Blog revival and 3D Week 1

After a break in the summer i'm back into the blogging game. I've started a new course in 3D and I will for ten weeks post 3D related stuff. This week I will be analyzing three different screenshots from different games and I will also be posting some of my work I've worked on throughout the week. I will start with the screenshots. I will talk about what makes them good and/or bad from an artist's perspective, let's get started!

Screenshot 1 - Batman

I haven't really played this game which can be good because I'm a bit impartial.This screenshot oozes of action and suspense. You can feel the strength of the composition from the slanted camera angle, this makes for a very exciting screenshot. I like that the camera is positioned in such a way that it feels like it's me lying next to Batman. The center of attention in this screenshot is obviously the dude with the gun. His armor gives him an artficial look which is cold and intimidating, he looks like a killing an assassin. He has so much power in this picture and I will explain why now. All the details in the screenshot is focused on mostly him and a little bit on batman. His silhouette is reinforced by the lighting, the color and the blurry background, he really stands out.

Conclusion: A very simple and straightforward screenshot, they want us to look at the dude with the gun and I think they've succeeded with that pretty well.

Screenshot 2 - Bioshock Infinite

Now this is a game I've played, Bioshock Infinite. If you haven't played this game already I highly recommend it. Enough praise, let's chop this up and analyze it. The first impression I get from this is the color and the architecture. I feel that this picture is trying to show me that this is just like an ordinary town, but way better. There's no litter on the streets, everything looks like it's in top shape, it's too perfect, in an eerie way. The focus in this picture is the statue in the middle, everything around it, the buildings, the people is all gathered around it; almost as if the statue was there way before the city was there. Utopia is the right word for this screenshot, the architecture and the constructions feels very warm and cozy unlike today's skyscrapers. The people and the vegetation makes it feel more organic than it is. The skyrail and the propellers merges in with the rest of the picture well, it makes the picture more interesting than it already is. I feel like i'm watching from a cat's point of view which feels a bit meh to me. I would have preferred a human's perspective but I guess it's to make you feel small.

Conclusion: A beautiful, colorful, playful and interesting screenshot to look at. There's not really any cinematic feel to the picture because nothing is really into focus, everything points to the statue but my eyes often wander off towards all the other interesting stuff unlike the earlier batman screenshot.

Screenshot 3 - Dishonored

Dishonored is also a very good game, definitely recommend this one too. This picture feels like a mix between the earlier two pictures. This one feels slightly cinematic, perhaps due to the first person perspective like we had in the batman one. This picture really sucks you in, i'm drawn to the building in the middle because it takes up so much of the space in the picture. The boat and the building indicates my direction and where I should go. The focus of the big building is reinforced not only by the detail but also by the color and light Of all the houses in this picture the big one is the only one where we can see inside, we can also see that the lights are on indicating it's a place we can go. Because the houses are in a row of eachother it helps me understand the scale of it all. We can also notice some color on our friend on the boat, it indicates that he is someone of importance to us, he is guiding us to where we need to go. This screenshot gives a vibe of industrial london, a very rough place to live. There is almost nothing organic in the entire picture expect from our friend on the boat and the reeds in the water.

Conclusion: This picture is tough and merciless, we are making our way through this industrial maze of houses. Amongst this abundance of small houses we see this one destination reinforced by the entire composition. I like this one because it tells both me and my eyes where to go, it doesn't feel forced.

Now that I'm done with the screenshots I will show you a little off my work during this week. I'll start this off with what I learned from a monday lecture. I was introduced to way of prototyping a game level quickly in the modelling software 3DS MAX. The idea is to use simple 3D shapes like boxes, spheres, cylinders and cones to quickly get an idea of what you want to do. This saves a lot of time in the pre-production phase of developing games. I created a quick level with the game Uncharted as an inspiration and the word danger as a theme. This took about two hours to create, with plenty of practice it will go a lot faster.

I also wanted to show off this fairly low poly knife I made in 3DS MAX and Photoshop. It took about a day to create and I like my results given the time I spent on it. I experimented with a texturing software called DDO by Quixel, if you haven't tried it you should check it out. Thanks for reading!