Final Concept

The final concept scene is based on the Soldier's march, just before he will meet the Witch. I was originally going to do a battlefield but I then turned more to the woodland idea to make the scene feel more like an enchanted fairy tale where most adventures happen in the deep dark woods. I did however keep the idea that we has been fighting previously due to the dead bodies scattered around the Forrest. I based my background one the image above of an ambient Forrest but developed my image a lot more so it looks like the solider is walking in the evening than the morning.

Colour Iterations and Character Sheet

In the end, I decided to develop the overcoat iteration, leading me to try it with 4 different colours to see which one works the best. In the Georgian times, troops from neighboring countries may have looked the same but it was their colour that defined them from their enemies. I went for 4 very stereotypical colour schemes at that time so that the soldiers nation could easily be identified e.g. Red and White- Redcoat- British.

After that I began to think more about the story of The Tinderbox and how my Georgian character would interact inside it. I took the opening extract from the story and briefly highlighted parts of it so that I can visualize them on my character sheet:

 SOLDIER came marching along the high road: “Left, right—left, right.” He had his knapsack on his back, and a sword at his side; he had been to the wars, and was now returning home.

As he walked on, he met a very frightful-looking old witch in the road. Her under-lip hung quite down on her breast, and she stopped and said, “Good evening, soldier; you have a very fine sword, and a large knapsack, and you are a real soldier; so you shall have as much money as ever you like.”

“Thank you, old witch,” said the soldier.

“Do you see that large tree,” said the witch, pointing to a tree which stood beside them. “Well, it is quite hollow inside, and you must climb to the top, when you will see a hole, through which you can let yourself down into the tree to a great depth. I will tie a rope round your body, so that I can pull you up again when you call out to me.”

“But what am I to do, down there in the tree?” asked the soldier.

“Get money,” she replied; “for you must know that when you reach the ground under the tree,

“Have you got the tinder-box?” asked the witch.

“No; I declare I quite forgot it.” So he went back and fetched the tinderbox, and then the witch drew him up out of the tree, and he stood again in the high road, with his pockets, his knapsack, his cap, and his boots full of gold.

“What are you going to do with the tinder-box?” asked the soldier.

“That is nothing to you,” replied the witch; “you have the money, now give me the tinder-box.”

“I tell you what,” said the soldier, “if you don’t tell me what you are going to do with it, I will draw my sword and cut off your head.”

“No,” said the witch.

The soldier immediately cut off her head, and there she lay on the ground. Then he tied up all his money in her apron. and slung it on his back like a bundle, put the tinderbox in his pocket, and walked off to the nearest town

http://www.hca.gilead.org.il/tinderbx.html extract taken form Hans Christian Andersen’s: The Tinderbox

In this particular instance, I have made the which an anonymous

form of evil that the soldier would have to fight in the video game to pass through to the next level.

Face Itterations

Here I have formulated a variety of features which the character would possibly have in the story. All of the variants have a probable chance to work except the wig which I just added in since they were very popular for men and women in the Georgian era but I doubt at the start of the story the soldier could afford one. The generic face of the character is based of a photograph taken by a friend who is doing a photography at University ( and allowed with the subjects permission to be used). Even though the person is quite young in the original picture, I decided to make the concept slightly older indicating that he has been in  couple of battles. After I got feedback off various people and helpful suggestion, I decided to formulate elements of the head iterations together to form possible characters I might use for my final concept.

Soldier Itterations

To get the scaling and perspective right for the character costume, I decided to look briefly at a mans anatomical structure. Along side that I looked at different European skin tones so that the character and be slightly more identified by his race as well as his uniform. Next I looked at a selection of low ranking uniform which a common soldier at that time would wear. I decided to keep the iterations simple by only using 4 colours so that the viewer can focus on the change in uniform rather than its colour.

Character Silhouettes

For my final project for this unit, we had to visualize a character from Hans Christian Andersen's "The Tinderbox"in the style of a particular era. I was assigned the Georgian Era (1714-1837). After reading the story and listening to the audio book, the character we I could visualize the most was the main character- The soldier, so I decided to conceptualize him. Since the character is portrayed as a greedy person who desperately wants money and fame but can lose it easily. I imagined the soldier in a low ranking position in the army, hence the eagerness to rise to royalty. My particular focus has been on Napoleonic foot soldiers such as one from Sharpe's Rifles. Since they spent most of their time fighting abroad and walking long distances, this would fit in well to the start of the story.

Final Concept

To go with the Egyptian theme, I decided to try to recreate a bazaar style background so that it suggests that the item is used commonly by Egyptian sailors and traders. After struggling with the wall light texture, I needed more scenery, so I used palm trees to give the scene a rather peaceful tropical vibe. I am pleased with my final outcome because I think the light source has been used correctly, making the picture fairly realistic but artistic enough to make it seems as if it was in a game. If I had more time I would work more on aspects of the background so that the scene is a lot clearer explained visually.

Shape Iterations and Model Sheet

Looking further into the idea of the sundial contained inside in the pocket watch itself, I began to create iterations of the container in  2 views, open and closed. My personal favorite shape was the circular one, but during my peers reviews and groups crits, I was told that the design would not work since I sundial needs to be still on a flat surface to work. The shape iterations were useful because they helped me develop my model sheet rather easily. Since the hieroglyphics I used earlier fit in well with the design, I decided to use an Egyptian scarab design on the lid to compliment the theme. I polished up my model sheet by adding light and shadows to help amplify that 3D effect.

Detailed Iterations

To give the design a more realistic feel, I explored various patterns and indents used in pocket watches. I came up with 7 different variants: 1-3 use engraving, 3-4 use marking and indents. , I chose to do the last 2 with a rectangular case, which I have now realized is impractical since it won't have the same spherical effect to tell the time.

Pocket Watch development/iterations

I decided to choose the idea of the sundial pocket watch because it seemed unique but rather practical. I have not had much experience of drawing pocket watches or sundials in great deal so I started of with some basic sketches and drawings. After I felt confident enough with the shape, I started to think how a sundial would comfortably fit in without damaging the lid and what angle the sundials shadow would be. I  then started working more with the idea of colour and how light sources effect the round surface of the pocket watch .

Timepiece project- Alchemy silhouettes

As well as the last project, I chose to use Alchemy to develop shapes and silhouettes for the time piece brief. One aspect I really like about the software is that It does symmetrical effect very well, meaning that you can produce detailed work very quickly. I also though about a brief use of colour and tried to use it to give more realism to my work but it is hard with Alchemy because sometimes the colours generate randomly.

Timepiece Silhouettes

My new brief for the 3rd/4th week was to design a timepiece. Since I had was unsure at first to which direction for this task I should follow, I looked up the suggested sources which led me to look at water clocks which work by the amount of water telling the time. Later on, I began looking at futurism and portability. Unlike my other projects, the silhouettes for this task are slightly more detailed because I had alot of thought going through my mind when I came up with them.

Character Sheet

Based on the colour iterations I created earlier, I used the same insect and made a sheet to show how the insect interacts with certain things,  This is important to do because if I was designing a game as part of a company, I would have to show an animator how the insect moves before someone programmed it.

Colour iterations

Even though I had an Insect outline and position, I was not entirely satisfied with it and decided to make something similar but look a lot more realistic so that you could actually visualize the creature in the game. To do this I did not use any black outlines and instead made everything colour using shades to show light and dark areas allowing it to look for 3D. I also took reference from a concept art of a giant Millipede  that was used from a game called Gryomancer. Using my previous ideas and slight appearance references from the millipede, I produced a variety of colour iterations showing the the insect in an adaptive form to its environments e.g. Brown- Earth, Green-Nature, Blue- water/darkness. 

Insect Itterations 2

After listening to a variety of peer reviews and opinions, I decided to make this insect design further by taking specific chosen parts from the previous selection and combining them together to create a new insect. Following the decisions, the insect turned out rather centipede like,hence why i have experimented with the idea of multiple arms.

The insects body is inspired by plate armour and dragon scales
to give the creature a very frightening/aggressive look while also giving it maximum protection. I also thought about trying other predatory features such as larger teeth or dragonfly-esque wings. I briefly tried various colours and shading but I wish to expand on this more throughout the project as I have put in too much black pen lines to obstruct the light.

Insect Itterations

After I finished creating a large variety of silhouettes, based on my own opinion and peer reviews, I decided to develop one of my insect bodies with more further detail. To create a selective number of iterations, I split the insect into 4 Key body parts: body, head,tail and arms. to form different effects I used numerous brushes and even included some shading to make the creatures parts look more realistic.

Alchemy Experiment

I decided to experiment with a program called Alchemy as another method of making random shapes and silhouettes. The effects that were created turned out rather interesting but at times were uncontrollable because you could not undo the mistakes, Of of interest, I decided to try a coloured silhouette which turned out pretty well using the dot effect to create a beetle.

Week 1/2- Insect Concepts

I started off with basic silhouettes to formulate quick ideas for shapes of various insects. These were very quickly done since I have never designed an insect before so I wanted to create a variety to help my thought process.They were done on Adobe Photoshop using a Graphics Tablet

Here I have kept to the idea of silhouettes, but I have added more form and detail to them using various brush strokes that Photoshop provided and various ones that I have downloaded for free on the internet from websites such as DeviantArt. I chose to look at more specific insects, focusing on various body parts such as: claws,wings, scales etc.