Environment Production Pipeline

I’d like to discuss a general Environment production pipeline to give students and aspiring developers a clear idea of how levels are made. First we’ll identify the different stages of production and then I’ll talk about each in a little more detail. Although there is a huge variety of genres and engines, there are usually a few steps in the process that are similar to most projects.

Now let’s dig into each phase a little bit:

Level Brief – This can be a story from the writer or a description of the objective, that needs to occur during the level’s gameplay. Sometimes level briefs are as simple as one or two sentences. The level brief is typically presented to the concept artists, level designers, and environment artists during a level kickoff meeting. A good level brief is descriptive enough to get the team excited, but also ambiguous enough to allow the artists to explore some larger ideas. It also helps give context for the way this new level ties into the levels before and after it.

Key Art/ Map layouts – There are two main directions that can be taken after a level kickoff meeting. One is to have some key art created, and the other would be to have some high-level layouts created. Some teams actually do both if they have the resources/time. Key art are usually beautiful paintings that clearly define the mood and color palette as well as some design. They also get the team excited and help everyone move toward the same vision. A high level layout seeks to define the level beats and possible ideas for the gameplay. Below is a high level layout that I did based on the level brief I received from the head of story. I was trying to explore fun ways to traverse through the level and decide where the major encounters would occur. I also tried to plan in “Gates” that kept the players from moving backwards so that we could stream out all of the level geo behind them.