CT4011 Portfolio 

Edward Graham

s4309466@glos.ac.uk

Icon

I first began by picking a theme for my icon and sub-sequentially the rest of my project the two themes we had to pick from where coast and desert, I felt like coast was a lot more limiting, so I picked desert and began working on ideas for my icon.

when i thought of desert i began thinking of things in the desert: camels,cactus,heat and sand.

I then explored further the idea of sand thinking about objects that relate to sand that's when i thought of hourglasses which use sand to measure time and i thought it fit my project as my idea was for it to be in the desert in some far off time your character would wake up and not know what year it was so i picked a broken hourglass to represent lost time and the inability to measure time.

I then put together a mood board for my icon.

while developing this i had to figure out what variations i would make for the store icon and the logo plus i needed the store icon to be scale able so i made a couple of sketches to decide what approach i was going to take

In the end I decide to go with a rounded glass hour glass so it could lay in the sand more naturally and i decided to have the top be pristine and clear to show a good appearance as if everything is fine and it also shows the people at the top with all the power are fine while the bottom was broken with sand flowing out to also represent broken and shaky foundations foreshadowing the environments design and to show the lower class are the ones suffering and are slowly falling apart and this design is meant to show and represent the general themes the game would have

This was my first design for my icon as a store icon when i first made the sand i felt it was too bland and did not really look like sand to fix this i used the texturing tool to add some grain to the sand giving it a more realistic feel, I also added a another layer of glass to show the thickness of the glass. 

I felt this design would look nice and conveyed the messages I wanted to show while still being able to be scaled up and down

This is the 1024 X 1024 icon

This is the 120 x 120 icon

Finally making my logo I wanted to take my original store icon and just add more to it to give it more life and further implement the themes and meanings into the game that I wanted

I added sand dunes and coloured them to give the look of waves in the sand and further used the texturing tool to make it look realistic and give it that sandy feel.

I made the texture and colours between the background sand and the sand in the hourglass different to differentiate them, so the meaning didn't get lost and for them to blend into each other, I also added a blue sky to give the image more colour and to break up the yellows adding a nice contrast into my design

HUD

I decided to go for a game HUD of the two options as i think a futuristic HUD would add to the atmosphere of my design so i began looking at examples of HUDs from futuristic games one prime example was the halo games they where a big inspiration for this design as they shared a lot of similarity with the atmosphere i was trying to create a genetically modify solider built to kill with aggressive efficiency i wanted to build a HUD that fitted and worked with my character design to further build the idea players would have of the character

so I started looking at game HUD and building my mood board

I liked the way the HUD showed you had a helmet on by just the placement of the parts rather then having a big bar on the sides to show that you where wearing something and i wanted to inc operate some of this in my design but making my fit more to my character to do this I gave it more of a inhuman feel almost alien in a way i started experimenting with some basic ideas and sketching them out

I put a health bar at the top as i felt this was the best place for it following halos design philosophy i felt if i gave the bottom bits a curved upward look and placed the info on them it would give that inhuman feel i was looking for while still functioning as a usable HUD that didn't distract or lessen the game play 

I decided to go with just one curve rather then two as i wouldn't to cover the screen as least as possible and also wanted to give the player less info this way they could truly get immersed into the character who also has little info of where they are by only giving them a small mini map and they only know what weapons they have it puts them in the same place as the character only being able to tell the time by daylight and see a small area around them

This is my finished HUD design I tried to keep it minimal while adding detail where i can.

By having a bare bones design this shows the lower ranking of the character, in contrast from the halo design your character isn't vitally important they are just your grunt soldier

they just need to follow those around them and know how much ammo they have don't need to know the time or where they are.

character 

for my character i wanted to build that inhuman grunt soldier that has been built for war that would fit into a desert environment so I started thinking about what sort of thinks would be in a desert that would be a good design for a solider looking at the animals that live in deserts i decided on a lizard like creature as i felt that it could lend itself to the environment while having a fun design to play with so i first created a mood board of all the features of the i wanted in my creature

i wanted a monster that was given the basics of a human form but everything else was designed to be used for war and easy to mass produce a creature that could last in many weathers with a tough exterior that could take a beating and still survive i loosely used Godzilla as my base as he was easy to use as reference while having the pose and shape that i envisioned  

my first sketch with big arms and a large tail a bulky unit that was simplistic in design i didn't like how inhuman it looked and it didn't have a lot of functionality so redesigned him

my design was given class and sharp teeth and more eyes i liked how it felt more developed for war but less human even more it was difficult to reach a good balance between the two so i decided to just go for adding a more upright pose and some human features more close to an intelligent creature then human exactly 

my first design for my character I gave them a prominent lizard form but a human hand and a bipedal pose, I gave them a human hand to signify they where capable of using tools and had some intelligence while replacing there other arm with a gun to show they where built for war and not expected to do anything else, they where the lowest of the low and it was easier to attach weapons to them so they would never be without one and so they couldn't lose anything precious like a weapon it was more important then there arm.

I gave them a large tail with spikes to be used as a weapon or to stabilise themselves while aiming with bug eyes to allow them a wide range of vision, there teeth large and sharp to be used as weapons and to strike fear, much to big for there mouths as them being able to hurt others was more important then there ability to comfortably eat as they weren't given real food anyway designed to be able to break bones and chew into carcasses so they can survive even without a direct supply line with naturally grown body armour they could save as much metal as possible while building these grunts

This is when i began colouring i gave them red eyes and blood on there teeth to show there savagery despite there humane features

i painted the body green as i felt like it fit the character and same feeling as soldiers in camo looking like the camo and uniform the real army uses 

I next painted the gun giving cold colours and a robotic feel i also shaded it to make it look better and more realistic

I then painted the gums and rest of the eye

This is my finished character with shading to make them more realistic i like how my design has come out and I like how feral the head looks without the whole design looking animalistic 

environment 

for my environment I wanted to make a desert but have high mountains and a fortress on them which was a challenge but I think it would look good and fit my themes of having shaky foundations and the look of a base on top of a red mountains gives a nice theme of being built upon blood building a base on top of sand to show how little they care of the work required and there lack of understanding trying to conquer everything even something as useless as a desert that does not have any resources to start i looked at images of deserts and fortress and compiled them into a mood board

I also got some images of a mountains in deserts to see what they look like in real life

my first idea was a man made mountain that was built in a pyramid formation a sort of ruined city in the desert but i felt like that would overpower the environment and didn't really incorporate the environment being a desert so I scrapped the idea

my next design was a sort of military base that had high walls and a large fence and outposts but it felt too modern and not really futuristic plus i didn't like how it looked so i decided to scrap this idea as well

i finally came to an idea i liked an outpost on top of a mountain like the castles in England and Europe built for defence but also to show authority

I first drew the desert and mountain adding a couple of rocks to break up the scenery 

then I added the outline for the base a metal structure that gave the feeling of a base but also took inspiration from oil rigs on the ocean a place for work and efficiency not really living a nice balance between the fortress and military base 

I added some details to the rocks and added a back ground and some other mountains just to add more to the scene and make it less empty

finally i coloured the base given it a cold metallic grey to contrast the vibrant environment to make it stick out and show it doesn't belong there I also added a shadow to the mountain below it to show how it looms over but the scene still looked a bit lacking

so i added textures to the rocks and sand to make them pop out more and finishing my design i liked the barren wasteland as it made the one structure even more feel out of place further adding to the atmosphere

final design

for my final I added all my designs into one placing my character,HUD and icon into my environment 

with all the designs added together i completed my piece i had a border around my icon to make it stand out