Tree Tests Round 2

For my second bout of tree tests I created 6 trees in a variety of different styles from the art style spectrum proposed in my last blog post.

These styles included:

A blend of realism and illustrative.  I knew from previous research that artistic realism would be too time consuming to achieve, and I really wanted to try incorporating vintage photographs in to my designs (which Ryan suggested a few weeks ago.) This Photoshop collage created out of vintage photographs of Halloween costumes was the result.

My take on a geometric style.  Not as true to a geometric style as it could of been - the games I have researched that use the style tend to use much more basic forms for their assets - however I couldn't help but play with sharp angles and minimal colour schemes for this one.

A textured illustrative tree, inspired by Year Walk.

Another illustrative tree, this time inspired by watercolour and traditional mediums.  I used watercolour Photoshop brushes for the base colours and used a brush designed to emulate charcoal pencil for the outlines and detail.

A painterly style tree.  This is a style I would love to improve on as I feel this style in general is such a nice blend between the digital and traditional.

And I couldn't resist doing a pixel art tree.  I've created some basic pixel art in the past however I've always wanted to try a more detailed design like this.

General feedback:

- Pixel art is overdone
- Painterly style is cliche
- Geometric style tree (2) has nice colours
- The third tree needs more contrast
- I should be wary of how a collage style would work in the context of a game.  Could be too busy and confusing.
- 1, 3, 5 are more stylistic and professional looking.

So 1 (illustrative/realism collage), 3 (illustrative, textured) and 5 (painterly) were the most popular.  My next steps are to create a forest scene in each of these styles then test out these scenes in Gamemaker with an assortment of atmospheric overlays and music.  The style I feel adds to an "unsettling atmosphere" the most will be the direction I take my game in.