Over the weekend I had a good think about how to elaborate on my previous post regarding my plan for this term's project. I've already mentioned that I'd like to focus on character design and develop my own visual style along the way, but I didn't go into too much detail about the genre/setting of the world I'll be building upon. This post should pose and answer a few questions relating to that side of things.
First of all, I'll tackle the genre: dark fantasy. Nice. The setting? Post-apocalyptic fantasy universe, where magic-channelling technology, cities and artefacts, once commonplace, are either destroyed or lay scattered throughout the land. While this power-source was once controlled by technology, a catastrophic event of some sort occurred and now it has seeped out, distorting and perverting nature's laws, creating abominations and distorting the geography.
World population has dropped dramatically as a result of the catastrophe; the great cities have crumbled and are now nothing more than ruins that nature has reclaimed. Remnants of the past technology remain, but are often useless, their resources having been depleted.
Some humans still remain, wandering the land and seeking solace - the quest for safe, untainted land, free from this purgatory. Therefore, this project will tell the story of scavenger/travellers; a monster-hunting/looting kind of deal. The rare magi-tech finds are extremely valuable in this setting; the travellers will be skilled enough to be able to dismantle, alter and create weapons, defenses etc from their finds. Magi-tech weaponry can be extremely powerful in this world, capable of allowing the character to face-off against some of the mightier foes.
Also in this world, I want there to be a cult of wizards/necromancers/dark mages who devote themselves to a higher being/demon of some kind. Maybe they were responsible for the catastrophe? Perhaps it was organised, or maybe something went wrong - they were used and betrayed by the devil/deity they worshipped, who maybe sought escape from some imprisonment and used the wizards/dark mages to suit it's own nefarious plan?
That might be a pretty vague and messy pre-vis summary, but I'm still juggling a lot of ideas around in my head at the moment, trying to imagine the characters that might inhabit this world, so as I figure it out a bit more I'll add to this.
My default art style is quite comic-book-y; bold linework; bright colours; exaggerated and stylised characters; special effects etc. This style of output will likely steer the direction of my designs along the way, which is no bad thing as it will keep me happy with the quantity of work I'll be able to produce.
While I'll be sticking to this style for the majority of my exploratory and illustrative work, one of my intents is to explore some alternative visual styles along the way. For instance, I might adopt more of a Manga approach to some illustrations, or go with digital painting techniques further down the line, if I find myself with enough time to learn some more techniques.
To summarise, this post has definitely created more questions than I thought it might, but I'll have fun trying to figure out some answers to them and continue to evolve this story. In the meantime, I still need to decide what output the story will benefit mostly from; at the moment I'm thinking videogame, but comic book illustration might also be an option.
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