Progress Update #5 – An Art Update

Hey Everyone, Andre here for my first post! You may have been wondering where I’ve been, but my focus on this project has been on the art and lighting side. I’ve also been lending a hand with the general design of the map as a whole.

This week we implemented our first art pass, and I’m here to give you the details! Unfortunately, I don’t have a video for you, but I do have some pretty pictures! I’ll give you fair warning: there will be text, but I’m sure you’re all a strong bunch and will be able to pull through

First up, in case you may have forgotten, the original idea for this map was to be placed within a ship yard. Normally, the textures used in TF2 are used for more outdoor areas with a bit of a western theme (while playing the game, you may have noticed how the red team uses a lot of wood, dirt, and brick in their color pallet, while the blue team uses a lot of cement, tile, and metal). So, when I started putting together our list of textures, the choices turned out to be somewhat slim. However, there were a few key textures that suited our design.

Throughout the map I used various brick textures to give some personality to many of the buildings (seen heavily used here at the red base). I really wanted to make sure that the map expressed our nautical theme, and given the textures that I had to work with, the brick seemed to work extremely well.

By comparison, although the brick is used at the blue base and throughout the first area, the dominant blue crates help to balance it out. Further, inside the blue base, I avoided using any brick at all, and focused on simple, subtle concrete textures for the walls, and a blue shaded concrete for the ceiling. These two textures are also used throughout building A and building B to identify them as belonging to the blue team.

A little further into the map we hit building C, where things start to get a little different. I brought in metal textures for our walkways and for much of the trim. White concrete was also used for the support pillars. Within this large central building, I continued the theme from the blue base, using white walls and a pale ceiling to identify the building as neutral ground.

Another common texture used in the map is wood, used for most of the floors to give the impression of a dock, and for most of the boat. I used slightly lighter textures on the interior of the boat, but kept the pattern of dark floors, light walls, and slightly darker ceilings that are found throughout the rest of the map.

Of course, since this is only the first pass, many of the textures look very flat and lifeless – that’s because a lighting pass has not been applied, and some of the scaling is a bit off. These are things that will be remedied in the weeks to come.

So, what are we looking at in the future for art? Over the next few weeks, we’ll be going through the map and making alterations to much of the brush work, allowing for more intricate texture patterns, and more detail on the buildings.

Coming up, Kevin will be posting a video showing the current progress of the map, along with a commentary on the feedback we received for our first Alpha test.

- Andre M.