Hello everyone,
It sounds like we’re very much on the same page with a lot of general ideas for the sylvari. Heck, I’ve had concepts drawn up for long hair, flowers and dreads since before ship that I’d love to see. Even palm trees were on that hen scratching sheet. And more. ;}
So long as we’re talking philosophy (because as I mentioned before in the previous disclaimer, these are not promises or schedules: this is a wish list, right?), there are a couple things I though you might like discussed.
In most cases, I personally agree with minimizing the line between male and female styles. In my opinion, males can wear flowers just as much as females can wear spikes. The styles we shipped with were a combination of retrofitting earlier sylvari art direction and creating styles to flesh out the race. If when we shipped we had males and females wear the same styles, we wouldn’t be as able to create varied silhouettes. Creating variety can be more important than hair equality when you have a limited amount of time to build a full race. At ship, of course. :}
Having said that, I do think as an artist there are some styles and concepts that work better on one gender over another. Just because a male can wear a flower, it doesn’t have to be the same design as the female. I believe in tailoring to characters, not being shackled to principles for principle’s sake.
Oh, I wanted to mention that I love love LOVE all the drawings that you guys are doing and would love to see more! But just so you know: mosses, dandelion puffs and other soft forms (pine needles, too) are difficult to create when you only have access to load alpha — as are cascades of flowers or complex blossoms due to poly count. There are certain restrictions in place for creating a hair or face for the game. That’s not to say it’s impossible, however, but it may be impractical.
For the question of hairstyles pulling a lot of skin color, that’s because the first dye channel blends with the skin in order to create the ‘growing from’ look. If I use the skin tone to work with it, the hair feels more complex than just one color shade. This can change from hairstyle to hairstyle, of course. There’s a need for both. But if you have a bark body, I don’t have the channels to give you a color for leaves and a color for flowers. I have to pick one.
I’ve noticed for faces, most requests are at the end of the spectrum… folks seem to want pretty or creature, not as much in between. Interesting. Out of curiosity, why not? The race was designed to live in the in between. Any thoughts? :}
If you guys have the stamina, keep posting sketches! It’s so awesome seeing them and they are inspiring! I’d join you in drawing if I didn’t think it’d be picked up by some article and reported as an official release. ;P Ah well, I can live vicariously through all of you! Art it up, guys!
