Hello Again!~ It feels like it hasn't been that long since I last posted on here! Well the reason my Week 00 and Week 01 posts are back-to-back is kind of because some of the stuff I put together this week. I also didn't really talk about all of the stuff I did first week. Most of the last post was just my thoughts moving forward with the direction of Twoneironauts. Let's talk a bit about what I'm doing to facilitate the massive scope that we know we have. (Next week I'll discuss more what I've done for the design of the game.) Art Direction Tip 1: PROVIDE DIRECTION! I talked in my last post about how I wanted to facilitate better communication between all of the disciplines, but I didn't talk about how I did that. Well, it actually started last week. The very first thing I did to get started on Twoneironauts, even far before thinking about the design of the game, was create a pipeline for producing concept art. This involves several important pieces of information just for the pipeline itself. (Art is the primary focus because it is an art-heavy game)
You can never provide enough information. One of the things I'm always blown away from is how lax art requests are at DigiPen. It's always; "We need a character." or "We need some items." NO. This is BAD. Very bad in fact. "We need an item which, when picked up, will speed the player up." this is better as it provides what we actually need, but NOT PERFECT. It is not actual DIRECTION. If the artist is still unsure about the direction of the game, this can still be infuriating. They wont naturally know at the beginning of a project what would work thematically. You're holding back design information. "I need a still-image item that will be a pickup for the player. (PNG) It should be a potion which looks like a classic chemistry beaker that is stylized similarly to what we discussed in the art meeting. The images should be exactly 250x250 in size, and have a transparent background. The image should be named "Item_Potion.png" and should be placed in "Art/Deliverables" directory Note: The potion will be used as a SPEED UP potion, meaning the player will run faster when he/she drinks it." MUCH BETTER. Even if you picture something different, which is still possible, you are now expecting a similar thing. If you want to leave a more open-interpretation to the item, you are requesting a different thing entirely, and need to adjust the description, notes, names, etc. as needed. One of the most important things you can do to sort all this information is providing a spreadsheet with columns of information. As you can see, one of the things linked to along the side of the site is a Resource List. This list represents all of the things I am personally expecting from the content team at any given point, and things they have agreed to. Everyone knows what is due and when. And more importantly, everyone has as much information as they could want. If they need more, ask me - in some cases I can't provide it all right there and I will provide it in a separate document that I can link to the content provider. Another important fact is that these lists do not represent laws! They are directions, and if any artist is unhappy with the direction, I am more than happy to change the requirements or see alternative possiblities. Keep in as much communication as possible and make sure they know talking is an option at all times! But we all know the end result. If an item is not checked off via the description of the item in the Resource List, the resource was never provided. This is why communication is important. Art Direction Tip 2: WORK FOR THE ARTISTS! There are several prerequisites the artists have for their classes. They have them for good reasons, they usually help with design. People tend to fight against these and implement them last minute because they don't see the use in them. How are you going to know if you don't try? If it's not useful, tell your instructor AFTER you've tried it, and then WHY it wasn't useful. Maybe you're using it wrong, or maybe they need to rethink things. All of that mess aside, realize that there are going to be requirements that is going to pull the artists away from doing what you want them to do - and what they want to do - produce beautiful art. Instead of waiting on the artists to put up a production site and then migrating everyone to the site, YOU DO IT. Why not? It helps them out, you can pester people more to get them to move to the site, you can bother other teammates for feedback. They should not have to think about this at all. Not because they can't understand it, anyone can understand Google Sites, but if they have to stop drawing to make the site, learn the site, and format the site - that's nearly a week of time wasted. And in the end, unless they have a strong passion for web development (which they might! If they do, allow them to do it, if they'd like the experience), they are taking more time away from producing content for their own portfolios as well. Here's a list of things you should do to help the artists so that they can feel better, and thus, produce better content:
Keep in mind, this is all stuff that - if you don't take it off their plate - the artists will have to do anyways. Look at all that, it's ridiculous. It's just too much! But it's all very important for keeping everyone in constant communication and working towards the same goal. And they get to spend more time doing what they love; producing art. Art Direction Tip 3: BE AVAILABLE AND ATTENTIVE! If there's a proverb to any layer of production, it should be the following: A producer's worth is directly proportional to the amount of times he/she doesn't have to say "I'm working on it." This proverb is true for anyone in a position of leadership. The more times I say "I'm working on it" because it hasn't already been done or accounted for, the worse I am as an Art Director. It's kind of a personal thing for me, if I notice I'm saying it, it's time to step up and work harder. As a side note, it doesn't make you a bad producer, just notice when you are saying it, and try to never need to say it.
Artists are going to have clarifying questions for you, as the Art Director/Creative Director/Producer or whatever your poison is. You should be able to immediately answer it, even if it deals with their own schedule/classes. For instance, you should know milestones in advance what things are expected of the artists, and how important those things are to the game. It's a lot of information to keep in order. It can be kind of daunting, and to be honest, it can take a lot of time. (I didn't expect this!) I manage my thoughts in an interesting - but I think useful - way. Whenever I think of something that will pop up, but can't immediately take care of it because there isn't enough information, and I can't get that information right now, I'll write it on a sticky not and stick it above my bed. Then when I wake up, it's the first thing I see, and it's the first thing I do. The normal course of the day will be you taking off one or two sticky notes, and putting three or four more up. At the end of the week - or earlier, if possible - go into super-producer mode and clear off more than you think you'll need to put up at the end of the day. Always end the week breaking even. Another part of this is allowing the artists to contact you when you have questions, and understanding their schedule so if you need to work on something that would normally block progress, you have something equally useful that they can switch gears to. Switching gears is bad, but not nearly as bad as "I'm working on it." it's kind of just another form of it. The thing about switching gears is it can arise from something unexpected, so essentially what I'm saying is know there will be unexpected things they will need from you, and have other things of equal importance they can work on so you aren't wasting their time. Closing Words This is quite a lot to take in, and I still don't think I have it right. It feels like I'm on the right track, but the next thing I need to work on is cohesiveness. Everyone is working, everyone is working hard; but everyone is not working together, yet. We're traveling in one general direction, but we're not in a line. I'm learning every day from this experience that there are many ways I am doing things wrong, but so far, these three tips have been insanely effective. Cheers!~
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Archives
April 2015
Tags
All
Production BlogPosts by our team members. |