We've finally finished up our audio design unit in Advanced Game Design at DSA. Here are my takeaways:
1. Check audio levels for multiple types of speakers: One problem I had when I was making an audio book for Advanced Game Design was that it came out too quiet when I sent it away to my teacher. This surprised me because the day before, when I had listened to it on my earbuds, it had sounded fine. I found that while I could easily hear the soft sounds on my earbuds, as soon as they were put through speakers these subtle sounds were lost. This meant I had to go back into audition and readjust the levels on my audio so they would come out right when I sent them to my teacher. 2. Less is more with effects and often presets are all that's needed: Another issue I noticed was when applying effects to different tracks it was hard to get the sound just right on my own. When putting things like echos or flangers on tracks I found it was easier to just use a preset instead of trying to customize it on my own. I also found the sound came out a lot clearer when I didn't mess with the effects a ton. Those were my two major takeaways from working in audio for the past couple weeks and hopefully they'll continue to help me in the future as we move on to video editing. -My takeaways on audio editing from the past two weeks
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On Friday, a representative from Full Sail University came in to our class to discuss her school and what it had to offer. The talk was okay but left a lot of questions regarding scholarship opportunities and the kind of work students did while at the school at the school. In further research I found that there were many scholarship opportunities available if I was willing to go after them and that much of the student work looked good and was creative in its vision and execution.
However I still have some reservations about the school and how I might fit in to it. On the one hand it isn't a traditional University. This, for good or for bad, changes the experience of going to college. It also only offers 20 month degrees. This means that if I change my mind on my career I'll have to go back to a traditional university to get a more general education. These are the pros and cons I'll need to weigh in the next couple of years as I try to decide what I want to do with my life. -Thoughts on the Full Sail visit -What do I think are the Pros and Cons of Full Sail? This past week we worked on learning about the international side of the game market. To do this everyone in my class each focused on a different country to learn about and at the end of the week present an infographic on (see the infographic on my portfolio page!). The country I decided to focus on was China and what I learned surprised me.
I knew China had censored content, but I didn't know that until July 2015 foreign consoles were banned in China. Further than that, I had no idea what a big effect this had on China's gaming industry and how much of China's gaming market is still effected by this long-time ban. Without consoles from large companies like Nintindo and X-Box, the PC has reigned supreme in China. This means that even now with the ban lifted many companies are having a hard time getting console-specific games to sell in China. The PC's supremacy in China is also seen in the rise of MMORPG's like Fantasy Westward Journey. These games are backed by the popularity of net-cafes in China. These two trends back each other by giving bonuses to playing online games in net-cafes such as more experience. This is a tactic rarely seen in American game marketing. All in all China has been deeply affected by its console ban years after its been lifted. This makes it a huge growing market for the international gaming industry. And likewise a very hard to reach market for companies that base their games off consoles. Drawing Basics and Video Game Art: Character Design by Chris Solarski Summary and Application3/12/2016 This article starts by talking about how game art and classical art is similar. It emphasizes that just like the old art masters in order to make your game art truly great you need to practice daily through quick small sketches. The article also stresses that keeping up good studio practices such as daily presentations and open feedback. It then begins to talk abut designing your character. To start it says that you should always create a high concept first in designing anything. This should include descriptive words on how you want your audience to feel. After that you need to start collecting research materials. You can do this either by taking quick sketches of things around you that give you a certain emotion or through researching images on google and creating quick sketches that way. Then you need to design the basic body shape of your character and use it as a mannequin to apply your rough sketches to. Eventually by combining many of these shapes you can design out the rough sketch of your character. To make sure that the features used in this character are obvious it is a good idea to silhouette the character and make sure you still get the same feeling out of it without all the details. Last you can redraw the character leaving out any unnecessary details and add colors and shading.
This article taught me that it is important to not only research The obvious things such as clothing while designing a character but to also research other things that evoke strong feelings and can be used in a more abstract form in my character to evoke those same feelings. It also showed me that it is the concept of how I want my audience to feel that is most important in my artwork and I should focus on that if I want my artwork to look truly emotional and real. |
AuthorSamuel Henry is a Senior at DSA in NC. He has 3 years of prior experience in the game design pathway and he's looking forward to becoming a great game designer. The views and opinions expressed in this blog are solely those of the author and do not represent those of Durham School of the Arts or Durham Public Schools Categories
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