Lighting is also very important to guide the player and to let the shaders really fire on all cylinders. It also helps to convey the mood I’m going for.

Blockout

When I first came on, the entire game was blocked out but it was very rough. In the end, much of the game changed, because over time there was an evolution of the game in terms of goals and game flow. So, I did do a good amount of blocking before entering production in the environment, though after making the preliminary blocking, I would go in and create higher level details so that I could get a better sense of how the lighting and silhouettes would work in the area. There weren’t any textures in this phase, just very rough and quickly assembled models that would be replaced later as well as some preliminary lighting. By creating this sort of “mid-level detail,” it helped in planning out modular pieces I may be able to use or not use in the given area as well as plan out the composition and generate new ideas in order to improve it. Those at Cyan are used to wearing many hats and helping to plan the environment from an early stage to final polish. This workflow worked for me personally because I liked having a high amount of control over the work I was doing. I felt like I could put more of myself into the game and feeling a higher sense of ownership.

Areas

When planning areas out, I get an initial verbal breakdown of what the goals are for the player in a particular area given by my art director, Eric Anderson and the CEO/game designer, Rand Miller. These breakdowns are usually accompanied by drawings on a whiteboard. We would also get in group discussions often that included the concept artist, Derrick Robinson, to see if any new ideas floated up to the top. In some cases, blockouts were made by the concept artist for me to work from if it was something he had a clear vision for. In terms of the following image, I knew that there were two draws–the girl hunched over the desk, and secondarily, the door behind her. I tried to focus the environment in a way that would show these two important things in exactly that order.