Development Info Project Eternity Kickstarter Update #59: Meet the Devs - Polina Hristova

[Infinitron]

Tags: Brandon Adler; Obsidian Entertainment; Pillars of Eternity

After last week's little crafting kerfuffle, it makes sense that this week's Project Eternity Kickstarter update is a nice and quiet "Meet the Developers" Q&A. This time, we finally get to meet Polina Hristova, concept artist.

Q: Hello, Polina. What is your job on the Project Eternity team?
A: I'm a general concept artist =). My primary purpose is to design what things look like (creatures, characters, environments, etc) and help get the conversations started. But I also try to do my best at making things look cool and try to solve any problems the modelers and animators might come by before they spend hours building it.​

Q: What are you working on this week?
A: This week I wrapped finished up some critters: the drake and the spear spider.​

Q: What is your typical work day like on Project Eternity?
A: I guess in comparison to most, my work day is pretty simple. I get to draw pretty pictures. The days differ based on the assignment and I do sometimes change my methods since creativity does flow differently day to day, but my general pipeline goes like this: I meet with Josh and the designers to get a description on what I'd be working on. Sometimes these descriptions can range from a simple word to an extremely detailed description on facial structure, hair length and color, outfit, tattoos, amount of skin pores... (okay I'm exaggerating the skin pore part)... and anywhere in between. I'll also talk with the animators if the creatures would share rigs or any other potential problems we can have (it's best to design with these problems in mind than having to change the design a lot later). After that (and depending on schedule) I'll do a number of variants fitting the description and summon a mini-character scrum (Josh, the designers, Rob, our modelers, and our animators). Together they'll discuss any problems or make any suggestions and pick a variant that I'll take to final.​

Q: What are you most looking forward to on Project Eternity?
A: I am really looking forward to playing it. =) But for now I'm really just enjoying watching the game come to reality. I love watching peoples' creations come to life and I give many props to our modelers and animators for all their hard work. I love how they animated skuldr and his sneaky "I'm gunna getcha!" walk.​

Q: Which Project Eternity creature that you have concepted excites you the most?
A: This question's a trick question. Creatures all excite me. I LOVE creatures, aliens (not relative) and things that go bump in the night. I guess if you had to make me pick right now I would have to say the drake. =) but I have a weakness for dragons and it’s also the thing most current in my brain. I also really enjoyed designing the godlike heads.​

Q: What other games have you worked on? ​

A: I'm actually pretty new to the industry. I graduated school in '09 and I didn’t get my first fulltime game job position until Obsidian ('11), but I've had the pleasure to intern and freelance on some amazing projects. I've worked on Naughty Dog's Uncharted 2, PlayStation Move Heroes, some other unannounced titles (some of which will sadly never see the light of day), and the Dungeon Siege 3 DLC: Treasures of the Sun.​

Read the full update if you want to know more. Oh, and if you haven't been following the news about what happened last week, you should probably check out this forum post.

 

[karfhud]

A dragon

I find these "Meet the Developers" short interviews to my liking.

 

[Jedi Exile]

Polina

 

[Kem0sabe]

Hmm, a women concept artist, that's something i bet we don't see every day.

Would love to see a portfolio of her extended work, i love drawing.

 

[Infinitron]

Hmm, a women concept artist, that's something i bet we don't see every day.

Would love to see a portfolio of her extended work, i love drawing.

http://www.polinadesign.com/

 

[Kem0sabe]

A Temeraire rpg/strategy game would be something to see, that setting is incredibly rich.

 

[Roguey]

Didn't ask the most important question: why is your art so bland?

 

[Infinitron]

Why do you hate women, Roguey?

 

[Roguey]

Why do you hate women, Roguey?

I'm not going to sugarcoat opinions, that would be an awful, condescending thing to do. She gets treated with the same derision I treat every other game developer.

 

[Kem0sabe]

She is young, for example, having worked with a lot of architects a long the years, their designs improve with experience. I can imagine that she hasn't had a lot of creative freedom in the projects she worked before, some of those sketches are props and level designs based on mundane settings, her Dragon design is interesting but nothing special, but it shows she can be creative.

 

[karfhud]

She is young, for example, having worked with a lot of architects a long the years, their designs improve with experience. I can imagine that she hasn't had a lot of creative freedom in the projects she worked before, some of those sketches are props and level designs based on mundane settings, her Dragon design is interesting but nothing special, but it shows she can be creative.

Aye, this. Her environment sketches are actually really good. I'm sure she's gonna develop a lot during her time at Obsidian.

 

[Duraframe300]

By the way Kem0sabe, look at her blog as well. There's stuff there that is not on the website.

 

[Duraframe300]

Both hers as well.

 

[Lancehead]

That's an actual level, right? Did she do the final paint-over?

 

[Rake]

That's an actual level, right? Did she do the final paint-over?

Not completely, no. But she did some. I think Sawyer said that the most work was done on the purple machine and the wires. The rest of the rooms have minimal/no paint over.

 

[Princess Rage]

I was under the impression that updates were actually supposed to contain some info about the game.

 

[boltrek]

What is it with womyn artists and small head/big body proportions, it's like I'm reading a shojo manga

 

[LeStryfe79]

This woman appears to be a pretty talented artist, but I don't like her concepts. They seem generic and unimaginative. It's by far the poorest aspect of Project Eternity I've seen so far. I wonder how she got hired? I'm not trying to seem misogynistic either. Many of the best concept artists from Japan are women, for example, and this has nothing to do with why I don't like Polina's work. I almost feel bad saying it, but poor concept art can mean the difference between the creation of a unique, memorable setting and a forgettable one.

 

[Duraframe300]

This woman appears to be a pretty talented artist, but I don't like her concepts. They seem generic and unimaginative. It's by far the poorest aspect of Project Eternity I've seen so far. I wonder how she got hired? I'm not trying to seem misogynistic either. Many of the best concept artists from Japan are women, for example, and this has nothing to do with why I don't like Polina's work. I almost feel bad saying it, but poor concept art can mean the difference between the creation of a unique, memorable setting and a forgettable one.

No it doesn't. Apart from concept art serving different functions (which some people apparently still lack to realize) it all depends on what kind of setting is in the first place. There's only so many variations you can put on any given thing. Since P:E is a *classic* high fantasy setting you're not going to end up with the wildest stuff.



(which is why everything will be *generic* in the end, and why I think it is a stupid term to give as much value to, but that is another discussion)

 

[karfhud]

I was under the impression that updates were actually supposed to contain some info about the game.

It does. There's gonna be a friggin' dragon in P:E.

 

[Irenaeus]

I enjoy the "generic" setting in this case, along with the art. I just hope the rest of the game is good.

 

[LeStryfe79]

This woman appears to be a pretty talented artist, but I don't like her concepts. They seem generic and unimaginative. It's by far the poorest aspect of Project Eternity I've seen so far. I wonder how she got hired? I'm not trying to seem misogynistic either. Many of the best concept artists from Japan are women, for example, and this has nothing to do with why I don't like Polina's work. I almost feel bad saying it, but poor concept art can mean the difference between the creation of a unique, memorable setting and a forgettable one.

No it doesn't. Apart from concept art serving different functions (which some people apparently still lack to realize) it all depends on what kind of setting is in the first place. There's only so many variations you can put on any given thing. Since P:E is a *classic* high fantasy setting you're not going to end up with the wildest stuff.



(which is why everything will be *generic* in the end, and why I think it is a stupid term to give as much value to, but that is another discussion)

Then why is it that anyone familiar with Lord of the Rings or Warhammer can see the difference between their characters and places despite both of them being Nordic medieval fantasy worlds? P:E world looks like shit to me. This isn't because it's classic fantasy, but because nothing about it stands out. I'm guessing it's because the concept artist has no love for the setting, and therefore imparts zero soul into it. It's probably just a job to her. I'm talking about nuances, and not broad strokes. Nuances take a special something to create. I don't know if it's talent, soul, or love, but whatever it is, I'm not seeing it in Polina's work. I'm not sure why you believe my comment was a simpleton's off hand urge for extreme exoticism in a D&D successor. That's not what it was at all, but I hope it doesn't make you feel stupid to be so wrong about this. It's not my intention to make you feel stupid, Duraframe300. I have no idea how you can say that artistic conceptions have little pertinence to the originality of a setting. Do you believe artists to be no more than robots who methodically select visuals to convey the writers whim? Did you know many American comics are drawn before they are written?

 

[Alex_Steel]

Didn't ask the most important question: why is your art so bland?

The concept art has to be in line with the rest of the game.

 

[Sensuki]

Her godlike concept was good and so was her paintover of that room Shop concept. The rest of the stuff is kind of bland because well, to get things up to the same level of the Godlike picture, that takes a week. The others are all just concepts for the character artists, environment artists and animators to work off.

Although I do admit I have liked every piece of Kazunori Aruga's work I've seen so far (in comparison).

 

[Duraframe300]

This woman appears to be a pretty talented artist, but I don't like her concepts. They seem generic and unimaginative. It's by far the poorest aspect of Project Eternity I've seen so far. I wonder how she got hired? I'm not trying to seem misogynistic either. Many of the best concept artists from Japan are women, for example, and this has nothing to do with why I don't like Polina's work. I almost feel bad saying it, but poor concept art can mean the difference between the creation of a unique, memorable setting and a forgettable one.

No it doesn't. Apart from concept art serving different functions (which some people apparently still lack to realize) it all depends on what kind of setting is in the first place. There's only so many variations you can put on any given thing. Since P:E is a *classic* high fantasy setting you're not going to end up with the wildest stuff.



(which is why everything will be *generic* in the end, and why I think it is a stupid term to give as much value to, but that is another discussion)

Then why is it that anyone familiar with Lord of the Rings or Warhammer can see the difference between their characters and places despite both of them being Nordic medieval fantasy worlds? P:E world looks like shit to me. This isn't because it's classic fantasy, but because nothing about it stands out. I'm guessing it's because the concept artist has no love for the setting, and therefore imparts zero soul into it. It's probably just a job to her. I'm talking about nuances, and not broad strokes. Nuances take a special something to create. I don't know if it's talent, soul, or love, but whatever it is, I'm not seeing it in Polina's work. I'm not sure why you believe my comment was a simpleton's off hand urge for extreme exoticism in a D&D successor. That's not what it was at all, but I hope it doesn't make you feel stupid to be so wrong about this. It's not my intention to make you feel stupid, Duraframe300. I have no idea how you can say that artistic conceptions have little pertinence to the originality of a setting. Do you believe artists to be no more than robots who methodically select visuals to convey the writers whim? Did you know many American comics are drawn before they are written?

Why would I feel stupid? Were on the codex. I also don't really see how your personal perception of Polina's work in any way influences me.

And nope I don't believe that. Which is why

There's only so many variations you can put on any given thing.

Yes, there are nuances (which I think Polina's work actually has. Like in the Godlike one or the enviroment paintover). I agree.

Still, there are only so many ways you can draw something if you have a specific target. A high fantasy dragon will still be a high fantasy dragon in the end. (For example)