WORLD BUILDING
April 2020
A personal world building + concept art endeavor centered around two ways of life.
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In the Forest: people are living and scavenging off of a devolved environment, using nature to their advantage, and avoiding the dangerous wasteland of a time long forgotten.
In the City: citizens are confined in a high tech, 1950’s inspired futuristic hub.
Final outfit breakdown for Alexia - Forest
Silhouette explorations
SilhouetteS
I did a couple of passes on the silhouettes and designs of these 3 characters (two above, one below) to further push their defining traits and the visual cohesion between the two groups I was exploring.
The silhouette of the city is rounded, with clean lines. Their weapons are often built from one piece of material, with moving and adjustable parts that add to their functionality. They also have hovering items.
The Forest’s silhouette is disheveled, irregular, and most importantly, full of movement. They are asymmetrical, and have a lot of attachable parts such as rings, knots, and belts. They occasionally invoke imagery reminiscent of animals and insects with horns, claws, and snouts.
Final character outline of Emerin - City
Final character outline for Rothin - Forest
Inspirations & Early PROCESS
I spent some time familiarizing myself and becoming comfortable playing with a set of styles I had selected as my inspirations before going into a design space. These were 1950s fashion, 1950s ideas on futurism, neosport styles, apocalyptic scenery, boho fashion, etc.
All of the characters are designed with the pose that is most significant to their character, based on frequency of use, or importance. For example, Alexia is drawn crouched down because she is a trapper, and will often be in that position. She is also emotionally closed off, and crouching highlights that aspect of her personality. Meanwhile, Rothin spends a lot of time in the camp, and is typically very idle. However, he is willing to sprint into action when the time calls for it. I designed his character so that he would look most natural when in motion, which would spark viewers to wonder why he didn’t spring into action more often. Finally for Emerin I focused on designing her within her mech, as that is an important technology distinguishing those in the city, and I figured it was important to get that visual language down. I also wanted the silhouettes of the mechs to be sleek and smooth looking while also being able to shift into looking more menacing when seen from the point of view of Alexia and Rothin, for example.
For further developlment, I chose one of the characters who I thought was the most complex design wise, and who would be the most difficult for a third party or 3D modeler to interpret, and worked on adding detail and breaking down the pieces of her design (seen above).
Item dEsign
THE City -
Visual References:
Ricardo Bofill
The Jetsons
Cloud Atlas
Metabolic Architecture & Gestural Architecture
The Fifth Element (interiors)
Compact Homes
For the items in the City, I wanted to capture the fun and colorful aesthetic of 1950s gadgets, combined with a few aspects that would be considered more modern or futuristic.
Most movies and games present a future that is either bleak, run down and dirty or overly clean and neon. Thus, I wanted to create a fantasy world that existed beyond this typical portrayal. That is not to say that there aren’t any problems in The City, but rather, that these problems aren’t immediately evident in the built environment. Through The City’s design, I wanted to highlight that problems can exist in beautiful well maintained places, just as they do in our real world.
THE FOREST -
Visual References:
The 100
The Last of Us
AfterEarth
Horizon 0 Dawn
Cottage Core/Witch Ascetic
Overall Idea:
For the items in the forest, I drew inspiration from pre industrial nomadic societies as well as combat attire. I focused on creating items that reflected the need to be nomadic and active.
These peoples coexist with nature and use it to their benefit. In their society, all items are made from natural materials, which includes those items in nature that hold magical aether.
Environmental Design
The following image is of a sacred space for The Wildlings. There are only a few sacred locations throughout the world, and are all within nature. Because of this, I made sure to create an environment that could feasibly exist in nature, but was still fantastical and larger than life. Anyone walking in should feel dwarfed by the environment and engulfed in the sacred connection between nature and their tribe. This is a natural cathedral; a place of worship, and a place to protect the important magical items of this world.
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