Colour studies

So from my previous series of sketches i worked on some colour study pieces, focusing on the light and shadow in the scene. Taking influence from prominent artists who use the style of Chiaroscuro in there work such as Caravaggio and Rembrandt. 

I was also taking inspiration from one of my favourite painters, Roberto Ferri, an Italian painter from Taranto. Who is inspired a lot by Baroque art, the old masters of the Romanticism and symbolism. I find his composition work absolutely beautiful as well as his masterful use of lighting, much like the artists of the Chiaroscuro style. 

I was also looking at artists who use religious symbolism in art. The below piece is by an artist call Mikhailovitch Vasnetsov

Horror Hotel concept (When bunnies attack)

So for the 'hotel corridor horror' brief, we had to create a scene in a hotel corridor in which its your first interaction with a mysterious being of some sort. I went with bunnies. Because why not; i wanted to do something fun for this project brief. Below are my initial sketches for hotel ideas, some more elaborate than others, i felt the simpler layouts would be easier to create a scene with, i liked the 'wonky' view point of the top right concept so that's what i went with. 

I kept with a monotone black and white image style as i wanted the red in the eyes to stand out more in contrast to the bleak environment.

God composition (4)

I really liked the concept that the gods are these manipulative 'puppeteers' of mankind like figures so this was the imagery I went with on this piece. My process with this shown below.

 Final piece

God composition (3)

Above is a really quick idea for a composition piece. As the gods i'm doing are the 3 fates, who in mythology deal a lot with the "threads of life" and yarn and weaving is featured heavily in the lore about these beings. I wanted the 3 golden strands to stand for each of the 3 fates, the hand being this big imposing puppeteer, of the fate of mankind.

God composition (2)

Below is a small aspect of my process, i started with a really simple and quick sketch out for how i wanted the composition and then i went straight in with colour to figure out where my light source would be. 

Above is the final piece. 

God conceptual piece (finished)

My finalised piece.  

Composition work

 Above is a set of composition sketches, through these i really wanted to portray a sense of majesty in the god figure. I was looking a lot into renaissance symbolism in paintings and looking at the works of surrealist artists like Dali, Andre Breton, Yves Tanguy and Beksinski. I will take these sketches further to produce some finished concepts.

Above is my personal work and progression into the final piece. For this I was heavily inspired by Beksinski's work, his use of colour to portray the mood of the piece and his dynamic composition. 

God character process

Above are some headdress designs, i was looking a lot into ancient Greek jewellery and headdresses for inspiration for this.

 Below are some more iterations on costumes design ideas in colour, keeping the base material neutral. Then I experimented with looking into having her with some body paint/tattoo ideas.

God Design concepts

 Using the programme Alchemy i produced some very abstract silhouettes for my god design. Below are iterations on these silhouettes in colour. I love bold and triangular shapes in my costume designs, i think it works really well with a subject like a god, who is to be a very imposing and domineering figure. 

Below is a collection of some simple outfit and headdress designs, the bottom 3 where my favourite and i will be taking these further. 

Dissertation notes/essays

Eugene F. Provenzo (Video Kids: making sence of Nintendo)

"Provenzo's work lacks some nuances: he seems to be a technological determinist, arguing that games do not give players the possibility of control and modification, therefor players subordinate to these instructions and obey mindlessly. perhaps games do not let players directly modify the conditions of play, but players, in their phenomenological experience of the game, have the capacity not to subordinate to the game, not to be totally determined by its rules." ---(This brings up the subject that it is important to take into account that games are designed objects with a set of pre-determined rules. Do games just offer the illusion to freedom of space and actions? and if so what are the boundaries to this?) 

Ethical Agents in game.

The game as a system with rules needs to be considered as a simulation of a world when players engage in activities which guide and reward by that same system; we have to think about the player as ethical agents. 

Ethics of game:

Games force behaviours by rule: the meaning of those behaviours, as communicated through the game world to the player, constitute the ethics of computer games as designed objects. 

Games rules - Salen & Zimmerman's quote -

" rules are the inner, format structure of games." rules have also operational values: they limit what players can do, and they also reward certain actions; they create the winning conditions and the limits and boundaries of the game. 

Zimmerman 3 rules: 

• Constitutive
• operational
• implicit

Dissertation work

The Ethics of computer games: Miguel Sicart

Notes taken from Miguel Sicart's book 'The ethics of computer games" in which he discusses aspects of ethical practices portrayed in games and interactive media. Whats right? how do we as the player react in these situations and is there a right or wrong answer? should there be? He touches on some major points in which i want to discuss in my written work such as 'player responsibility' and the portrayal of important events/factors from real-world situations.

--"Deus Ex is a critically acclaimed first-person shooter, in which players explore a dystopian world as a super-soldier. The aim is to stop the spread of a plague by retrieving the vaccine from the "terrorists". But who is the real terrorist, and what does it mean? its not as simple as good Vs evil. In many combat games, " following orders" means "doings the right thing". Deus Ex breaks that expectation and forces players to reflect on the meaning of their actions. Ethical thinking is as powerful as a handgun, and ethical responsibility the most adequate gameplay strategy."--

Notes:

There is a really interesting little indie game coming out in February of 2017 called '911 operator' created by a kickstarter campaign from a company from poland called PlayWay. The premise of the game is you play as an 911 operator from a city of your choice, answering the calls to 911 and responding to the caller, giving first-aid instructions, advise, send our dispatches or even ignoring calls altogether (if you was so inclined to do so) 

But here is an example of how situations explored in games can maybe have a controversial backlash due to the subject matter. about a year ago a small game created by a 6 person team designed for the VR system caused major backlash with various amounts of people on the subject matter the game was based around. It was called '08:46' named after the exact time the very first plane crashed into one of the twin towers during the 9/11 attacks. Gamers plays as an office worker trapped on the upper level of the world trade centre during the attacks and has to make decisions on what to do next in order to survive. I would view this as less a game and more an interactive experience, there is no overall goal to this apart from experiencing the happenings around you and listening into the conversations and calls of your various co-workers, you cant win. no matter the choices you make, and its not intended to be something which you 'win'. The main goal of making the game the creators said was to create a simulation in which players could emphasise and better understand the situation the victims of the attack where in, some people have called out that people don't need a simulation of the events in order for people to emphasis with the victims. This brings up another aspect i want to touch on in my research. In games are there some situations and topics that should not be recreated? and if so, why not? does this not all come under creative freedom? what topics are seen as "too sensitive". When people are perfectly fine with playing a game such as grand theft auto, which has portrayals of abuse on prostitutes or games such as Call of Duty and other warfare games which highlight the horrors of war most people don't blink an eye, but being put in the position of a powerless victim of a terror attack has people calling out in disgust? Does it have something related to the fact that even in today's age, games are still seen as purely an entertainment media as apposed to facilities in which to touch on more important issues, does that trivialise the subject matter at all in the views of the public? 

Parasite Concepts (colour 2)

Here i was looking into some alterations with the colour designs, at this point i'm still not sure on what way i want to take the colour with them, i do want to make them a bit more muted. Below are some alternate design ideas, i quite prefer the way these are going so i will carry on with this a bit further.  

Parasite concepts (colour)

Some various alterations on the original parasite design, as well as looking into colour

Parasite Concepts

Here are some really simple workings on initial parasite silhouette designs, at the moment they feel too character like and less like small parasitic beings, i will come back to these at a latter date  most probably.

From my sketchbook work i produced some digital versions of my 2 favourite ideas, I also included a little idea of how this parasitic being could gain control of the host and latch onto the body. I like the idea of this very 'alien face-huger' idea wherein the parasite latches into the head of the host and gains access through the mouth/nose directly to the brain. As the main purpose of my parasite idea would be for them to gain control of the host and release them of inhibitions, going straight to the sources of this (the brain) would make the most sense. I also played with the idea that the 'sack' the parasite is part of totally envelopes the hosts head, filled with a liquid like substance which distorts the hosts vision and senses.   

Sketchbook curiosities

Some sketchbook workings on some of my project work for uni, looking at ideas for parasite designs, which i was really influenced by sea creatures, i like the idea of this 'orb-like' creature manoeuvring in the environment as if in water. I also did some really quick 3 scenes of compositions of ideas for the god, at this point i'm not sure in what direction i want to take my god designs of the 3 fates, what they look like, if i want them to be 3 separate beings or a combination of all 3 combined into one being. But i'm thinking i like the idea of this ethereal body being less humanistic in appeal, but at the same time i have to be careful not to make it so devoid of human character as i still want my god to produce a feeling of empathy and understanding from the viewer and i feel that in some cases when the design is taken completely out of human characteristics it looses this feeling of understanding with the viewer as it is so alien. 

Anatomy lecture (Face, shoulder, back muscles)

Some work in my anatomy lectures, starting to look more into the back muscles and shoulder bones like the Coracoid Process, Subscapular fossa, Acromion Process and Clavicle and how these different bones work together in order for the arm, back and shoulder to do certain movements.  We also looked more into the anatomy of the facial structure and the different muscles in the face.

Anatomy update (The Hand)

Using copper wire i wrapped around the wire which will be used for the Humerus and Radius bones in the arm and then skimmed this with wax in order to give the sculpt something to latch onto. I also added some extra wire to the ends to be used as the skeleton for the fingers and hand bones. The Ulna bone and Radius will be worked on latter in the models stages.