Hello again! I am back from summer and will now start up this blog again. Last week was the first week of our 3D1 course here at campus gotland.
Our first assignment was to discus and analyzes different screenshots from different games in groups of 4.
I am going to give a link to all the screen shots at the end so you can view them in its original size.
Screenshot one: Batman
This screenshot is geometric. Though a bit too much. If you don’t know it is batman lying on the floor then you would not know who the bad or good guy in the screenshot is if there are any of course.
The screen shot is Low-key. The picture is very dark in its colors. It has diagonal lines so the player will know something is about to happen. This is achieved with the camera being tilted to the side.
The negative space is out of focus. This makes your eyes go straight for the center of the screenshot where the action is going on. Even if you try to look at the background your eye will be pulled towards the center.
The color pallet is a classic Sci-Fi pallet. We have the different blues mixed with a red that stands out.
The Character standing is in a vertical position. Giving the feeling that he is strong and powerfully and towering over the character lying on the ground.
A note to make is that if you would take away the gun you would still feel that the character on the ground is in danger because the character standings pose and position.
Screenshot two: Bioshock Infinite
This screenshot has vertical lines. The camera is placed very near the ground centering the statue in the middle of the screenshot. The statue is towering over you because you are so close to the ground. This gives the feeling that you are small and tiny in this world. The lines in the street makes you want to move towards the statue. This is empowering the feeling that you are tiny and small.
The screenshot is high key with a bright and colorful pallet. This gives a friendly feel to the screenshot. But because of the towering surroundings (the houses and the statue) it makes you feel trapped and uncomfortable making the friendliness feel fake.
Screenshot three: Dishonored
The Horizontal lines in the screenshot is giving the feeling of calmness, the bird adds to this feeling.The birds help with the because if there was action in the scene the bird would not be there simple because that birds are fast to flee if something happens. The player is heading towards the vertical lines in the screenshot is making the player sense that something is soon about to happen.
The screenshot is Mid-key due to the rather light colors used, you have the light in the sky mixed with the light blues.
I get a sci-fi vibe of the screenshot but because of the texture that is rather old and industrial I would say that it is more to the steampunk theme.
The opening between the buildings on the right has diagonal line that make you want to focus there and be ready that something is about to happen.
Screenshot four: Penumbra
The screenshot is organic and low key but the light gives it a dramatic feel to the space in the screenshot.
The lines that go towards the center of the screenshot makes you want to center you attention to the middle, where the character is surrounded by the mouth of the alien slug looking like it’s just about it devour the character.
The Colorsheme and that the screenshot is low key gives the screenshot a rather depressing feeling.
LVL Design!
We got an assignment when in pairs were supposed to build up a simple level design sketch using the 3d tools we had learnt in class. We also had to choose from 4 different game to keep in that games style we also had to choose a word representing the esthetic goal.
We choose uncharted and solitude.
This first picture is an look from the top so you can see the layout of the level.
We looked up reference pictures for uncharted and found that a few of the levels were set in desert towns. So we started to think what might be in a desert town, we fast choose we wanted to go for a bit of a wild west theme. We also thought that the best way to show solitude is to show that people have lived here before but then suddenly left because they could not live there for some reason. So we built a well in the middle of the level witch we thought represents life in a desert but we made it broken. We also added carts that where torn down and broken.
Thies pictuers are just taken from the side to see all the elements of the level, The purple box is the size of the player.
This is what the player would see when he enters.
Gamedesign and Graphics 