FMP Evaluation

I believe that the progress I have made throughout my FMP has been significant to me in a number of ways relating to not only design, but marketing within the video game industry. Through my research I have discovered ways in which designers can create successful concepts that are central to a project and ways in which these are perceived by the public. I have strived to create designs and concepts which could be plausibly marketed to real-world consumers and I believe that with further time for development I could produce a worthwhile project which could be backed by an audience which spans several demographics.

I have reached several goals that I set for myself with this project. I began working with the intention of developing a number of skills in design; many of these were character-based. These included creating a successful design which has a unique number of recognisable features; developing my skills in traditional media, such as drawing; and producing digital work for the final piece which maintains consistent themes.

I believe that I could improve on my consistency within drawing a figure multiple times. I did not have the time to expand on my figure drawing skills within the project, but if I were to develop this further or engage in a project of similar density in the future I will be sure to improve in all areas of figure drawing if I am hoping to focus on character design. While I believe the final design was mostly successful in portraying a consistent set of features, I struggled to produce many separate drawings and graphics of him which is something which would be necessary for a full video game project.

I was hoping to be able to create an instruction booklet in addition to another item for the final piece but ultimately decided that it was less graphically significant and that I would rather work on commercial skills such as advertising and box art covers. These are the most iconic aspects to a game as they are the primary items that would attract their audience; next time I will consider these aspects of marketing before engaging in a project.

While I believe that experimentation is key to finding the most appropriate ideas and the most effective designs, I believe that I could have benefited from deciding earlier on on a set design and creating more finalised images and layout trials which feature it. I produced many logo and character variations which were all useful and significant in my development and they helped me to refine my idea of what the character consisted of, but in the future I will attempt to manage my time more effectively in order to result in more complete assets within the project.

The research I conducted regarding this project was useful for me upon analysing particular aspects of visual game designs. I enjoyed analysing sprites in more depth and understanding how sprite artists created depth of field within gameplay. I have realised that I believe pixel art and sprites to be an effective mode of communication within video games and I aspire to develop my skills in this area as well; this is why I created a pixel-based portrait for my final piece poster which featured my main character. 

FMP: Week 7

The following week I continued to finalise concepts and experiment with media in order to find other plausible design principles for the logo and character. Below feature a series of medium experiments I created using a brush and black ink. The game is based upon a series of Japan-based franchises and I wanted to take this into account in terms of design principles. I believe that if this game were to be released it would also be released in Japan due to the style of the game being very popular in Japanese media. Thus, the logo experiments take inspiration from Japanese calligraphy - poorly-loaded brushstrokes, angular designs and a mixture of thick and thin lines to comprise text were all features I experimented with in an attempt to find a consistent looking design. I then decided to try using actual Japanese text, which the second page shows. 

In Japan there are two phonetic alphabets - "hiragana" and "katakana" - and a selection of Chinese characters named "kanji". Due to Inbound being a foreign word, this would be written in Katakana, "インバウンド". I attempted to emulate Japanese calligraphic styles to write this and I believe it was effective when paired with the image of the character. 

Upon completing the fully inked portrait of the character's face, I believed that the contrast of a dark helmet colour plus the lighter skin tone would prove effective in future experiments and drawings and possibly the finalised colour scheme. It is also from this point that I decided to experiment with items extending from the sides of the face in order to create a more complex character design. I had not decided at this point whether or not to keep this as a design principle.

Continuing from this, I decided to do some final colour tests using the previous sketch as a base. I decided on a contrasting mix of black and red for the final piece and used water colours for another media experiment. I believed that the leftmost design is effective as the red being featured on the face of the character provides a contrast while being definitively red in colour scheme. While watercolours created a new shading effect which I could potentially utilise in my final piece, I decided that I would be using digital software to colour my final designs.

FMP: Week 6

The following week I decided to experiment with layouts of box art designs. Again, I experimented with 30-second drawings first in order to get a sense of composition and style and find ideas that I liked. I developed a number of split-composition ideas between the main character and the antagonist, as seen in the second and third pages here. While I believe that the split composition is effective, it may have become cliche in recent advertising terms; I saw a poster on the underground recently depicting the same design principle for an advertisement on ski holidays or something similar. I decided to further experiment with designs which were more unique in composition, or perhaps designs which did not feature the antagonist, due to the main character being the mascot icon for the franchise.

Back to creating logos and experimenting with logo designs, I decided to experiment using black paper in order to achieve contrast. I decided that the italicised and capitalised typography was the most effective out of what I had designed so far, and decided to experiment with these design principles in particular.

I employed the use of split designs for a more "ragged" and dynamic effect. I decided that while this could be effective for a certain other project, it did not fit the mechanical-themed nature of the game's protagonist due to the cut-paper effect. My favourite out of the left page was thus the middle design; while I think the top-left character silhouette is effective, that paired with the eye silhouette within the text was not consistent and I believe that the eyes underneath the logo suited it more definitively. Thus the right page utilises the basic line-driven italicised logo; this page is another series of experiments with primary colours in order to test the effectiveness of previously tested colours against a black background.

 The ideas featured left are experiments upon the decorative style of William Morris whose work I consider to be inspiring. As annotated, I don't believe that these fit the style of the game and the graphical themes that are central to the project, but decided to experiment with them in case there was something I could use within the experimentation. I realised that within the game there may be a "level" or "world" which is grass- or plant-themed, which may use intricate and curved decorative designs such as these; if the character were to take up an inspired form from this level it may result in something that looks similar to the bottom design. 

FMP: Week 5

After completing some sketches for the main character's design, I decided to focus on typography and logo creation the following week. I realised that the logo is central to a game's recognisability and that it should encompass various established design principles within the game. Here I focused on sketches and creating a rough finished product.

These pages depict trials of logo designs I created. The initial page depicts rough sketches I completed quickly in order to get a feel for a number of ideas I could expand upon. It turned out that the first idea I attempted was one of the most coherent as a design and I developed it in the following pages.

I felt that the facial expression (defined by the specifically shaped eyes and eyebrows) and the ear-style helmet were a defining graphical feature of the character and that it should be emphasized within the logo. Having one set of recognisable characteristics or design principles makes a franchise memorable and unique, and my main character is going to be the poster character for the series, so I based it around that. I decided to make the text slanted as opposed to the upright text of my initial sketch on the first page; the italicised capital letters depict movement and energy as opposed to a static upright stance.

FMP: Week 4

After experimenting changing the colours of the sketches I tried to depict the character in a different style. I came up with a facial style for the character while drawing him in a new stance and with a different style of shading. I wanted to make the character more androgynous in body shape; I feel that an androgynous character would reach a wider set of demographics. In Sonic the Hedgehog, for example, the character is male but due to the highly anthropomorphised look, and lack of a particularly gendered body shape, he appeals to any gender of consumer. The character in this image is more rounded and neutral, while maintaining the same design principles of the large ears helmet and the cross. I decided to implement robotic joints, taking inspiration from the Megaman series, which features a mechanical main character.

The picture featured left shows photocopies of my developed sketch with some rough weapon designs and colour schemes superimposed. As the annotation explains, I attempted to change the perception of the main character through the use of weaponry. Ultimately, I did not go with any of these design trials due to the clash of shape types. The sketch I was drawing on had a more rounded look and these designs did not complement the qualities of the shapes due to the sharpness. I also experimented with a blue colour scheme over the sketch to check if it was an improvement from my previously considered red colour. After these sketches I decided to experiment with logo designs,.

FMP: Week 3

On the third week I began to create original designs that stemmed from the research I conducted in previous weeks. The following page features my first sketch of a main character concept. 

This was my first concept sketch of my main character. I have taken into consideration the points of interest of previous video game characters I have studied here; he has an anthropomorphised look, with a set of consistent design principles (large head, distinctive ears / hat and cross on chest). I hope to make this design into a set of sprites in the future and indicate movement within the character.

On the page featured left, I experimented with some plain, base colours for him. I have decided at this basic stage that red is the most fitting due to the "heroic" nature of the colour; many video games would indicate that blue is the most appealing and "neutral" colour for a protagonist - one example being the aforementioned Sonic the Hedgehog - but red is equally appealing as a colour choice and suits the image I have in mind for the character.

FMP: Week 2

Following my focus around Kirby Mass Attack, I further looked into its visuals and found sprite sheets for the characters that are used in-game. The following page (left) features these, in addition to a screen-capture to demonstrate how they are used within the background of the game.

I found sprite sheets very interesting as a point of study as they provide frame-by-frame details regarding how movement of a given character is depicted. In this instance, Kirby (the character featured) is jumping, and there is a different fully completed frame for each aspect of the movement. Sprites are generally interesting as they demonstrate how a character design can be simplified into a very limited space or number of pixels. Application of colour, proportion and composition of design must all be taken into account when creating sprites.

The first image shows many of the Kirby sprites in a background from one of the stages within the game. One can see how they stand out through the colour scheme: the background was drawn without the black outlines prevalent in the character sprites, and uses a less saturated palette.

Following the train of interest of pixel and art and sprites from Kirby Mass Attack, I decided to look more deeply into games of a similar genre. The first example of this is the series Sonic the Hedgehog, as it is an iconic and well-known series within gaming which has maintained a set of design principles since it started. The following is an example of a sprite sheet of the main character, Sonic, and some of his concept sketches.

This page demonstrates the good design principles of the main character. He has a clear form, as it is evident through the sketches - the circles demonstrate a straightforward composition. This form can be minimised into a set of sprites, as shown in the sheet; a simplistic and comprehensible design is needed to make such a successful set. Sonic's colour scheme is also significant; the hues of blue and red provide contrast, the white oversized hands are also distinctive, and he has a clear and unobscured face. I aim to create a successful character such as this one. Anthropomorphic designs often tend to be easier in this sense, as they can be stylised more effectively and personified in imaginative ways, easily sparking interest in multiple demographics.

FMP: Week 1

As of the new term, we have begun work on our Final Major Project.

After due thought, I decided that I should base my project around my interest in the graphic elements of video games, as it is a field of study I wish to pursue in the future; this involves and includes sprite work, character designs and other such visual assets. My project concept proposal is as follows:

My project will centre around certain types of advertisements and pieces of media that constitute an original video game concept. These may include (but  limited to) digitally created posters (as advertisements), concept sketches or base designs for the centric characters, an instruction manual, and box / cover art. 

The concept for this game will centre around a single main character (with possible supporting characters or mascots designed) and have a consistent visual theme that fits appropriately with a meaningful and clear message. 

I am seeking to develop skills in the creation of a successful original character (designing a memorable figure), traditional drawing for sketches, production of digital-based advertisement media, and the ability to create and maintain a consistent original theme and design that reappears in different forms. Outside of practical and technical skills, I am hoping to develop my ability to create an interesting and convincing concept and plot. 

I will be researching existing works of a variety of media in order to present a coherent project. The game concept may take inspiration from (and thus be enhanced by research of) existing video games; among these will be well-known and visually memorable franchises such as Pokémon, Sonic the Hedgehog and Mega Man in order to study what constitutes a well-designed game. 

Other areas of study will include pieces of media outside the video game franchise; this may include 2D animation, for the study of character design. Examples may include series such as Bleach and Beyblade, both of which franchises have also released spinoff video games, which may be an additional subject of study. I will also research visual advertisements in the forms of posters, particularly those which advertise games and similar media.

My initial research focused around the aspects of video games that I mentioned above. The following images are of my first research pages:

The above page features designs for box arts for two contrasting genres of video game. The former, titled Final Fantasy, and the latter, Kirby Mass Attack (Japanese cover), appeal to two different target demographics through their visual assets. I have analysed these in the hopes that it will help me with my box art designs:

Colour: While the Final Fantasy cover features a gradient colour scheme, the application of it is modest. The logo itself is in plain black, and the background of the cover plain white. The simplistic application of colour is distinctive to the series. In contrast to this, Kirby Mass Attack's entire cover image centres around a bright scheme of pink and blue; this is equally eye-catching but more so to younger demographics due to the bolder nature of the design.

Font:  The Final Fantasy series uses a distinctive, tall font for all of its game logos. It resembles a Times font, demonstrating an appeal to a more mature audience. Kirby Mass Attack aspires for the opposite function as the main series logo is always in chunky, colourful bubble-writing with a variety of visual effects; the star in the exclamation point is one example, as is the shining effect and the strong outline.

Composition: Both pieces have a strong sense of composition due to the central focus on each image. Both of them feature their main point of interest in the centre of the canvas, with the sides drawing attention to it (either through visual elements or lack thereof). 

Next week I will continue to conduct research on various similar elements of game design and write analyses on the blog.

Manifesto project

Our Manifesto project involved creating a final visual manifesto piece which outlined various personal beliefs and significant words or phrases. We were encouraged to look into our cultural and familial backgrounds in order to find the content we would use in our manifesto. In order to do this, I began by looking into the landscape imagery of both London and Morocco, where I am from. The following images are examples of photographs I have taken of London scenery for this project. I have been using a square format in order to maintain consistency and proportion.

These examples of London’s imagery include famous and significant or recurring things such as the London buses, and the infamously rainy climate. I went on to use the featured simple photo of the BT Tower with a consistent colour scheme as the final photograph for the piece, due to its effective simplicity and reverent colour scheme, which suits my personal style and manifesto.

I experimented with many different trials of layouts and text composition, and ended up using a combination of three. The contrast of each of the different font styles created balance and contrast, while the limited line style and colour scheme retained its unity. I used a graphics tablet to recreate my paper sketches, and Photoshop CC once again to edit and compose the final image. 

Mapping project

Our Mapping project revolved around the concept of cartography and the many forms that it can take. I started my research with an artist named Fernando Vicente, who focuses on creating figures, shapes and animals out of simple geographical maps. He enhances and draws from existing shapes within the image, and shades them in a way which creates form. I decided to try several similar exercises, working not only with geographical maps but train lines, such as Harry Beck’s famous London Underground tube map.

The exercise involving the koi imagery is my favourite, as I felt that the fish’s simple lines and bold, contrasting sense of colour were a memorable visual theme. I decided to go with this for my final piece, using “koi” as its central idea.

I started by finding some photographic references online from which to practice drawing the shapes of  the fish, and proceeded to use a graphics tablet and a mix of Photoshop and Paint Tool Sai in order to create the line work. I am not yet confident with using a graphics tablet, so I decided to rely on simple lines and colour created using a simple circular brush. The following image is the line art for the final picture.

I believe that its simplicity was effective once paired with the background image. The underlying map shows several parts of South-East Asia, the place in which koi fish are the most popular, and contributes to the piece’s fairly pastel colour scheme.

Branding project

The next project we were assigned revolved around the concept of “branding” and our role within this as graphic designers. I chose to base my branding pieces around the volleyball sport, for which I created a logo, a Facebook banner complete with the page and its description, and several pieces of merchandise.

I underwent several series of trials for the design and composition of the logo. I created and was content with the name of the company (FLY), but was initially unsure as to how to represent this through imagery.

After sketching the designs pictured above, I finally decided to use imagery of the ball itself with wings; this seemed like a small and concise enough visual item to include in a short logo, and was memorable in its imagery. In order to create the finished logo, I drew it by hand, before scanning and editing it on Photoshop to give it its finished, more professional look.

I decided on the use of an angular, yet stylised typography design of exclusively upper case letters for the central visual theme. The stylised aspect, paired with the stripes of bold colours, is intended to draw in a slightly younger demographic, as FLY Volleyball is intended to be a youth club. This is amplified by the winged volleyball design. I continued to use a limited and yet contrasting colour scheme of blues and yellows with the banner and merchandise items in order to maintain consistency and a sense of professionalism within the design.

Book Cover project

This is a project in which we were to design a cover for the famous John Steinbeck novel, “Of Mice and Men”. The following image shows the finished product of my design.

I went about this task with the intent of creating a dramatic, dark tone, which many readers may find enticing; in addition to this, the dark tone reflects the aspects of the novel that were not apparent until later on in the story. This creates tension for the reader as they begin to read the book.

I used my own photography to create this, making use of a hand-drawn title and an original compositional idea. The hand and crushing imagery exists to represent Lennie’s (one of the main characters) unintentional murders that take place throughout the novel, all of which times correlate to his hands and the strength he cannot gauge himself.

I edited the photograph and scanned items using Photoshop CC, changing the amount of light in the photo as necessary, blending the title with the rest of the image. I removed the colour from the photo, leaving it in greyscale, which is a suited colour scheme for a book which has such a dark tone to it. I attempted to create a professional image while retaining a dramatic, and childlike (again reflecting Lennie) approach to the image.

Climage Change project

This is the piece that I created for the Climate Change project we were assigned during this week. The intended type of media was a poster, and I decided to take on a more shocking and dramatic approach to the task.

Many of the “eco activism” posters and pieces of media we see in modern advertising include very simple, bright, encouraging and calming imagery, in order to convince individuals to make a personal change and inform them of the benefits of altering habits. However, I  believe that climate change is a much more pressing and immediate issue than many are willing to account for, particularly in advertisements. As a result of this, I opted for a dark, serious visual theme which points out the danger we pose to the Earth, its climate and its health. 

The text present on the top of the poster was created using pen and pencil, and was scanned and digitally edited in order to match and enhance its overall aesthetic. I chose a colour scheme based on reds and blacks for the sake of both consistency and seriousness of tone.