations and simply do the best I can for my team, without sacrificing time. I learned from this and have moved on from this.
While these aren't my proudest 2D works, I can say I am pleased to see what I managed for my first anime style drawings. I likely will have to make adjustments as I already find important problems with each character, for example, the inconsistency of the style of their eyes when compared to the main protagonist, Zayden. I think its important we keep a consistent look for something as noticeable as eyes.
However, I don't see this as a setback, as it won't take long to fix, and my team is happy that I completed cards, which is what matters.
Next I moved on to my next task for the week, which was a character.
I am used to completing more points per sprint, and I have to say I still want to take up the method of attributing points to me as it takes so much work to complete a character, and I'm not sure that 3 points is enough to encapsulate everything that goes into it. That being said, its simply important that our main character is completed sprint one, so this was my job.
I started consuming ZBrush tutorials quickly, and while its safe to say I know the most about making characters on my team, this by no means makes me a professional. I still had lots to learn. Luckily, things went smoothly, and I believe my greatest strengths aren't just the speed I learn, but my tactful ability to learn the right techniques at the right times, as well as conduct sufficient research in short periods of time. This is why I think I have never had trouble being onboarded to a team.
I started with the bust of our character Zayden, as this likely would be the most difficult part and it was important I put in the most attention to his face. Next I moved onto the body, which included its own set of tutorials, but I managed to get there in a few days.
This is the final high poly of Zayne, which came out great. On top of sufficient notes from Brie, who created this character, I managed to finish the product in time with the rest of the art team in agreeance that he looked good.
Finally I had to retopologize this character since he will be in a game. This along with unwrapping really only takes me a day, especially for a character as simple as Zayden.
If I managed to complete my first cards earlier I may have had time to texture Zayden this sprint as well. Its unfortunate I wasn't able to complete every card for this sprint, but in the future I really hope to discuss with our producer about how points are managed for characters. While I think its possible that I could have completed a character, textures, and two concepts in two weeks, the characters I will be making in the future are far larger and more complex than Zayden, and I hope our producer doesn't overlook how this will scale with my points.
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