First of all, I do feel this project could have gone a whole lot
better, but I would've expected to struggle to adapt to the increased workload
so quickly. Needless to say I know what to expect for the next project so that
I can approach it with less hesitation next time.
For strong points, I felt I was
particularly good at discovering ideas and developing them. Ideas such as the
dogs being part of the 'untouchable society' and thus got all their gold from
thieving and begging, or the whole Tinderbox plot being a trick set up by the
possessed princess in order to free herself from captivity. I would not have
come up with these ideas had I not done the research and attended the group
crit sessions, of which I made sure to attend every single one so that I could
get consistent feedback on my work. I also felt I was particularly strong when
understanding the silhouette stage of work, where I quickly understood that the
silhouettes needed to be quick, undefined work rather than 10+ minute jobs,
meaning I could get many of them out much quicker than others did.
However, I felt I let myself down a little on the iteration stage.
After being in one of the lectures and being shown the sheer scale of iteration
work in the games industry, I know that the amount that I have done does not
even compare and there were a lot more elements that I could have considered
for my character, such as alternate colour schemes, patterns on various parts
of the clothes as well as accessories. I could have also done with more
iterations on the parts I did iterate on – I only produced 3 different designs
for the kimono and, although I do like the design from the one I chose, I felt
there could have been a whole lot more potential there that I missed by pinning
down on a design too early.
What could I do better for next time? Create a more formalised
work structure so that I know I will produce the right amount of work for my
projects. The beginning of the project should be about doing research and
formalising ideas, which should only take a few days at most along with having
the silhouettes done. Then I should devote the main bulk of my time to doing
iterations and making sure that I do them a lot quicker than what I was doing
before. Although I did do paint-overs, I took too much time on them, so I should
work to practice making my work more efficient and learning how to express more
with less work.
Overall, considering it was my first project, it didn’t fail as
much as I had been expecting. Though I do know I could’ve produced a lot more
work had I known the scale of work that was to be expected out of us, I am now
aware of what is needed from me in the next project.