Partheniad

Mitch

@Partheniad

waste of flesh.

game designer. queer. disabled. amazing taste. poor choices.
look, i just like talking about media, okay?

it aint that deep.

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Partheniad
@Partheniad
Scampir
@Scampir
gee-man
@gee-man

Overthinking things is part of the job

When I'm working on key art, I have to balance my personal aesthetics with what's best for the piece. You want a cool pose but you should also clearly show the design, which don't always align. Then you have to consider the dimensions it'll be displayed.

Printed in a book? Then you're likely working within a letter size page. A double page spread is doable but then you have to consider the crease. Digital? What the size of the display? Monitor, TV, or phone? Board or card game? Probably more horizontal but also it's going to end up pretty small so a crop will probably be preferable to a full body shot.

To put it another way, Okawara and Obari both have an important role to play in their field. Obari's baroque dynamism might inspire and enflame the heart, but Okawara's art informs the fundamental truth of the design. The toy manufacturers, animators, and 3D modelers of the world know how vital a clear (if uninspiring) piece of art can be.

If you were hypothetically working on the key art for a pivotal and iconic Lancer design for an upcoming book that'll typically be displayed as a digital PDF in the dimensions of a standard letter size page, what would you pick?

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in reply to @gee-man's post:

osgpod
@osgpod

Layout designer here; I would pick C or D. D is pretty obvious in that it lends space to other work without crowding the page, but C is actually my favorite because it cuts a really interesting silhouette when I think about if/how I could wrap text, fit a stat block, or include the bottom-heavy angle as part of a dropdown block from a title header!

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gee-man
@gee-man

Thanks for the insight, I always love to hear from other parts of the pipeline how they'd use my work. I hadn't even considered how well D would play with other page elements. Lancer's general house style for layout tends to favor single page spreads with the art being the focus so I was thinking under those conditions.

An example from the player handbook of their typical mech page layout. Which sort of explains why I'd be hesitant to use a pose that weighs more horizontally than vertically.
https://sidequest.zone/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/OcrftLv.jpg

And I loved to hear that about C. I sometimes wonder if silhouettes like that cause more trouble than they're worth for layout so I'm glad to hear there's an interesting possibility space there.

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weeks
@weeks

not knowing anything about lancer id probably do something like b, but working for them i might pick c or d; i prefer dynamism but i think being flexible is important and idk if they would add letters or other elements or a background (reading the other comments i suppose they don't usually, though, so...)

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