Game Designs and Concepts

Over Winter while I was interning at Deep Sky Studios here in Portland, OR. I was given the task to do  over a few weeks to concept out some designs for different levels and obstacles for a game they are working on called "Scooter Shooter", which is a game for their animated series "Og's Adventures". So here are some of the designs and concepts I came up with and that you may or may not find in the game once it is complete; which might be soon.

First I post the Lava Level designs, which I feel is my top favorite designs. You'll notice that i like to write little notes to myself and the team about what things are, what they do, or even how they work. Can I say that Level design is loads of fun and hopefully I will get to work on some more in the future, because I had a lot of fun.

Oh and I should point out that the game is a traditional Platform game in the same format as the Megaman Series, but done in flash with higher resolution.

Musical Birds

Recently I was reading the newest issue of National Geographic and they had an interesting article about a species of bird from central and south America. They are pretty cool. They have especially designed feathers with hollow chambers that when struck together create chime like
tones. The have several different feathers of varied thickness and lengths that can create many different tones. They use all of this just to mate.

Anyway, here is a quick paint I did of one of these birds.

The Goblins are coming

So a while back I started to work on a co-operative table top role playing game about Goblins. The game mechanics and storyline are just about done being written up and will be going into the play testing stage.
However, i have working on conceptual designs and look of the art work for the game book that will help set the some what light hearted mood of the game.

The game consists of several different breeds of Goblins that will also have some variations that can be mix in.

This is one of the illustrations that will go into the game book that I just finished.

Tasks can only be completed with co-operation of all goblins in play.

10 minute digital painting

Today I took a break from animating and did a 10 minute painting of the view out the studio window.

Art test pt2

Recently I did an art test for a company out Seattle that creates pretty kool internet games. The art test was for Production Artist position and was not only testing the quality of my work and my work method, but also my ability to handle multiple projects at once. This piece is something I did for this test. Its a simple little Icon for use on a website. The fun thing about this piece was that one of the requirements for it was that it had to be completely original. Meaning that I could not use any of the Reference art they had sent and comp it in like I could for several of the other pieces. I had to create it all from scratch. All in all I like how this one turned out. there were 4 other things I had to create for this art test. All of which I will not be putting up on here right now.

I like art test like this. They are fun and exciting, but also they challenge me and help me grow as an artist. This reflects well for the company because it should be both the company and the artist's desire to grow and become better by challenging each other. For me this was a challenge because I had never done anything like what was require of the test. I had never made a Icon for a game before and really enjoyed it.

Daily Art Challenge pt1.

Thsi month i decided to give myself an art challenge that i would (try) to do every day. The art challenge I decided to do is one that my wife had found and copied a jpg of, and that has been

sitting on the computer for over a year now. Unfortunately, i don't know where this Art challenge is from or otherwise I would have placed a link and mention its creator in this post. So if you

know who did design this challenge, please leave a comment with their name and a link to their page.

Anyway, Here is the first couple of days that i have completed. The hardest one so far is Drawing yourself. We all have this idea of who we are and that gets ruined when we sit down and try to draw ourselves with a mirror or photo.

I was suppose to draw my Favorite Animal, but i don't have a favorite. No I really Don't have one. So I did some sketches of some lizards.

My Favorite food is Stir-fry:

My Favorite place is a Secluded Beach:

My Best Friend:

Art Test

So in the last year I have done several Art test in order to get work; either full time or freelance. Some times the test don't really make a lot of sense for the job I was applying for. An example for this would be when I applied for a full time position as an CG Animator with a company out of LA and the Animation test that they sent me was not one where I would be required to animate. Instead they wanted me to model clothing that I would then have to rig to the CG character they had given me. This was not what i would call an animation test, but more of a 3D artist test. So i decided to take the test.

Don't get me wrong I know how to model and all that, but i don't really want to do it as a job. i much rather be an animator.

Another Animation test i received was for an online game that some company was bringing over from japan. I have to design Justin Bieber in Illustrator and that Animate him in Flash; just a basic walk cycle. I did a lot of research to prepare for this test because it all had to be in the same style as the game in japan. The style is very simple, but that just makes it even harder to work with when you need a character to look like someone in particular. I didn't get the job, but here is what I turned in. The animation for this style is soooo simple and easy by the by.