Gaahhh.
Oct/090
Trying hard to get back into the workflow, but every time I attempt to do some more character animation I’m reminded that I suck at just drawing people, let alone animating them.
Consider this an impassioned cry for help. If you can animate characters and want your name shown prominently in the credits of the game, please let me know.
Brand New Logo
Jul/090
Brand Spanking New
You’re looking at the very first image of the Marvin Cooper logo on the main menu background. Obviously I have yet to add any menu parts to it, but that can wait for a bit.
In case you haven’t guessed by my production of actual computerised artwork, I have finished all of the planning for the visual aspect of the game. All backgrounds, characters, items and interface designs are done and dusted and I’m really looking forward to translating them into ‘proper’ images.
While I’m not drawing the backgrounds (which I will do first), I’ll be scripting all the dialogue for the game in an object-by-object and character-by-character manner, so there is (hopefully) something unique for every action on every item. The other major point for scripting everything is that it means I can divide off all of an individual character’s lines and send them to be voiced. Of course I have yet to pick anyone to do voices, but I think I’ll take dibs on at least Marvin himself or Dillbury. Perhaps both.
I was thinking a good faux-review snippet would be “An abundance of facial hair!”. There is indeed a good ratio of characters-to-facefuzz, and if that doesn’t draw people in, I don’t know what will.
At Last!!
Jul/090
The background drafts are finally all done! It feels nice to put that behind me for now and get on with something new – not that I don’t enjoy designing background art, but things get very dry when you do them on their own for a long time.
Step two of my ‘master plan’ is in three parts – character design, item design and GUI design.
I’ve made a great start on the character design already today, doing seven of what I worked out to be thirty-one in total. It isn’t easy, given that my inability to draw people is in serious need of attention, but hopefully the more I do the better I will get, and I can go back and redraw the earlier characters later.
I never seem to have a problem with drawing cartoon heads and faces, so that is where I’ve been starting each character; the issues arise with drawing the bodies in a way that I’m happy with. I have to find a way to show a good amount of personality in each character but also make them simple enough that I can animate them with ease, so I’m going to be relying heavily on instantly recognisable body types and exaggerated features.
I’m glad I decided the game would have a cartoon style to it; having to draw one realistic character, let alone thirty-one, would leave me very flustered indeed.
On a final note, I haven’t yet named Marvin’s assistants. I’ll be posting a topic to Draglide nearer to production-time to see if anyone would like their name in the game, but if you’re reading this and I haven’t made an announcement about it, feel free to drop me a line.
