The inspiration of professional game artists (updated)

GarageGothic · Wed 13/07/2005 10:38:33

I was flipping through the awesome Disney book "The Illusion of Life", and came across this piece of production artwork from Pinocchio. And maybe it's just me, but I immediately thought "Monkey Island". Could it be that the LucasArt background artist looked to Disney for inspiration?

Have you come across other examples of game art being inspired by existing art? I was thinking perhaps we could start a thread where people posted things like this. I also found an architectural drawing in a book about art deco design of a room that was straight out of The Dagger of Amon Ra (the office with the guy impaled on the hedgehog). I'll scan it as soon as I get the book from the library.

Ali · Wed 13/07/2005 12:19:33

I remember that picture from 'The Illusion of Life', but I didn't spot the similarity. Bravo!

The production art for Pinnocchio is marvelous though, a good place to look to for inspiration. If I remember correctly that book shows a scene in several stages of completion - pencil & paint. That's something that might be of great interest to backdrop artists.

Mr Jake · Wed 13/07/2005 12:25:04

I still don't spot the similarity...

Care to highlight the points you are referring to?

GarageGothic · Wed 13/07/2005 12:54:45

I wasn't suggesting it was an exact copy or even that the artist looked at this specific drawing. But look at the style of the houses - the way the second floor juts out. Notice the windows on the righthand side of both pictures. Also the perspective and composition - though not identical - is similar. The tower as the centerpiece. A sign hanging on the building to the left.

Haddas · Wed 13/07/2005 13:01:46

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v86/Haddas/forstarters.jpg

These things I found similar, for starters. I think I got what GarageGothic pointed out too. Very similar.

Alun · Wed 13/07/2005 13:11:45

Actually, I'm with Hotspot on this one; I don't see any similarity worth noting. The style of the houses and the arrangements of the mullions on the windows are more simply attributable to the fact that that's how buildings actually looked at certain times and places; it seems to me to be a far more straightforward and likely explanation that the Disney and LucasArts artists were both getting inspiration from the same real-world architectural style than that one was copying the other. The perspective and composition aren't really similar, other than the fact that they're both looking down a street--the angles are very different (one is angled pretty much straight down the street; the other notably to one side so the fronts of the buildings only on the right side are visible), and the Disney picture has foreground elements and overall a much more asymmetrical and irregular look than the LucasArts picture. As for the "tower as the centerpiece", that's true only of the LucasArts picture. There isn't a tower as the centerpiece of the Disney picture; there are a number of tall buildings in the background, but none that particularly stands out, and in fact the one in the center is one of the shorter buildings.

Yes, they do both have signs hanging on buildings to the left, but I think we can probably agree that that detail isn't enough to make a strong case for similarity. You could probably find any random picture looking down a street of a village with that architectural style (which is fairly common, or was a few centuries ago, at any rate), and it would look about as similar.

Kweepa · Wed 13/07/2005 14:58:29

Alun,
The clock tower is the centrepiece GG is talking about. Note the similarity of the slope of its roof to the tower above the arch in the Disney image.
If this was Critics Lounge, I'd have a thing or two to say about that 2D clock tower in the MI image!

Kinoko · Wed 13/07/2005 15:38:27

I think there are some similarities but nothing near thinking one artist saw the other picture. As Alun pointed out, most of it is simply because that's a particular style of architecture and the rest is really just coincidence and also common sense as far as aesthetics are concerned.

Helm · Wed 13/07/2005 16:18:55

I'd with with, if there is a reference, it's a subconscious one. And yeah as it was said, looking back at these graphics, they could stand a lot of refining.

monkey0506 · Wed 13/07/2005 16:29:26

NEVER say that again you impertinent fool! The graphics of SOMI are a thing of beauty! Refining is for those who do not understand the meaning of...well...the...INSOLENCE! This shall not be tolerated! Helm, I sentence you to execution at dawn immediately*.

There are some similarities, but I don't think that SOMI was inspired by that picture. Just IMO...not like I would know lol.

*The sun shall be reset to it's dawn position immediately so that you can be executed right now!

Helm · Wed 13/07/2005 18:17:09

settle down, monkey boy.

Mr Flibble · Wed 13/07/2005 18:45:54

That painting looks a lot more like the Shades from the Discworld intro.
I don't have a screenshot so I may be mistaken.

monkey0506 · Wed 13/07/2005 19:33:08

Quote from: Helm on Wed 13/07/2005 18:17:09settle down, monkey boy.

EEK! How do you know my name??? GUARDS! Seize him immediately!

Pod · Wed 13/07/2005 20:45:40

Come on then, give some crit and paintovers of that image

Andail · Wed 13/07/2005 21:55:59

I don't see enough similarities to find it striking. The fact that they have certain elements in common - like the sign for instance - is hardly uncanny.
I'd say it's much more similar to Kings Quest 6 in that case. The soft oil-like colours and architecture of the buildings is very reminiscent to that of the village in the beginning of the game.

And while the SOM graphics were good for its time - and still stand strong in terms of originality and atmosphere - it's not impeccable in today's standards.

switcharoo · Thu 14/07/2005 13:15:38

I think it could well have been influenced by the Disney picture as there are some similarities, but they could be coincidences. The only person who really knows is the artist I suppose.
Things that look completely different at first glance can be linked by subtle similarities. For example, there was a house that won an award (very specific I know, but I don't remember which house or award at the moment). The architect explained how his inspiration was drawn from two paintings.
Looking at the paintings and photos of the house most people would never see the conection, but it is there.

Maybe I'm taking this a little too far into the art side of things though.

Floskfinger · Thu 21/07/2005 00:13:11

I definitly see the similarities.

btw. Monkey island is based (inspired) on Disney's "pirates of the carribean".

GarageGothic · Thu 28/07/2005 15:06:55

Ok, let's see if there's as many skeptics this time around. I bring you Pierre Chareau's 'BibliothÃ¨que' in the 'Ambassade Francaise' at the Paris 1925 Exhibition, and the museum office from The Dagger of Amon Ra:

*cough*paintover*cough*

HillBilly · Thu 28/07/2005 15:35:20

I don't think the first one has much in common, but this one convinces me. I'm not sure if it's a direct paintover, but it's probably used as a reference.

Mr Jake · Thu 28/07/2005 15:54:15

I second one is much more like it, It doesn't really look like a paintover to me tho, it could be.