作者：Josh White

美术设计是原创设计师和设计执行者之间的交流。它不是设计过程，不是最终设计的执行。在本文中，我将讲述一个关于游戏的美术设计的故事。

假设，你想给你的宠物蜥蜴来张绘像。你的想法是，把蜥蜴放在一根漂亮的枯枝上，以沙漠作为背景（设计）。你请了一名专业摄影师来拍照。你花了15分钟解释你想要的镜头，还画了简单的草图（美术设计）。摄影师拍了影片、打印出来给你看（执行）。你提出意见并要求摄影师重拍照片（美术设计）。

现在我们对美术设计的范畴已经有所了解，可以继续看看游戏行为中的美术设计是怎么回事了（显然，接下来的是一个虚构的故事）。

game art(from gnomonschool.com)

Kotz和Amy的小问题

Kotz是一名美术总监，已经有过不少成功的设计项目。他是一个对设计非常热情的人，每当想到好的点子时，就会手舞足蹈、滔滔不绝地说自己的想法，然后飞奔到工作室开始画草图，还一边叫着“哦呼呼！”——这就是他处于最佳状态的表现。

Kotz受雇为一个游戏项目，叫作《DreamFly》的卡通风格飞行模拟游戏做设计美术。在这款游戏中，可爱的精灵角色在庞大的飞船中振翅飞舞，飞船外是超现实的风景—-你知道的，这些都是概念。Kotz很喜欢这个设计，已经画了很多游戏美术的草图。

现在，项目已经开始了，Kotz的工作是寻找能够执行他的设计的美工。他请Amy这个经常怀疑的资深游戏美工来制作精灵飞舞的2D图像。Kotz给Amy的初始设计材料是，关于精灵的粗糙简略的执行草图。

“嘿，看看！我猜你肯定迫不及待要做这个小家伙！”当Amy正在怀疑地盯着草图时，Kotz对她说。

我们把剧情暂停在这里，看看目前出现了什么问题。对于角色设定，这份草图是完全不够用的——信息不足。但这里还潜伏着另一个大问题。

问题1：合作关系

Amy和Kotz正在培养合作关系。但正是这个非常重要的互动活动进展得不好。他们二人都没有用心培养合作关系，即使他们都希望形成坚实的合作基础。

作为Amy的上司，Kotz希望向她传达自己的热情，使她产生共鸣，但他对问题的轻率处理给他自己带来灾难。因为这是他和Amy合作的第一个项目，他本应该更加认真地分析情况。他应该让Amy也参与美术设计过程，让她乐意提出反馈意见。现在，Amy不可能就Kotz搞砸的任何地方提出批评，但她觉得自己有满腹牢骚。这就形成了双输局面。

在这种情况下，Amy能怎么办？她对Kotz说，“Kotz，我画不来这个，草图真的太粗糙了。”她低沉、慎重的语气彻底暴露了她的心情。Kotz心里一沉，“有什么问题？这个小精灵很酷啊，不是么？”Amy再也忍不住自己的怒火，“哦，天呐……Kotz，这个草图离完整设计还差得远呢！我画不了。”

Amy的反应是合理的，因为Kotz确实犯了一些错误，但她那种自我为中心的态度对她的职业生涯不会有好处的。即使她讨厌Kotz并打算退出项目，如果她能好好地说话，也不至于让结果变得这么尴尬。她要怎么做才不至于让合作关系破裂？Amy可以通过缓冲自己的消极反应来防止冲突。

David Packard写了一本叫作《The HP Way》（1995）的书，里面描述了Bill Hewlett提出的不会打击创作者的热情的批评过程：

当与一位充满热情的创作者交流新设计时，Bill会先后戴上三顶帽子：第一顶是“热情”。他会倾听，表达自己对恰当的和欣赏的地方的兴奋之情，同时提出一些不痛不痒的问题。几天以后，他会再次找到创作者，这时他戴的是“探究”的帽子。这时候要提针对性的问题、深入地探讨想法。这个环节还不需要做出最终决定。再过一阵子，Bill会戴上“决定”的帽子现次与创作者交流。在顾及适当的逻辑和敏感性的情况下，对设计做出最终决定。这个过程会让创作者感到满足，即使决定与项目并不相符——这对维持创作者的热情和创意是极其关键的。

Bill Hewlett是做出最终判断的人，但Amy可以借鉴他的沟通技巧。她首先要做到的事是，认识到Kotz的热情对项目是非常珍贵的，即使那令她感到苦恼。作为一名资深美工，她曾经与缺乏创见、只会按模板作画的美术总监共事过，她应该知道这样的总监是不能对项目有什么贡献的。好游戏融入了创作者的热情，如果她希望做出好游戏，她就要理解和重视Kotz的热情，至少是一点点。

所以她的第一个反应应该是领会草图的精神，而不是挑它的毛病。“我很喜欢画精灵！回想还在美术学校时，我也画过这种角色，跟这个草图有点像，但更写实一些。”

Kotz会觉得好奇。“真的吗？我真想看看！是写实风格的还是像真人假扮的？”

“有点……难说。我有把画拍成照片，你想看的话明天我带来。对了，你觉得精灵要穿什么样的服装？”Amy把话锋一转，进入更详细的设计方向。

一旦她彻底理解Kotz对角色的想法，她就可以开始分析制作上的技术问题。例如，她可能会想到“嗯，所以如果我们做了四帧动画，我们就可以做一些扑翅的循环。但可能不能有眨眼了，因为动作会太多。”

从这些思考中，Kotz会了解到Amy面临的限制条件是什么，使他有机会扭转Amy对他的作品的判断。“嘿，Amy，要跳过眨眼吗？那不是一个问题吧？”经过几个回合，Amy和Kotz会对彼此的风格和分歧非常了解。如果Kotz熟悉Amy的风格，他就会相信她的判断，避免在他们都同意的地方做调整——他会控制分歧的范围。

问题2：美术设计

第二个问题很明显：这份草图还不够详尽。Kotz必须提供更多信息，Amy才有可能做出成品。当然，Kotz不想花一周的时间描述可以在一天内做成的设计，所以彻底沟通和时间之间必定会有所权衡。以下是美术总监传达想法的常用方法：

各种参考资料。从杂志上撕下来的图片、电影的截图、知名的美术作品（如自由女神像），都是迅速传达想法的好参考，但极少与理想的风格完全一致的。大多数美术总监会在参考资料中加上限制性条件：“与此图类似，但不要霓虹灯的色调。”美术参考资料也可能与计划的东西完全不同——例如，可以参考小人鱼的色调做出精灵。

手绘示意图。角色草图、场景布局、故事板——都是描述的强大工具。通常来说，标出特征的示意图比画出具体的图像更快——例如，写出“肮脏的皮带”几个字，用箭头指向角色的腰部。如何制作快速、实用的示意图本身就是一个可以写成另一篇文章的话题。

词语描述。故事和短文是描述美术的常用方法——容易创作，给解释留下空间。通常，文本描述最适合形容场景或角色，如果能与详细的草图相结合就更好了。词语描述也适用于技术问题，如角色动作或循环动画的帧数的准确列表。

美工早期作品的参考资料。这是确定风格的好办法，因为美工已经非常清楚如何制作。与同一批美工合作不同的项目的好处也在于此。如果没有共同经验，通常要花很多时间来磨合像风格这么主观的东西。如果总监可以获得美工以前的作品，然后花时间回顾新作品，那么他的设计通常会非常令人信服。

表演。对于描述动画，真人表演是非常迅速实用的方法。昂首阔步、猛击、垂头丧气等都是真人在几秒钟内就能完成的动作，而画草图却要好几天。

必要的信息

优秀的美术总监也可以很有创意地表达技术上的要求。对于2D美术，以下是美术总监应该学习的例子：

品质和风格的预期。美术参考资料可以告诉美工要完成多少细节，以及需要什么样的美术风格。

技术特性。总有不可避免的限制性条件：像素的大小、程序如何识别透明像素、属性边缘的可能性、色彩数量（如果你使用固定的调色板）、文件的交付格式、命名惯例，等等。

摄像和光照。镜头的角度是什么：头顶？等距？侧视？背景如何处理？有没有远景？应该有明亮、闪耀的高光吗？

角色设定。我们需要各个角色的独特属性的描述。首先需要角色设定的第一版草图，但最终，我们会需要更多信息：男性或女性？年龄？文明（从服装上看出来）。

动画。必需动画的列表是一定要的。美术总监还应该指出他们期望看到的动画风格。这个技术问题通常包括：可用帧数、过渡类型，等等。

美术设计之路

不仅美术设计本身是复杂的，它的方法也是相当复杂的。除了研究关于这个话题的专著，Kotz和Amy还可以通过学习一些专门的技巧来促进合作关系。

定位。定位是指，对想要的风格加上限制，而不是命名风格本身。就像围绕一张图像画出空间，或数学中的“否定证明”。例如，Kotz可能告诉Amy，“这个精灵比小叮当还胖了一些，但不太有成年人的样子。它也不是小孩或标准的圣诞天使。”除了使用角色本身的描述以外，定位也是一个避免风格范围太大的好办法。

确认决定。Kotz描述了概念以后，他希望知道Amy是否真的理解了或只是装作理解了。Amy可以通过提出她认为适合Kotz的概念的新的设计想法，以证明自己理解了（或不理解）。例如，她可以建议精灵中有小胖精灵和高瘦精灵，有两个经常拌嘴的精灵。然后Kotz可以看出Amy心目中的精灵是善良的、强大的、愚笨的，而不是像幽灵那样的角色。

这种方法也有一些风险。第一，Amy必须预料到自己的建议可能会被否绝——如果她的自尊心太容易受伤，她可能不会乐意提出建议。第二，如果Kotz认为Amy只是在夺取设计的控制权，而不理解Amy只是在解释自己的想法，那么他就不会采纳Amy的建议。显然，Amy应该以非常外交辞令似的话作为开头，如“让我看看我是否理解了你的想法。我其实不认为我们做了新东西，但是……”也有可能Kotz会喜欢Amy的想法，给她更多创意控制权。

Kotz和Amy的故事就这样愉快收尾了：二人经过一小时的讨论后，Kotz认为Amy理解他的概念，但需要更多细节才能做出成品。Amy认为Kotz是怪才，但理解游戏制作的现实且理解她的需求。二人的合作前景一片光明，不久以后，世界上将诞生二人合作的结晶：一款具有漂亮的美术设计的游戏。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Art direction: A touching story

By Josh White

Art direction is the communication between an original designer and the executor of the design. It’s not the design process, and it’s not the final design’s execution. This month, we’ll peek at the perils and delights of game art direction.

For example, let’s say you want a portrait of your pet lizard. Your idea is to put the lizard on a nice branch with a desert scene as a backdrop (that’s the design). You hire a professional photographer to actually take the photograph. You spend 15 minutes explaining how you want the shot to look and drawing a simple layout sketch (that’s art direction). The photographer sets up the shot, takes some prints, and shows them to you (that’s art execution). You provide criticism and ask the photographer to retake the shot (that’s art direction).

Now that we have an idea of the scope of art direction, let’s look at how it works in the game industry (obviously, this is a fictional story).

Kotz and Amy’s Little Issue

Kotz is a wound-up monkey of an art director with a couple of solid hits under his belt. His enthusiasm is legendary — with spittle flying and arms flapping, he spews out quirky artistic ideas nonstop and then leaps onto his drafting stool and slashes out his trademark designs, hooting “Ooo-ooo! ” when he really gets in the groove.

Kotz was hired to design artwork for a game project called “DreamFly,” a cartoonish, dreamy flight simulator that feels like a kid’s book. There are little fairy creatures fluttering around a big, puffy airplane. The plane zooms over surreal blobs of landscape — you know, concept stuff. Kotz loves this idea, and has already scrawled out a huge pile of sketches for the game artwork.

Now the project is ready to start, and Kotz’s job is to find artists to build his design. He hires Amy, a skeptical veteran game artist, to create 2D sprites of the fairies dancing around the airplane. Kotz’s initial direction to Amy consists of handing her a crude and childishly executed sketch of a fairy.

“So hey! Check it out! I bet you’re just itching to build this little bugger!” Kotz chirps as Amy stares at the sketch in disbelief.

Let’s freeze that frame and take a look at the problems so far. The sketch is completely inadequate for character definition — there’s not enough information. But there’s another important problem developing here.

Problem 1: Staying Friends

Amy and Kotz are forging a relationship. This is an important interaction, and it’s not going well. Neither of them is taking care to create a solid foundation for their working relationship, even though that’s what they both want.

As Amy’s boss, Kotz wants to communicate enthusiasm and good vibes, but he has set himself up for disaster by approaching the problem too lightly. Since this is the first project he and Amy will be collaborating on, he should have assessed the situation more carefully. He should get Amy’s input on the art-direction process and make her feel comfortable giving feedback. Right now, Amy can’t criticize anything without implying that Kotz screwed up — but she needs to say something. That’s a lose-lose situation.

What are Amy’s options, given this situation? One option would be a response such as, “Umm… Kotz, I can’t draw this.” Her low, measured tones totally puncture his mood. “This sketch is, uh, really rough.” Kotz’s heart sinks. “What’s wrong? It’s a cool little fairy, right?” Amy’s exasperation wells up as she dramatically sighs, “Oh, good grief… Kotz, this drawing is so far from a complete design! I can’t work miracles.”

Amy’s reaction is justifiable since Kotz has obviously made some mistakes, but that kind of self-centered attitude won’t get her far in her career. Even if she hates Kotz and is planning to quit, she’ll do better if she doesn’t burn bridges. How can she be honest without burning bridges? Amy can prevent conflict by buffering her negative reaction.

David Packard (of Hewlett-Packard fame) wrote a book called The HP Way (HarperBusiness, 1995), which describes Bill Hewlett’s three-step process for critiquing ideas without dampening enthusiasm:

Upon first being approached by a creative inventor with unbridled enthusiasm for a new idea, Bill immediately put on a hat called “enthusiasm.” He would listen, express excitement where appropriate and appreciation in general, while asking a few rather gentle and not too pointed questions. A few days later, he would get back to the inventor wearing a hat called “inquisition.” This was the time for very pointed questions, a thorough probing of the idea, lots of give-and-take. Without a final decision the session was adjourned. Shortly there after, Bill would put on his “decision” hat and meet once again with the inventor. With appropriate logic and sensitivity, judgment was rendered and a decision made about the idea. This process provided the inventor with a sense of satisfaction, even when the decision went against the project — a vitally important outcome for engendering continued enthusiasm and creativity.

Bill Hewlett was passing judgment, but Amy could use the spirit of this technique. Her first step is to recognize that Kotz’s enthusiasm is very valuable to the project, even if it bugs her. As a veteran, she has on occasion worked with uninspired art directors who glumly create standard-looking artwork, which never makes for an exciting game. Good games have passion in them, and if she wants to make good games, she’s got to understand and empathize with the passion, at least a little.

So her first reaction should be to the spirit of the sketch, not the problems with it. “I’m into drawing fairies! Back in art school, I drew these kind of wood-gnome-elf characters, kind of like this sketch, but more realistic-looking.”

Kotz is curious. “Really?” he asks. “I’d love to see them! Were they photorealistic, or more like Norman Rockwell fake-real?”

“Well, sort of like… hard to say. I have some photos of the canvas I’ll bring in tomorrow if you want. So anyway, what kind of outfit were you thinking?” and Amy steers the conversation around to gathering more design input.

Once she’s gathered an overall sense for Kotz’s vision of the character, Amy can start exploring the technical issues of creating game art that works in the engine. For example, she might think aloud, “Hmm, so if we’ve got four frames of animation, we could do a little wing-flap bobbing cycle. But maybe we couldn’t get an eye-blink in there because it would happen too often.”

From these musings Kotz would learn what Amy’s limitations are, giving him a chance to calibrate Amy’s judgment to match his. “Hey Amy, wanna just skip the eye-blinks? It’s not a big deal, right?” After a few rounds of this, Amy and Kotz will each become familiar with the other’s style and where they disagree. If Kotz knows Amy’s style, he’ll trust her judgment and avoid micromanaging her in the areas where they agree — and he can keep control of the areas where they differ.

Problem 2: Art Direction

The second problem is the obvious one: the sketch doesn’t say enough to build art. Kotz needs to provide a lot more information before Amy can build any production artwork. Of course, Kotz doesn’t want to spend a week describing art that could be built in a day, so there’s going to be a tradeoff between thorough communication and time. Here are some common ways in which art directors communicate their ideas:

Artistic References. Torn-out magazine photos, scenes in movies, well-known artwork (for example, the Statue of Liberty) — a good reference gets an idea across quickly, but rarely matches the desired style exactly. Most art directors use them in combination or with limitations: “like this photo, but no neon signs and dirtier.” The artistic reference can be a completely different subject from the planned artwork — for example, a mermaid drawing that has the right type of color saturation and detail for a fairy.

Hand-Drawn Sketches. Character sketches, top-down scene layouts, storyboard cel-frames — they’re all powerful methods of description. Often it’s quicker to label special features than draw to draw them — for example, write “dirty leather belt” with an arrow pointing at the waist. Making quick, useful sketches is an art discipline in itself, so we’ll leave that for a different article.

Word Descriptions. Stories and essays are also common ways to describe artwork — they are easy to compose, but leave a lot open to interpretation. Often, text descriptions are best for giving an overall sense for the character or scene, and will work best when combined with a few detail sketches. Word descriptions are good for technical issues, such as an exact list of a character’s poses or the number of frames for looping animations.

References to Artist’s Earlier Work. This is a really powerful way to define style since the artist knows exactly how the artwork was created. This is one of the most powerful benefits of working with the same artists on multiple projects. Without that shared experience, it’s often time consuming to convey something subjective such as style. If the director can get the artist’s earlier work and can take the time to review the new art in terms of the old, the definitions are often very convincing.

Acting. For describing animation, a quick and powerful method of communication is to actually act out the motion in person — a goofy strut, a wild swing, a sulky slouch-stance — all these motions can be acted out in seconds, whereas good sketches could take days.
Necessary Information

A good art director can creatively communicate a number of technical requirements as well. For 2D sprite art, here are some specific examples of what the art director should share:

Expectations of Quality and Style. Artistic references tell the artist how much detail to create, as well as what kind of artistic style is sought.

Technical Specifics. There’s a host of inevitable limitations: dimensions of sprites in pixels, how your program recognizes transparent pixels, possibility of antialiased edges, number of colors (and if you are using a fixed palette, a copy of the palette), file format to deliver in, naming conventions, and so on.

Camera and Lighting. What angle should these be drawn from: Overhead? Isometric? Side view? What background will they be viewed against? Is there perspective? Should there be bright, shiny highlights?

Character Definitions. We’ll need a description of the unique attributes of each character. That first sketch is a great start for character definition, but ultimately, we’ll need more information: Man or Woman? Age? Culture (as indicated by clothes).

Animation. A list of required animations is a must. Art directors should also communicate the motion style that they expect. The technical issues usually rear their ugly heads here, too: number of frames available, type of transitions, and so on.

Ways to Direct Artwork

The methodology of art direction is pretty complicated in and of itself. Whole books have been written on the subject (see References). Still, there are some specific techniques that can help Kotz and Amy forge a more productive working relationship.

Framing. Framing is the concept of putting limits on the desired style, rather than naming the style itself. It’s like drawing the space around an image, or “proof by negation” in math. For example, Kotz might tell Amy, “This fairy is fatter than Tinkerbell, but not as adult-looking. It’s not a baby or a standard Christian angel, either.” When used in addition to descriptions of the character itself, framing is a great way to rule out huge regions of style.

Confirm Decisions. After Kotz has tried to describe the concept, he wants to know if Amy really gets it or is just nodding along. Amy can demonstrate her understanding (and reveal areas she doesn’t get) by offering some new design ideas that she thinks fit with Kotz’s concept. For example, she might suggest that there be a fat little fairy and a tall thin fairy, and the two argue and tease each other. Kotz then can see that she’s thinking of the fairies as having very clear, strong, goofy personalities, rather than being ethereal, ghost-like creatures.

There are some dangers with this approach. First, Amy has to expect that her suggestions will be shot down — if she has easily injured pride, she may not be willing to offer suggestions. Also, if Kotz thinks Amy is trying to take design control and doesn’t understand that Amy’s trying to prove her understanding, he’s not going to be O.K. with her input. Obviously, Amy should preface the talk with a diplomatic comment, such as, “Let me see if I’ve got the idea. I’m not actually suggesting we build anything new, but…” It’s also possible that Kotz will like Amy’s ideas and give her more creative control than he was planning.

Our story ends happily. After Kotz and Amy have an hour-long discussion about fairies, Kotz leaves with the idea that Amy is into the concept but needs more details before she can actually build anything. Amy thinks that Kotz is kooky, but is open to the reality of making games and understands what she needs. Their future is all roses, and the world will soon be blessed with the fruits of their relationship: a game with great artwork.(source:gamasutra)