Seeking a book about game art
Author
Hi,
I'm looking for a book about game art to improve my skills as an hobby artist. I'm not a noob and being able to model basic things, but I'm in search of a book recommendation covering most of the following topics:
- sketching
- modelling (tips on normals, modelling joints, sculpturing ...)
- texturing
- rigging (what is IK ..)
- animation
- art pipeline process (sketch->modelling->texturing->rigging->animation?)
- tips and tricks
- base (color theory etc.)
I don't need tutorials for a certain tool (max,blender,maya), I'm just looking for a book which covers most of the above topics, no need to go too deep into details.
Any recommendation ?
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Ashaman
Sketching and color theory are totally separate topics from the rest of this and from each other. (Well color theory might be tangentially related to texturing and use of lighting in 3D...)
So, I definitely recommend looking for a sketching book, a light/color book, and then maybe you could find the rest of it in one book.
What aspects of sketching, and what style of sketching, are you interested in? And what aspects of light and color theory?
So, I definitely recommend looking for a sketching book, a light/color book, and then maybe you could find the rest of it in one book.
What aspects of sketching, and what style of sketching, are you interested in? And what aspects of light and color theory?
Author
Ok, I target to make 3d models for games including textures, animation, rigging etc. I don't want to master any specific sketching style, just want to know or learn the basics about sketching, enough to sketch my models before starting to model them. For color theory I got similar requirements, just the basics. Currently I just took some colors I think which match the model best, but I often read that you should use a fixed color palette or to use certain colors to create a certain effect. For all the basic a short chapter or appendix would be enough (for the beginning).
Ok, I reorder my topic list from hightest (top) to lowest(bottom) priority:
- modelling
- texturing
- rigging (what is IK ..)
- animation
- base (color theory etc.)
- sketching
- art pipeline process (sketch->modelling->texturing->rigging->animation?)
- tips and tricks
--
Ashaman
Ok, I reorder my topic list from hightest (top) to lowest(bottom) priority:
- modelling
- texturing
- rigging (what is IK ..)
- animation
- base (color theory etc.)
- sketching
- art pipeline process (sketch->modelling->texturing->rigging->animation?)
- tips and tricks
--
Ashaman
Author
If I have to compare it to an other book, I'm in search of a "all-round" book like "Real-Time Rendering by Tomas Akenine-Moller and Eric Haines", just for game art.
--
Ashaman
--
Ashaman
I think I understand what you're saying but I'm not sure if something like this exists. It is just too broad of a topic. I know from a programmers side of things that you can read books that talk about general concepts and ideas without having to talk about a specific coding language, but for art it can't be narrowed down quite so easily.
Even the modeling, texturing, rigging and animation steps are almost always going to be about a specific program as each program works a bit differently. There was a tutorial in "3D World" magazine maybe 6 or 7 months ago that went through the entire process you speak of from concepts sketches all the way through animation of a dinosaur. It was very good, but he still used specific programs to do specific things.
If you are serious about this you have to realize that this is not something you can just learn from just one book anyhow. Even after you start learning programs it takes a lot of practice to get better at these things. I'm not trying to discourage you in any way, quite to the contrary I think you should try to figure out what program is right for you and dive right in. As for drawing, that just takes time to get better at it. You can get books on sketching, but no matter how you boil it down you just have to practice.
Even the modeling, texturing, rigging and animation steps are almost always going to be about a specific program as each program works a bit differently. There was a tutorial in "3D World" magazine maybe 6 or 7 months ago that went through the entire process you speak of from concepts sketches all the way through animation of a dinosaur. It was very good, but he still used specific programs to do specific things.
If you are serious about this you have to realize that this is not something you can just learn from just one book anyhow. Even after you start learning programs it takes a lot of practice to get better at these things. I'm not trying to discourage you in any way, quite to the contrary I think you should try to figure out what program is right for you and dive right in. As for drawing, that just takes time to get better at it. You can get books on sketching, but no matter how you boil it down you just have to practice.
Author
kag245, thanks for your view. I think you are right. I'm a IT professional coding half my life, since 10 years I'm coding my own engine (=> adding game content now). Over all the years I've learned to create my own "programmer" art and I'm now used to blender,gimp,mapzone,xnormal (I like freebies). So my goal is not to become a professional artist ;-)
It doesnt matter if the tutorials are written for a special tool, I think most features needed in a tutorial are available in other tool too or could be simulated through a workaround (photoshop layeroptions => gimp layer plugin).
To be honest, I'm not a very creative artist at all , laking lot of talent in art :). But I experienced, that with pratice my own skills has been improved over the past 5 years and I'm at a stage to improve my skills further in a more "professional" direction.
So a good reading in a all-around game art fashion would be enough for the next 5 years ;_)
Nevertheless, I ordered the following books, hoping that this would be good read:
- 3D Game Textures. Create Professional Game Art Using Photoshop
- Creating the Art of the Game: Highly visual Guide to the worklflow and creative process of a game artist
--
Ashaman
It doesnt matter if the tutorials are written for a special tool, I think most features needed in a tutorial are available in other tool too or could be simulated through a workaround (photoshop layeroptions => gimp layer plugin).
To be honest, I'm not a very creative artist at all , laking lot of talent in art :). But I experienced, that with pratice my own skills has been improved over the past 5 years and I'm at a stage to improve my skills further in a more "professional" direction.
So a good reading in a all-around game art fashion would be enough for the next 5 years ;_)
Nevertheless, I ordered the following books, hoping that this would be good read:
- 3D Game Textures. Create Professional Game Art Using Photoshop
- Creating the Art of the Game: Highly visual Guide to the worklflow and creative process of a game artist
--
Ashaman
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