Experimentation

For my experimentation, I played around with some different possible colour palettes that I might consider using, as well as some brushes that I have looked at possibly using on my final piece.

For the colour palettes that I created, I decided to stay with a pastel theme, as I really like the effects the colours can bring out on clothing. While I may decide on some different colours when I create my final piece, these are a very helpful starting point for me.

Character Synopsis

Name: Lucas Durant (Lucas meaning 'bringer of light'; Durant from the nickname Durandus meaning 'enduring')
Alias: Luca
Age: 17
D.O.B: September 18th
Gender: Male

Personality:

When off of the stage, Lucas is true and honest spoken to the point, so much so that people often think he's quite rude. He hates lying to people, so he sticks with honesty no matter who it upsets. He's energetic and optimistic in all situations, even when he probably shouldn't be. His twin sister, Olivia, is quick to become pessimistic, so he maintains a bright disposition in order to lighten her spirits.

While on stage, he lives under a persona; he understands that there are certain ways that he has to act and, while it makes him slightly uncomfortable from time to time, he understands that it's just show business. On stage, his bubbly personality draws flocks of fans towards him and he can't deny that he loves the adrenaline it gives him.

Backstory:

When he was younger, he had a weak constitution and couldn't be very active, spending most of his childhood inside a hospital room watching his sister learn dance routines from her favourite TV shows. His dream was to become a superhero so that he could stop all of the injustice in the world he lives in. As he got older and his illness less severe, his twin sister was scouted by a talent agency. Upon hearing the words "you'll become a symbol of light for those living in this dark world", he volunteered them both in an instant. 

They became a duo and, due to their bright appearances on stage, they quickly gained popularity. While the show business causes stress to them both, they learnt to adapt over the years. He still longs to be a superhero, to give his city back their brighter days, but he supposes that being a symbol of light is as close as he can get where he is.

Weekly Review 2

By the end of the second week of this project, I managed to complete my initial, artist and outfit research. While this was more research than I had originally planned to do, I feel like the added research will benefit me greatly in the weeks to come. However, as I added to my original plans, it took me longer to complete them, so I had to use more of my free time in order to complete them.

For my initial research, I found it difficult to find the right words to use in order to get my point across, which took a lot more time than I had planned for. However, despite this, I felt as though it was a piece of research that had to be completed in order for me to be able to move on with my project. I feel as though it's important for me to understand exactly what concept art was and how it contributed towards games, which is what I covered in this section of my research.

Whilst researching artists, I decided to choose someone that had worked on games and someone that had worked on anime/manga. My reason for this is because I also wanted to see how differently they went about completing concept art. While the ways are similar, they are still carried out differently. This research helped me greatly, furthering my understanding of concept art, as well as the difference between concept art and promotional illustrations.

For my last piece of research, I decided to research different outfits in order to prepare for creating my rough sketches. At this stage, I'm unsure of which gender I will decide to make my character, so I thought it would be better to prepare if I researched both male and female outfits. I also decided to research matching outfits as, while I'm unsure of the gender, I know the basic synopsis of my character, and that they're going to be a part of a duo. By researching matching unit outfits and expanding my ideas, it will be easier if I decide to expand on the setting and characters in the future.

Outfit Research

As I am creating an original character, I need to create the outfit that they will be wearing as well. While I was gathering my ideas for a design, I looked up outfits from different games that I know of that helped to inspire the design of my finalised outfits. As I am currently unsure of my character's gender, I have decided to research both male and female outfits.

For the female stage outfits, I looked up some different ones from the mobile game 'Love Live!', which centers around female idols. I chose to research outfits from this game, as I know that there are a lot of different stage outfits that I could take inspiration from, if I decided that the gender of my character would be female.

In this game, the members of the main groups have a main colour that will often appear on the outfits that they wear. In the times that the whole unit has a matching outfit, each girl's outfit will be slightly different, as their own main colour will be implemented somewhere on their outfit.

The characters in the above image are part of a sub-unit called 'BiBi', with the main unit, 'μ's' (pronounced 'muse'), consisting of nine members altogether.

The reason I chose this particular 'set' of outfits is because I found that they were pretty much a matching set, regardless of being released at all different times. It shows one way that 'unit' outfits can be designed; rather than being a completely matching outfit, they can be different from one another but still with enough similarities that one is able to tell that they're part of a sub-unit.

While these outfits could be worn as stage outfits, I feel that they also fit in under the entertainer category. Given that the theme of the outfits is a circus theme, this could be very possible. The above characters are from the main unit, and don't form a sub-unit; the whole of the main group has a circus stage/entertainer outfit, but I chose these two as the whole of the character is visible, which allows me to look at the kind of leg-wear and foot-wear the characters are wearing.

This set also shows that unit outfits can also be matching, but with slight differences, such as added or differentiating accessories, that allow a character to show off their personality and individuality. 

From the same game, but a different unit called 'Aqours', I chose these two outfits as they are perfectly matching. The only difference between them is that the flower near their waist and the dots at the top of their socks are changed to match their own main colour. I really like that the matching outfits in this game are changed for each member depending on the main colour that they associate with.

For my research of male stage outfits, I chose to research outfits from 'Ensemble Stars!', another mobile game that centers around male idols. As I am familiar with the game itself, it is quite an easy topic for me to talk about.

Whilst looking at the different outfits in this game, I found that the individual units have matching stage outfits for performances; however, I chose to use examples from the main unit in the game, called 'Trickstar'. Aside from being the main unit, their stage outfits always match, even though the colours that they wear differ. As can be seen above, their outfits are the same; however, it feels as though the unit itself is split into two, as they wear two different coloured outfits among the four of them.

These are the initial stage outfits for this unit. These outfits also match, even though they wear two colours among the four of them. When in these initial outfits, the colour of the sweatband they each wear on their wrist, as well as their footwear, changes to the colour that represents them.

My research on the different outfits has been extremely helpful towards my project. I mainly chose to research matching outfits, as opposed to just solo ones, as my original character is a part of a duo. While my final piece will only contain the one character, I wanted to have done the research on unit outfits in case I decide to continue with designing other characters and aspects for my plot in the future.

Concept Artists / Illustrators

• Yoshitaka Amano

Yoshitaka Amano was born on March 26th 1952 and is a well known name among video game fans. He, himself, considers Final Fantasy to be the series that made him as famous as he is. He was once in charge of the character designs for a number of the early Final Fantasy games in the franchise. He has since stepped back slightly, these days working on the different logos and promotional artwork and illustrations for the newer games.

When designing the logos for the games in the franchise, Amano is given limited information to work with. As the logo is set around the central concept of the game, specific and important aspects of the game aren't required when creating the logo for the game. Amano is given text-based information about the general concept and, from that, he creates the logo. 

Concept pieces for the Final Fantasy I & III Logos

These are some of Amano's concept designs of the logos for Final Fantasy I and III. These show different potential ideas he had whilst designing. I really like this sketch piece, as it showcases the different ideas that were thought up while being created. It's very nice to be able to see how something started off and what it ultimately ended up looking like.

• Akira Amano 

Akira Amano was born in 1973 and is most well known for her work creating the manga series Katekyō Hitman Reborn!, which became a hit manga series in both Japan and ran for 411 chapters that were compiled into 42 volumes between 2004 and 2012. It was published in the Shōnen Jump magazine and became a hit, later being made into an anime series that consisted of 203 episodes.

In the same year that Reborn! finished, 2012, Amano took on another project as the character designer for an anime original series called Psycho-Pass. While was an anime original series to begin with, it later branched off into a manga series; however, this manga adaptation had a different manga artist. More recently, a visual novel style game was released that was set during the original anime season.

This is one of the pieces of concept art for one of the characters in Psycho-Pass. I particularly like this piece, as it shows the different outfits that were considered before the character, as well as giving off pieces of base personality just based on the poses that the character was drawn in.

References:

Juba, J. (2016). The Art That Shaped Final Fantasy: Thoughts From Famed Artist Yoshitaka Amano. Available: 
http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2016/04/27/the-art-that-shaped-final-fantasy-thoughts-from-famed-artist-yoshitaka-amano.aspx. Last accessed 2nd June 2016.

Regniez, M. (2002). Video Games. Available: 
http://yoshitaka-amano.kouryu.info/genre_eng-jeux.html. Last accessed 27th May 2016.

Plunkett, L. (2012). The Beautiful Final Fantasy Art of Yoshitaka Amano. Available: 
http://kotaku.com/5917619/the-beautiful-final-fantasy-art-of-yoshitaka-amano. Last accessed 27th May 2016.

Initial Research

• What is concept art?

Concept art is a form of sketch or illustration that is used primarily to communicate an idea or thought process. It is what is created at the beginning of a project, and is later built upon as the project progresses. Concept art can come in many different forms, such as: character designs, clothing, weapons and backgrounds or places. Concept art is where the artist is able to show how they get from a rough sketch to something that will be used later on.

• What is a concept artist?

A concept artist is someone who creates concept art. More often than not, they will be given the story and characters in order to create concept art that fits those aspects. Most of the time, a concept artist will create a rough draft, or sketch, that will then be passed on to the project manager. From there, the sketch will be handed on to a 3D modeler or illustrator that will work further upon it. Sometimes, concept artists will just work up to the sketch, until the piece is passed onto the illustrator; however, some will be included and involved throughout almost every step of the process. 

Sometimes, concept artist will work in groups and use their combined talents to make something as good as it can possibly be. 

There are occasions where companies will call in more than one concept artist to create the same pieces of concept art. When each artist is finished with their designs, the project manager would choose the one they thought fit the game better.

• What is concept art used for?

Concept art can be used for anything that is created. Animated movies, games, anime and manga are just a few examples of what concept art is used for. Before something is finalised and created, there is, more often than not, concept art for it. Concept art is used as a starting point for a project. While there would be a story and characters planned out, the concept artist is the person who would be the one putting the words of the creator into sketch form.

• Why is concept art important?

In video game designing, concept art is hugely important as it creates a direction for the project. By hiring concept artists to create different design ideas a game, a specific feel is given to the designs. However, if all of the individual tasks are handed to the different departments from the beginning of the project, each designer will design something that they each think is right. The designs would all think differently, therefore all of their designs would probably not fit together.

If this initial task is handed by a concept artist, the same imprint will be left upon the work; while they may make changes according to what the project manager is looking for, it would still ultimately be their work.

• Concept art vs. Illustration.

Quite often, when looking up 'concept art' on the internet, some of the results will contain what are actually illustrations from a game. These days, the line between concept art and illustrations is blurred; the two often being put into the same category, even though the two are very different.

Sometimes, early illustrations are released online or in magazines in order to create a gathering, and to make people look forward to what is coming. However, there may be many changes from when the illustration is revealed to when the final thing is finally released. The changes could be made for any reason — maybe the project manager wanted to change something because they thought that something else would fit better; or maybe something would be easier and cheaper to animate than what was already created.

A lot of the time, what gets released under the guise of 'concept art', can actually be seen as promotional art — something that is final enough to represent what the final design will be. While changes are still subject to change, they wouldn't be drastic at all, and would still represent the promotional art that was released. 

Concept art is everything that leads up to the promotional art. All of the messy sketches of different ideas that slowly progresses into what everyone will end up seeing. Concept art contains all of the 'what ifs' and 'what could have been' of a character or piece of scenery, and all of these different experimental pieces and mock-ups will lead up to the thing that is created in the later stages of development and illustration. 

References:

Anhut, A. (2014). Let's Get Real About Concept Art. Available: 
http://howtonotsuckatgamedesign.com/2014/02/lets-get-real-concept-art/. Last accessed 26th May 2016.

Pickthall, J. (2012). Just what is concept art?. Available: 

http://www.creativebloq.com/career/what-concept-art-11121155. Last accessed 26th May 2016.

Raymond, J. (2014). Concept Art: What is Concept Art and Why is it Important?. Available: http://artistryingames.com/concept-art-concept-art-important/. Last accessed 28th May 2016.

Unknown. (Unknown). Concept Artist. Available:
http://creativeskillset.org/job_roles/3072_concept_artist. Last accessed 25th May 2016.

Weekly Review 1

By the end of the first week of the final project, I was slightly behind where I should be. Due to being unable to attend the first two lessons, where we were introduced to the project, I had to catch up during the rest of the week and at home in my spare time. My proposal was rather easy for me to create, as I have a vague idea of what it is that I want to create by the end. 

As for my schedule, I found it harder to set the times for myself, as I wasn't sure where I would be by the end of each week. However, I tackled this problem by ensuring that my tasks were spread out in my schedule depending on how much time I thought each task would take to complete. In some sections of my schedule, there are areas where it doesn't look as though I will be completing a lot in a week; but this is because it is a task that I think will take longer to complete than some others.