I was just wonderign if you guys ever work from Concept art or fo you pretty much just kind of lay out the general elements in floorplan form and have at it or what?

I have no ability what so ever with digi tools, but I am a sculptor ( Red Box Games ) and I do a bit of 2d here and there. I have made a lot of off handed suggestions but I wonder at your Modus Operandi. Migth a suggestion with actuall art be a better suggestion?

Even completely disregarding my interest in offering any form of contribution I do think it would be really cool to get a peek at how you guys go about the conception and design parts of each release.


- edit - actually I do have a background in 3d modeling. But it was all organic forms. I tried to do some level modding for Rune, btu just never really put the effort in that was needed.

First of all I really like your sculpts at the Redbox site. You've got great talent! I hope you continue to fill out that catalog.

In terms of work method; each of us has our own process so I can only speak for myself. I always start my projects with bare-bones sketches. I go through a mad sketching frenzy (not all of it very good) just to get the ideas out of my head. I then work my way back and start narrowing down the list based on complexity and the rough production time I've given myself for the project. From there I move into Photoshop and that's pretty much where I stay. Textures are developed from scratch and beyond filter usage there's a lot of painterly techniques used...I'm not a big fan of photo cheats and I think that it cheapens or destroys the kind of continuity you can create doing things from the ground up. Bottom line is that a fine art background with solid illustrative skills REALLY help.

Honestly, its a very long and very involved process that I can't sum up here. You could make a living explaining the tools and techniques alone.
Here's a couple ancient bits of media from past projects. Doesn't really tell you much but it might offer some insight:


And here's a short presentation: http://www.worldworksgames.com/cat_images/somcreate.swf

Wow, your sculpts are awesome! Colour me jealous...

I start with some very basic, utilitarian sketches and tend to go from there. It's nothing more than visual short hand really, not nearly as involved or as pretty as Denny's gatehouse sketch there and it's riddled with notes. Then I lay everything out on a flat template (this is where most of the actual development takes place). Then I move on to the texture development (which includes making any elements I need in 3D and rendering them out).

It's kind of convoluted and weird but it seems to work for me...

many thanks guys.

I have alway sadmired the ability of painters to bring things to life the way you guys do. It is a skill that has always eluded me. I do very much appreciate the small peek into your process. the vid clip was awesome as well. Thansk for taking the time to enlighten me.