A concept artist, or artists, are people that work on the design of characters, environments and objects for an animation, film or video game. The artist is given a theme or idea and they use their imagination to create an interpretation of this theme. It is their work that helps give you the feel for the animation you’re working on and helps iron out any problems before production.
The resulting images can be beautiful photorealistic pieces of art or simple sketches. Either way it gets the idea behind the design across to the person viewing it, even if it doesn’t make it to the final cut, the essence of it is there. Concept art seems to capture the mood of a setting because it can use a colour or style without having to worry that it doesn’t fit in with the rest of the film.
Concept art can be done totally digitally or physical art materials on paper; whatever medium the artist is most comfortable with expressing themselves in. Now programs like Photoshop have become more popular you see more expressive digital concept art appearing that has become more difficult to tell apart from traditional methods.
I really like the concept art for the video game Fable 2, the lead concept artist was Mike McCarthy who currently works with Lionhead Studios for four years and has been in the industry for about nine years. He has also worked on concepts for Black and White 2 I really like the way he captures a feeling in his work, at it comes out in the final game too. He draws his work as a pencil sketch first, and then colours it in using a program called ‘Painter’. It gives it a grimy effect and looks like you could reach out and touch the rough edges. McCarthy said in an interview that “It’s common for people outside of the digital industry to be completely unaware of what exactly a games artist does,” and also said: “Ironically, I think people are under the impression that the computer does it all. The average reaction I get when I talk to people about being a games artist is, ‘Oh, do you actually have to draw, then?’”
Here are some concept designs of the Spire from Fable 2 by McCarthy:
The resulting images can be beautiful photorealistic pieces of art or simple sketches. Either way it gets the idea behind the design across to the person viewing it, even if it doesn’t make it to the final cut, the essence of it is there. Concept art seems to capture the mood of a setting because it can use a colour or style without having to worry that it doesn’t fit in with the rest of the film.
Concept art can be done totally digitally or physical art materials on paper; whatever medium the artist is most comfortable with expressing themselves in. Now programs like Photoshop have become more popular you see more expressive digital concept art appearing that has become more difficult to tell apart from traditional methods.
I really like the concept art for the video game Fable 2, the lead concept artist was Mike McCarthy who currently works with Lionhead Studios for four years and has been in the industry for about nine years. He has also worked on concepts for Black and White 2 I really like the way he captures a feeling in his work, at it comes out in the final game too. He draws his work as a pencil sketch first, and then colours it in using a program called ‘Painter’. It gives it a grimy effect and looks like you could reach out and touch the rough edges. McCarthy said in an interview that “It’s common for people outside of the digital industry to be completely unaware of what exactly a games artist does,” and also said: “Ironically, I think people are under the impression that the computer does it all. The average reaction I get when I talk to people about being a games artist is, ‘Oh, do you actually have to draw, then?’”
Here are some concept designs of the Spire from Fable 2 by McCarthy:
The Spire is one of the main focuses of the game as a place that you are lead to believe throughout the story, is full of death and evil. However at the same time it’s full of magic and wonder. I think these concepts capture this because they are so dark and are made up of grey tones which make the glowing blues stand out so much more.
The perspectives in the concepts are just as important as they would be in art that is destined for the art gallery. The point of view is positioned carefully for the greatest effect, even though in the game it’s the player that positions the camera for the most convenient view. The low angle of the outside view it particularly effective because it makes the Spire more imposing as it towers over you, I think this shot was used eventually in a cut scene in the game.
Other pieces of concept art I like:
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