I'd be willing to bet that you're the type of person that will AT THE VERY LEAST
look up a trailer for a game before you go out and buy it.
We are people of the internet after all.
Imagine for a second that you had to buy all of your games based SOLELY off of what the
box art looked like.
How many terrible games do you think you would have gotten duped into playing?
When most people think of video game art, THIS is what they think of.
But, there are so many other artistic tasks that are more detrimental to the development
of a game.
Concept art is messy.
There's room for mistakes.
The goal here is to turn out a lot of different ideas or to show the team what the end product
should look like.
Key Art is for promotional use.
It's to grab the attention of a potential buyer.
This is VERY important.
It's most likely the first imagery the general public will see.
It could take months of planning.
It usually goes through many different iterations, and gets passed between many different people.
It could be focus tested over and over until it's exactly what will catch the eye of the
most amount of people.
These pieces rarely depict actual in-engine gameplay.
A good example would be the first Mega Man.
Capcom already had promotional art worked out for this little blue guy.
So without the limitations of the NES, THIS is what they envisioned Mega Man to look like.
But for SOME REASON, they decided THIS would sell more games.
This cover art is actually blamed for the games weak sales at the time.
But I'd consider this to be an example where the game looks BETTER than the box art.
Fallout New Vegas is an example of a game that looks WORSE than it's box art.
Look at the graphical fidelity here.
You mean to tell me that was rendered on an Xbox 360?
This box art looks phenomenal.
I'm not saying the game looks inherently bad, it just never had a chance of ever looking
THAT good.
And by no means is Fallout New Vegas the only title that decided to jazz up it's box art.
Every AAA game publisher does this.
There's just a fine line they have to walk between adding a little bit of extra polish,
and blatant false advertising.
As graphics get better, this disconnect seems to be fixing itself.
I think Metal Gear Solid V is one of the few games where I'd believe it if you told me
that this image was rendered in engine.
But even when a publisher tells you it's rendered in engine, you have to be a little
skeptical.
The Call of Duty WW2 reveal trailer started with a title that said "Actual In-Game Footage."
That trailer contained EXCLUSIVELY cutscenes and scripted events, and no gameplay footage.
Even the so called "in game screenshots" used for promotion can go through a lot of editing.
A looot of people called bullshit on this Far Cry 4 preview screenshot.
Anybody can tell it's just...
TOO perfect.
How the hell would a person actually capture that moment.
It's also possible to use a lot more processing power to render a single screenshot, adding
a LOT more detail than you'd find in actual gameplay.
It's less taxing than rendering all of these things moving around.
This is how Horizon Zero Dawn's photo mode renders beautiful crisp photos.
But even with tricks like this, key art is never as simple as taking an in game screenshot.
Sometimes it could START that way, but there's always much, much more work to be done.
In fact there can be many different mediums at play.
In game models can be posed to perfection, then colored, rendered in SUPER HIGH detail,
and painted over to make sure the image is immaculate.
In some cases, photography is used.
Then it's mashed together in photoshop and again, painted over.
I know I just summarized it pretty quickly, but this process could take MONTHS.
Last year we got a pretty good look behind the key art of Battlefield 1 from Senior Concept
Artist Robert Sammelin.
He's the guy responsible for the general theme of the Battlefield covers since Bad Company
2.
When you see a mostly blue image of a soldier walking towards screen with bright orange
highlights and lot's of blown out lens flair, you know it's a Battlefield game.
Robert and his team started with a bunch of sketches and speed paintings to get the general
idea.
Then they got some props, brought in some models and had themselves a photoshoot.
Lot's of photo's are taken and mashed together.
This cape was likely added in later.
Cloth is so finicky, it's just easier that way.
The model in the cover art for Battlefield 3 was a motion capture artist.
He notes that on normal mo-cap days he's dressed in a motion capture suit.
You know, one of those leotards with the white balls all over it.
On the monitor though, he could see a real time feed of himself wearing full military
gear.
However, for the cover art shoot, he had 65lbs of actual gear on.
The Battlefield 1 art took eighteen months of planning and 3-4 months of hands on work.
Of course, it's finished towards the end of production as to get the most accurate representation
of the game, incase things change.
So, is this disingenuous?
I mean, it's a photograph, and NOT rendered gameplay.
This type of realism literally could not exist in the game.
I guess it's not much different than say, an over the top movie poster.
There's a weird sort of fine line between artistic license and actual false advertising.
How good can you make this game look without promising something that it's not.
People seem more able to suspend their disbelief for box art, not so much for so called "in
game screenshots" or "pre-rendered trailers"
Good key art is iconic.
It immediately makes you think of the franchise it represents.
It doesn't have to be complex.
It can be abstract or minimalistic and still serve it's purpose.
To me the simpler the better.
What if the Order 1886 cover was just it's logo?
Well, they don't have the same brand recognition as lets say, Elder Scrolls.
The Skyrim box art is just the logo.
It's stylized really well, but even if we take away all of the detail you still know
exactly what game franchise it is.
This is just good design.
Fallout 4 is a better example.
That power armor helmet provides all the information you need.
The logo and the power armor were actually the first designs created in the development
of Fallout 4.
They wen't through more iterations before they made their way to the cover, but the
general idea was there.This is also fairly close to what we see in the game.
You might also remember this image from the promotion of Fallout 4.
It's basically a summary of the "Welcome Home" trailer, just in one long image.
The art book shows us how much work went into this trailer, and in turn, this key art.
It's not just a screenshot.
It's WAY too beautifully rendered.
And this screenshot, which is just as beautifully rendered, is on the back of the box.
It's placement gives off the impression that it's just promotional art and not an
in-game screenshot like the 3 we see at the bottom.
You know at this point, I think we've seen so much bullshit from the games industry that
we're just trained to sort through it.
Of course, this isn't limited to the video games industry.
Key art also applies to movies, TV shows, music, hell even YouTube Videos.
It's purpose is to draw you in, peak your curiosity and give you the BEST representation
of the work.
But ALSO give you an accurate representation so that you don't fee swindled after you're
done consuming the content.
If you do feel swindled, ya got CLICKBAITED.
And that's the fine line content creators have to walk.
How can I show the most idealized version of my product without giving people a false
impression?
If you're going to draw people in with a fancy image, you better have what it takes
to back it up.
And if promotional art is something you'd like to do yourself someday, well good luck
to you.
Key Art is a very specialized type of art.
Having some drawing chops often isn't enough.
You've got to wear a lot of hats.
Granted most of the time it's a large team of people with varying skill-sets who create
the key art for these AAA games.
I don't necessarily think that box art being rendered differently than in-engine footage
is necessarily malicious.
It just should be at least a LITTLE representative of the content inside.
I think screenshots and promotional material these days are WAY MORE malicious.
It's much MORE likely that a potential buyer could be tricked by this sort of advertising.
Every other form of media has trained us NOT to judge a book by its cover.
So next time you look at your game collection, take a minute to consider the sheer man hours
that just went into creating the physical boxes that decorate your bookshelf.
And next time you see a game ad out in the wild, consider how it was designed to pull
you in and take your money.
So what do you guys think about promotional art?
What are some of your favorites?
It's very difficult for me to pick a favorite but I like the illustrative ones like Red
Dead Redemption or Metal Gear Solid 2.
That Yoji Shinkawa.
Mwah. MWAH.
Firewatch is great too, if only the GAME WAS AS GOOD.
ANYWAY leave it in the comments below and if you LIKE THIS VIDEO show us by clicking
that like button.
If any of you like The Storyteller series here, Jason, the voice of the Storyteller
will be at SacAnime from Sept 1-3rd.
He'll be walking around in his Storyteller shirt.
If you find him, he's got some free loot for you.
SIGNED loot.
Hey if your interested in these Art videos, I did an analysis of the Art of Sonic Mania
over on my channel.
So if you want to hear more of my big dumb voice go check that out.
Anyway thank you guys very much, and have yourselves a very good week!
For more infomation >> 2008, March 19 - President George W. Bush - Remarks on the War on Terror - open captioned - Duration: 26:22. 
For more infomation >> 1977, April 18 - President Jimmy Carter, Address to the Nation on Energy - closed captioned - Duration: 18:32. 
For more infomation >> Se s vivimos unha vez Real Club Celta de Vigo - Duration: 4:06. 
For more infomation >> 24h à l'UdeS : Une armée de gens pour animer la communauté - Duration: 2:50. 
For more infomation >> Qui sont les meilleurs amis de Nicolas Sarkozy, François Hollande et Emmanuel Macron? - Duration: 1:42. 
For more infomation >> Séparés, les parents de M Pokora réunis autour de leur fils - Duration: 1:56. 
For more infomation >> 여름 바람 해돋이 (ナツノカゼ御来光) 불러보았다｜[소시오] - Duration: 2:58. 
For more infomation >> مازوزي الصغير يتحدى فيصل الصغير 🎤 في اداء اغنية خسارة فيك كلمة نبغيك 💔 / من كان الأفضل في الاداء - Duration: 4:19. 
For more infomation >> Mindy, sa blessure : Loana sans nouvelle de sa fille depuis 16 ans - Duration: 2:17. 
For more infomation >> Valérie Trierweiler a-t-elle recueilli les confidences d'Alain Delon pour Paris Match ? - Duration: 2:14. 
For more infomation >> Au Cap Ferret, Guillaume Canet apprend à surfer à son fils Marcel - Duration: 1:52. 
For more infomation >> Stephanie's Horse Carriage
For more infomation >> Mercedes-Benz E-Klasse E 220 d Limousine Automaat | COMAND Online | LED | 360* camera - Duration: 0:59. 
For more infomation >> Календарь спортсмена на все случаи жизни. Спорт лайфхак для качка. Реальная Качалка Рекомендует 2017 - Duration: 1:28. 
No comments:
Post a Comment