The above image is my attempt at doing perspective in Illustrator. I wanted to go for a simplistic look for the image so I decided to not include much detail on the buildings and instead used the pantone colour palette to show the sides and tops of the buildings. If I were to improve upon it I would add more buildings going into the background to create a true cityscape in this simplistic style. Doing perspective in Illustrator is somewhat easier than doing it in a sketchbook as there is a tool that makes using perspective very simple. It is known as the perspective grid and it can be configured for whatever type of perspective you want. When making this image, I used the two point perspective.
For my assignment, I may use this method of making a perspective image to create a background for my character instead of drawing it all myself as it is a much more efficient way of doing it. Though I will probably add some detail if I do include perspective.
The above images are my attempts at using perspective within an image. I drew them using a ruler and a pencil and then went over in pen afterwards. I felt like using perspective was relatively simple although I did make some minor errors here or there. I decided to attempt all three types of point perspective with simple buildings and then I added some details to the two point perspective image although I didn’t add much. For my one and three point perspective drawings, I feel I did them pretty well as mostly all the lines seem to match up with the vanishing points. However, with my two point perspective drawing I used more space which was an issue with some parts of the drawing as my ruler is not full sized so some of the lines don’t match up that well. I also messed up with the windows as I tried to freehand them rather then using the ruler so the sizes of them aren’t consistent. If I were to do another perspective drawing like this I would try to replicate an image rather then drawing from my own ideas as I think this would produce a better piece of artwork.
Overall, I feel using perspective will help me when I make 2D art in the future but because I intend to do a character design for my assignment it won’t be that useful for me in the immediate future. Although, I could make some kind of background for my character using perspective.
The above character was a design I made with basic shapes based off of a reference image. To create the design I used the various shape tools as well as the pathfinder tool to remove parts of the basic shapes. I didn’t do this for the whole character however as I got carried away with manipulating the anchor points of the shapes using the direct selection tool. The character was an interpretation of the main character from Watchdogs. To make sure I got most of the character’s appearance right I used a reference image which I imported into Illustrator and placed next to my canvas as seen below. I feel like this design turned out very well considering that I had limited ways of making the design. However, if I were to improve the design I would like to add more detail to parts of the clothing.
Reference Image 1
Game Character
This design was my second attempt at making a character while using or manipulating basic shapes. This character is intended to be used in my game for the Introduction to Game Engines so I had more freedom in terms of the appearance. However, I did still use a reference image (shown below) as I wanted to use a similar visual style to 3D stealth games like Splinter Cell but replicated in a 2D game. The character was made using the same methods as I used for the Watchdogs design. I think the design is great as a basis for the character although I do want to add more details to the character.
Reference Image 2
I will probably use this method of making a 2D character for my assignment but I won’t exclusively use this as I feel this used in conjunction with other methods will allow me to make a better quality piece of 2D art.
The above image was my first attempt at redoing the logo of the popular mobile game ‘Atomic Bomber’. I wanted to retain the colour scheme of the original logo while making the logo a little more complex. I based the shape of the bomb on a reference image and made it by manipulating shapes made from the various shape tools in Illustrator. The text was made by using various effects available. The word Atomic was done by using the bevel effect to make it stand out while the word Bomber had the Twist effect added to it. I then duplicated Bomber and added the Roughen effect to it to try and create a fire visual. The original bomb was also added to reference the original logo. As a first version, I think that it looks alright although the Bomber is a little out of place and the placement of the new bomb doesn’t match up with how the bombs work in the game. To improve it I would change the Bomber word somehow and I would change the rotation of the bomb.
Second Logo Redesign
This is the improved version of the Atomic Bomber logo redesign as I think it is a little more visually appealing. I duplicated the bomb and Atomic word and made them smaller so that they had a consistent appearance with the Atomic bomb although I did make the Bomber word red. I also rotated the bombs so that they look like they have been dropped out of a plane.
I enjoyed designing a logo in Illustrator but I feel like I would rather explore another aspect of 2D art for my assignment.
The above image is a mock up of a gameplay segment from my game that I am going to make for the Introduction to Game Engines module. I limited the time I had to make this because I needed it for my game design document and because the mock up doesn’t need to be detailed to convey what I need it to. I used basic shapes for most of the image and used the paint tool to make the character. The enemy is a duplicated version of the character with adjustments used so that is distinct from the character. I am happy with this image as I did the majority of what I intended but if I were to improve it I would add more gameplay elements and show the player doing some of the actions I described in my description accompanying the image in my game design document.
The above image is my first attempt at making the church on the cliff using image manipulation in Photoshop but it wasn’t my first time using Photoshop even though my prior experience wasn’t that in depth and was quite a while ago. I started with an image of a cliff side with a port in the daytime. I used the clone stamp tool to cover up the port with the ocean and I replaced the sky with an image of the night sky. Also, I ‘smudged’ the line (using the smudge tool) between the two images to make the images look better together and I added a moon into the sky. The main part of the image is the church placed on the cliff edge. I took the church from another image and cut it out using the selection tools available in Photoshop. To add some semblance of realism to the image, I added a reflection of the sky in the ocean by copying part of the sky and the moon and flipping it vertically as well as turning the opacity down to around 10%. I also turned the brightness down on the parts that I used from the photo in the day using adjustments. The image turned out pretty well in my opinion although I could have improved multiple parts of the image such as the reflection and the ocean line. Considering I hadn’t used Photoshop for a while I feel like I managed to turn out the image quite quickly but if I had taken more time I could have fixed the issues I mentioned.
Second Version of Image
After finishing the first version of the image, I failed to realise that the ocean line varied in height even though there was no reason for it to do this in the image. This was because when I replaced the port that was at that part of the image, I didn’t bring the ocean line down when it should have been. I once again used the clone stamp tool to rectify this issue. To try and make the moon look more natural in the sky I used the blur tool but it didn’t make that much of a difference so I aren’t happy with it. With the change to the ocean line, I think the image looked better as it made it look more natural.
Third Version of Image
To try and make the reflection more realistic, I got an image of the moon being reflected in the ocean (pictured below) and attempted to isolate the reflection the best I could. I then placed it underneath the moon. I feel like it is an improvement over the previous reflection but I think it looks out of place so if I were to do more improvements I would try to make that and the moon look like they fit more naturally in the image.
I enjoyed using Photoshop to manipulate images but I feel like I would rather make 2D art using other methods as I feel like I would be able to produce better quality images using other methods.
This week’s task was about texturing and baking an asset using Substance Painter. The asset that I chose to use was the crate that I made for the high poly and low poly task.
Before I could start with the task for this week, I had to make some minor changes to my previous work to make them ready for this task. I deleted some parts of the high poly model that could be duplicated later to save some time when texturing and baking and moved the handle on the low poly model to the other side so that it matched up with the handle labelled A on the high poly model.
When I baked my high poly model onto my low poly model, there were some issues with parts of the baked textures so I decided to use the provided models instead of my own. It was easier then spending more time changing parts of my own models and would allow me to focus on this week’s task.
I baked the provided models and started to experiment with texturing. To start I added a smart wood material to the crate as a base to work with. To make sure it only made the parts of the model wood that were supposed to be wood I used the polygon fill tool and a mask. I then added a new fill layer separate from the wood group for the metal. I used the same mask technique so that only the metal parts would be metal and put the metal slider to 1 in the properties of the fill layer. I also chose a suitable colour for the metal. To make the wood have a more realistic feel I then started to use grunge by adding a new fill layer with a black mask and adding another fill layer to that mask. In this new fill layer I added one of the grunge textures and experimented with the different settings. I also added a second grunge layer to add more variation to the look of the wood.
I now wanted to add some text to the crate. To do this I created a new fill layer and created a group called Engraving. I then once again added a black mask to the fill layer but this time I added a paint layer to that mask though which allowed me to use the brush tool to add text. I added the word Hull to the front of my crate and edited the height of it so that it would look like it was engraved. I did a similar thing to add the warning on the side except I changed the colour and made the height 0 so that it would look like it was stamped on.
To finish the texturing of the asset I added a smart material to the metal parts of the model and a smart mask to all of the model. The smart material made the metal look like realistic and the smart mask added some dirt to the bottom of the crate as a whole so that it looks like the crate has been used.
To start the task for this week, I first had to create a small ‘art studio’ consisting of a vase, two material spheres and a table. To make these I used my knowledge from the prior weeks such as the extrude tool and subdivisions. The vase started out as a cube that I used edge loops and subdivision on to create the model that I wanted. I then used extrusion and the move tool to make the vase look how it does now.
After the models were done, I had to set the scene up for the render. To do this I had to add a camera and lights as shown in the image below. To test what my render would look like at this point I added an AI standard surface material to the models so that I could do a test IPR render. This allowed me to know whether I had to change my light settings because it doesn’t display correctly until rendered.
Test Render
I then changed the material properties of the different model in the scene so that they each were different. I made the vase look like glass and the spheres look like different metals. I also added a ramp to the background to create a gradient effect in the render.
After changing some of the render settings, I then was ready to do a final render. I let the image render fully at a higher resolution then the test renders I did and then saved the image of the render which is shown below.
