Saturday, May 12, 2012

It's been an incredibly long time since I've posted anything.  So here's a few of the larger pieces from Fantasy Kingdoms from various sets (Valentine's, Kingdom of Giants set, and January's winter set)


The rooftop tiles and the tower columns were pieces reused/altered to fit this piece from some prior FK pieces created by A. Andrew.




Saturday, August 20, 2011

FK Creature Concepts

We use a few different animators in Fantasy Kingdoms.  One of the animators, I make front concepts for the creatures for him to generate the assets.  Here's some of the concepts:



This guy was inspired a bit by Rex in the BBC show Primevil.




FK - Map Background Images

Here's some larger versions of the map background corners for Fantasy Kingdoms.  They were made to feel a part of the map parchment and not be too distracting, so they don't have the vibrant colors of the in-game map assets. 

The in-game versions are much smaller and are programmed to float above a repeatable parchment texture, so that it can fit to any-sized monitor.  They basically sit behind the playfield and then move out to the corners when a player goes to fullscreen.

Top Left Corner

Bottom Right Corner

Bottom Left Corner



Saturday, May 28, 2011

Kingdom of Giants Assets

An archway to go with the grass fence below


A flower planter made from Mr. Morden's Salve Metal Tin.  The name "Mr. Morden" was borrowed from one of my favorite tv shows "Babylon 5."

I wanted to add some uniqueness to the house in a shoe, so I thought it would be fun if it was a pirate's boot. 

Our trees have two states with the 2nd growth state being harvestable.

Our producer loves the glowy flowers from the movie Avatar.  I thought I'd make a glowy piece and give it a rock base that matched some previous in-game rocks made by my co-artist in crime in FK!


This set was originally called Land of the Giants, but was changed since there was a tv show with that same name.  Most of these flowers are around twice the height of the player's character. (Select the image to see the actual in-game size!) :)

Saturday, May 7, 2011

Fantasy Kingdoms - Vector Characters and Creatures

Above are the two base player characters and an NPC named Harmony (right) larger than in-game.  These were vector creations in Flash.  They are animated, and those animations were initially done by another artist, but I have made a few tweaks since then.  They have different hair, accessories that can be switched out.  I, also, have made a few seasonal items.  The colors of skin, hair, accessory, clothes are changed programically when a player makes a selection in-game.  These characters have back versions as well. Harmony (right) is the mentor for new player's in-game, and she has her own set of kingdoms that player's can visit. 



The cats are also vector and were created in Flash.  Our creatures are mainly outsourced, but the blue cat was the first creature for the programmers to test in-game.  The other cats' creation soon followed. I did animate these although animation isn't a strong skill for me, I can get by. :)

Fantasy Kingdoms - St. Patrick's Day




Lucky's Tavern, Clover Wagon, Fairy Luck Tree

I suppose Lucky's Tavern was a bit of a stereotype, but the idea popped into my head, and it was too fun to miss.  This was actually done as a giant pilsner in anticipation of the later Land of the Giants set (which is our current in-game collection as of this post.)  For our building sets, we generally include four buildings: a house, tavern, magic library and alchemist, so this one completes that set.

I'd been wanting to do a Gypsy-style wagon and found a reference of an old beat-up Irish wagon online.  I used the shape as inspiration for this wagon.

The trees have two states.  The second one is the "growth" state where there is some kind of "fruit" that has been added that can be harvested.  I didn't post them on previous posts, but those trees also have a base fruitless version.

Fantasy Kingdoms - Chinese New Year

Some of the assets I created for Chinese New Years above.  A celebratory banner, rabbit terracotta warrior, a lantern bonsai tree, and a Chinese Airship.  Select the images for the larger in-game sized version.


Since it was the Year of the Rabbit, I wanted to make a rabbit warrior based on the Terracotta army - historically made by artisans for the first emperor of China and found buried underground (in 1974 according to Wikipedia) - Yeah, I watched a documentary special a while back on the history of China. 

Bonsai is a bit more Japanese although there is a Chinese equivalent.  I found a gorgeous bonsai reference which made me so envious of the patience and talent to raise and care for such a tree, I entertained the thought for a moment.  (I have cats, so it seemed overall an exercise in futility.)  This was my ode to that tree.  I added a little rabbit graphic on the base.

For the Chinese Airship, I combined the inspiration of the parade dragon floats along with my desire to create a floating ship.  I actually designed similar wings for an old ship I'd drawn a long time ago.  All the little details were fun to play around with creating.