You're preferred way of drawing backgrounds and characters?

[goldensox]

I draw all my maps and backgrounds like those technical architecture drawings, kinda like this:


Then I plan the whole game using those rooms and whatever they have inside, so I take the plans and turn them into oldschool perspective drafts. Kinda like, wallcam perspective, something on the molds of


I make the models in Sketchup, and use them as they appear or do some editing, mainly I render them and apply photoshop effects. I'm currently working on a hybrid of Clay Render and Digital Colouring.

Alternatively, I ask for some people around the worl to take pictures of places I wish to use, then I edit them, add rendered things, details, atmosphere and everthing. 'Tis kinda hard, but works like a prim.

I'm not very fond of outdoor sceneries, so I make them the most... Indorish possible. The feeling of a person struggling through a closed space to free itself motivates the player, also, a large number of rooms, passages, cabinets, drawers, secret passages and corridors make the player want to explore more and more.

About characters,  my games are mainly an lonelosome experience, with the story being told to the player through the eyes of the main character. I use dialogue scenes an such using photos of my friends and stuff like that.
I've got no human drawings ability (even though I can still concept and design), But making sprites an such is far away from what I can do.

To the deepest part of the character, my character are generally made like this:

First I think about the scenery: A ghost hospital in the middle of Europe (at least, some europe-looking place). The character arrives misteriously, after a 's'posed train crash.
Middle europe, Train, A not-hero character... Humm sounds plainly empty.
Then, we add the backstory:
The guy's grandpa was killed in the hospital 20 years ago. So the character must be at least 20.
Europe is cold, so he must wear europpean-fashioned winter clothing.
Europe is mainly white, people tend to let they'r hair long and wear glasses.
So we got a 20's white male dressed in winter clothing and glasses. He also wears a touque and it's kind overweight, to break completely the HERO look.

About his personality: He's an europpean young adult, the hospital was huge and expensive, so we can bet his family was rich enough to put his grandpa on it for years. But, ho! Hi's gramp's death was acause of money, so they aren't so rich anymore.
Thus, he got a lazy, dispretentious personality. He's kinda sour because of growing up in a decadent family with various judicial problems. He also is not fond of cold, then he is always sleepy.

We got a sour, dispretentious young male adult who likes sleeping, hate expensive stuff and it's introspective.

That's more or less how I create my scenery and charaters. Hope you guys enjoyed =D

[Technocrat]

I have the annoying problem of, as I get through a game, my art noticeably improves. Because I do a lot of what I do on the go, I've been making use of my tablet PC a lot (a Fujitsu Siemens laptop with a screen that swivels around, and a pen), and kind of come up with a formula.

I start with the absolute basic features of a room (where the walls are, and the vanishing point), work out where the doors and windows will be, and then go to the basic colouring. Fill in the walls/floor, detail the walls/floor (make them bumpy, make them textured), then go on to furniture. It looks crap to start with, but eventually the more detail that goes in, the better it gets, until you have a decent room.

Since I'm actually trying to get this game finished, I set myself to do one room an evening, and it takes me on average about 3 hours to do a decent, normal sized room. Not sure about characters, since I've only gotten one done, but they've always taken longer for me.

[Invalid]

i draw with my laptop touch pad strait from microsoft paint, usually takes me 30 min to finish one of my crappy backgrounds 8)

[Layabout]

Jebus Christ. A touchpad? You must really hate yourself. Go buy a mouse. I hear they are pretty cheap.

[krishaw]

I'm not particularly good with it but I like to use MS Paint for backgrounds and inventory sprites. Easy to use and good quality. Haven't made any characters with it yet but I'm starting to try. As for time: You can't time yourself for a background. If you have an idea and what a rought background only seen once or twice then you might take 30 minutes. If you're a perfectionit who likes thigs done right then it could take an hour to a day. It depends on what you have going on in your personal life and how intricate the design of your room is.

But don't limit yourself with time. Most would prefer it takes you a year for your backgrounds to be done right  thank play a game with bad backgrounds that are impossible to make out.

[TerranRich]

3D:

http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/7971/zelinalokitolanuv4001.jpg
http://img30.imageshack.us/img30/1120/zelinalokitolanuv4002.jpg

[heribertovalle]

Backgrounds, hmm. We usually Create the original sketch or concept, then move onto 3d max for the actual modeling and try to match it as closely as possible with he models and the original shape. Textures are done in photoshop.

[Layabout]

Personally I think the concept looks far nicer than the 3d background. Mainly just the wood effect looks over done compared with the rest of the image. But jeez, that is looking really really lovely.

[Ryan Timothy B]

I'd have to agree that I like the concept much more than the 3d background. It has a warmer old school feel to it and much more welcoming in my eyes as an adventure game background. But the 3d final is also very very nice.

I really like your style, wouldn't mind playing a game made by you.

[heribertovalle]

I really like your style, wouldn't mind playing a game made by you.

Oooh you will soon, i can promise you that. I would direct you to the trailer and whatnot, but it's on this same forum, just another thread.


Actually I like the original better too. It's done by an amazing artist: Christoph Siemens. He's produced some mad  backgrounds for the game. The problem is that to make the 3d characters blend well in that background we would either have to:

1- Use outline shaders or
2- Spend some more time (and moolah) achieving a more refined, outline free coloring of the lineart.

The problem is that the first approach makes our game more taxing on the pc, therefore, reducing the quantity of people that can play it, and the second one just costs more money to develop.

The 3d background has something else going for it. the fact that there is an actual plane as floor, serves well as base for the collision box/walkplane needed when doing this kind of thing.

[Greg Squire]

Nice screenshots heribertovalle.  I also like the 2D one better, but I'm a classic adventure gamer.  I'm just curious what engine you are using.  With it being 3D it certainly isn't AGS.  Is it your own custom engine perhaps?

[heribertovalle]

Nothing that fancy. Our engine is called Wintermute Engine. VERY good and solid, specially for 2.5D games.

[Snake]

 

I also like the concept much better. I just don't like 3D rendered backgrounds anyway.

[Greg Squire]

Wintermute's a good engine too.  Good Luck with the game heribertovalle!  It's looking awesome so far.