Hi there! I’m Lizzy, Cook Serve Forever’s Art Director. We’re getting very, very close to finishing up the remaining art assets for the game - the team has created some absolutely gorgeous work that I can’t wait for you to see! For this month’s post, I thought I’d give you all a look at how I approach the character art for the game’s visual novel sections (plus a sneak peek at some future scenes). Among the team, we call these “Dialogue Box” scenes or DBs for short. If a DB requires any new characters or outfit changes, I’ll draw up some rough concepts and send them to the writers for feedback. Usually it’s a pretty quick process, but anything concerning the main characters can take a few rounds of sketches. For example, these are just some of the drawings I made while we were figuring out Brie’s design. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42251747/9d1d092e5ca98eb2d5bc4d2599e43531f1eb5e75.png[/img] Choosing the right outfit is important! We ended up combining elements from a few of these concepts for her final look. [b]>> Note: if you haven’t played through the Rhubarb & Grill part of the story, this next section will have some visual spoilers! <<[/b] Once the general designs needed for a scene are settled, I listen to the voice actors’ audio and scribble all over the script like so. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42251747/eadd76045a2accb6245c0fb2a33aac94e8243988.png[/img] A little on the chaotic side, but it’s basically just me planning out the poses for the Rhubarb & Grill DBs. I use notes like these as a rough guide when I go to draw the character art in Clip Studio Paint. For each character or new outfit, I generally make a “default” pose as well as a bunch of other heads/arms I can switch out with some minor cleanup. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42251747/5611a296fc4a8dee7e6f6c6f975790f9091053b4.png[/img] I mix and match these components to create the final assets, rotating and skewing the different parts a bit as I go. Doing so makes the characters seem like they’re shifting their weights, raising their shoulders, etc. as they switch between expressions (which I think looks cool). [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42251747/987f1c573598d25c99417972479ec6717f2d9579.gif[/img] So cool, right? Anyway… Once all the art for a scene is finished, I use Photoshop to create mockups of what each line of dialogue should look like in-game. Below is an example of one such mockup from the Rhubarb & Grill section (special shout out to Andrea and Pierre for the beautiful background art!). Other members of the team use images like these as a guide when they construct the DB in GameMaker. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42251747/844d1cd09aafbacad51c5efdf5b72c13a54d2cfa.png[/img] That’s a little different to what’s currently in Cook Serve Forever, isn’t it? That’s right! I want the visual novel portions to feel more like the characters are actually talking to each other, so we’ve redesigned them to display multiple characters at a time. This change is coming in a future update, but I have a few more examples to share with you for now. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/42251747/09defee6a8ae2a3128567d6b30b3d96cc08ff069.png[/img] Thanks so much for playing! I can’t wait until we can show you more! :) -Lizzy