How To Create Game Art?

create game art

When it comes to developing a game, the first line of thought that come to the creator’s mind is what the game is going to be about and how to realize it. Game designers remain plagued with the first thought while game developers and game artists are concerned about the latter.

As the design and concepts are decided, the next line of processes involved involves game art. It involves several roles such as 3D modeling, lighting, sculpting, rigging, texturing, and finally animating.

Are you interested in creating video game art? It implies that you are ready to delve deeper into the world of video game art designing which involves crafting props, characters, and environments.

But video game art refers to a general term showcasing any part of the visual gaming world – ranging from casual art to highly realistic 3D models. It’s obvious that the subject is very deep and detail-oriented. And the best way to start discussing it is with 2D art for games.

Understanding video game art pipeline

The process followed by any game art studio is highly creative and innovative and it needs to follow a specific game art creation pipeline which makes it highly efficient. The first step is devising the pre-production. Most outsourcing animation services opt for creating and launching the products as early as possible.

But that doesn’t mean you can opt out of any vital process or reduce the time required and create something in a hurry. Here goes a checklist of elements that need to make it to your to-do list:

• Researching

As you define the genre as well as the style of the game, it’s important to search for relevant instances of art pieces among contenders along with other related projects. Experts suggest that you should collect visual references of the best ones and highlight those features that will work for gaming art.

• Defining the backdrop

To create unique features for your game art, it’s important to come up with a detailed backstory for the characters, ambiance, and locations. This will allow the artist to picture the future game art concept clearly.

• Concept

Video game concept art is basically documentation with meticulous 2D sketches of the characters, environment, and assets. Every artist determines how to create video game concept art on paper and particular software like such as Autodesk Sketchbook. If you are looking for outsourcing animation services, it’s worth exploring how much it takes to create concept art and the factors affecting the price.

Designing the game art

One of the most exciting and responsible aspects of game art creation entails bringing those abstract concepts to life. This procedure comprises four primary steps that will lead to the creation of a fascinating video game art.

The first step is drawing in which the creators outline the future assets, characters, and ambiance of the game scene depending on the instance of concept art. The next step is working on the lighting and shadows. As the drawing is ready, the creator paints the art with a color palette decided before. The assets and characters appearing in every scene must be coherent with the shade as well as the color scheme.

In the next phase, the creator rechecks the game art and brings about the necessary alterations for allowing a flawless appearance. Based on the style of the game, the picture can be optimized with particular editing tools available online.

• Vector art: This art style is developed on mathematical algorithms and calculations for creating digital images with geometric primitives known as vectors. Specific software such as CorelDRAW, VectorMagic, and Adobe Illustrator can be used in this regard.

• Pixel art: This is one of the most sought-after styles even today in the times of hyper-realistic art. This style is representative of flat digital images as opposed to vector art and is constructed from tiny squares called pixels. For creating pixel art for games, game artists use software such as Pixie or PiskelApp.

Cutout art: Games such as Paper Mario and Tearaway are composed with the type of art presented by the name itself, cutout. Props, environment, and characters are made from paper cut-out effects with the help of software.

The last phase of designing the game art is creating art as well as animating it with various multifunctional applications like Pencil 2D or Autodesk Sketchbook. Above all, creating outstanding video game art involves talented, proficient, and skilled artists in the team. And if there is a lack of art design specialists in the team, it’s better to go for outsourcing animation services.

The phases involved in post-production

If you are new to the world of video game art, you will be surprised to know that the work doesn’t come to an end even after the illustrations are absolutely perfect and appears life-like with animation. In the post-production steps, various professionals work together to turn the game art into a functional piece.

As each scene of the video game becomes ready, the developers include the visuals together into a single system. This phase of game development is referred to as the backend and it incorporates coding to make those visuals work as per the game script.

To implement the animated game art into a coherent system, it must be quality-tested. In the initial phase, the game developers opt for unit testing to determine the operational ability of each code unit. Further, multiple tests are run for checking game performance under various conditions.

Final thoughts

To think of some specific game genre, we usually think of some peculiar details about the art involved in it. For instance, when gamers play Dead Cells, Pinstripe, or Elden Ring, they presumably imagine the particularities that go into making fantasy art for the games.

Many people opine that fantasy game art is defined by magic elements and sci-fi along with fantastic creatures such as unicorns, elves, or dragons. This is where game artists play their role efficiently in creating art for various genres. Game art studios typically rely on classic elements of a particular genre and use them to create a stupendous end product.

Gretchen Walker
Gretchen is a homemaker by day and writer by night. She takes a keen interest in life as it unfolds around her and spends her free time observing people go about their everyday affairs.