Background blitz [ june 10 - july 1 ] extended

[Hudders]

Idea: Snarky
Atmosphere: Loominous
Design: Loominous
Composition: Loominous
Functionality: Neil
Technique: Loominous

[cobra79]

Same as Hudders:

Idea: Snarky
Atmosphere: Loominous
Design: Loominous
Composition: Loominous
Functionality: Neil
Technique: Loominous

[Neil Dnuma]

Idea - To be honest, I often find the ideas for the blitz entries very standard adventure clichés, endlessly boring stuff. A couple of nice details this time though. Loominous: extremely pretty, but I'd love to see a more exciting subject treated. I give this to Snarky for the cool jokes.
Atmosphere - Loominous obviously. Is your nick related to Andrew Loomis, or also the Luminist style of painting? (or something completely different, what do I know) The light and mist in this piece is what makes me think of the latter. The Loomis connection I'm aware of. I should read those books!
Design - Loominous. Gotta like the house, but the mailbox is the jewel!
Composition - Loominous by miles.
Functionality - Loominous. Raddicks with a little more visible ground.
Technique - Loominous. I think Raddicks' piece is a tad too blurry. I believe the image could have turned into something really good with a couple more "drafts" (probably goes for mine too). Snarky: It is good and shows great improvement from other BG's I've seen from you! Keep it up!

[loominous]

Shame there weren't more entries this time around, but the actual entries were very imaginative.

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Idea

Tough one. It's a bit hard to make out what the actual idea of raddick's n Snarky's entries, though in a game scenario where you'd somehow be introduced to the place they'd probably work very well.

I think I'll give it to Dnuma since it introduces a whole scenario which you can't help but to wonder about when you see it. I like it in games when scenes pull you into a context, instead of act like a gallery with merely a bunch of stuff to look at (my own entry would be a prime example of the latter).

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Atmosphere

I like the atmosphere of raddick's entry the most, mostly due to the elements, with a nice restaurant like house with a BBQ n an old big tree.

I guess this might seem more of concern for the design or idea categories, but I think elements just by their mere presence evokes certain moods, plus in this case just the sheer amount of elements. Sterile spaces bother me.

Dnuma's entry on the other hand has this weird, dreamy, thick atmosphere that creeps me out a bit, but I think it's very well done, and gets my vote.

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Design

I think Dnuma have succeeded to create a very nice coherent whole, from the palette to the lonely trees.

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Composition

I think Dnuma's entry has a simple yet effective composition, but I can't help but to think that a more interesting angle could've elevated it very much. On the other hand the straight on high angle might be adding effectively to the interesting atmosphere.

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Snarky on the other hand has clearly made an effort to find a good, interesting composition, and while I think it has some issues, I think in itself it works well in making a quite boring room - pretty much a large box for a room with smaller boxes inside it - into something quite exciting looking.

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Functionality

Snarky, due to the clear walkable area n exit.

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Technique

I think raddick's technique (is it based on a photo in some way?) without the evil smudginess would have worked very well. Another gory photoshop victim.

I think Snarky's lighting is unfortunately a bit of an unhappy mix between noir contrasty, and ambiently lit, which gives an incoherent impression. That aside I think the technique is nicely painterly yet still functional, and would probably work very well.

Again, I think Dnuma's consistent execution in all areas really elevates the whole pic, in a 'more than the sum of its parts' kind of way, and gets my vote in this category as well.


Edit: Neil: can only agree about the subject matter; I was just itching to do a house design n much has suffered for it.

About the name, it's not related to either Loomis (which just turned out as a strange coincidence, though I think my endorsement of his work has been misleadingly inflated), or to the luminism style (which you just introduced me to. Looking briefly at some wiki entries it seem really nice though, even though I'm not all that fond of pure landscapes without any human constructions).

[Daniel Thomas]

ok, ending the voting now and loominous wins with his great awesome background.
Great backgrounds this round, looking forward to the next round and what people will come up with.

Gratz and take it away, loominous!

[ildu]

[Larry David]Ending the voting? What do you mean ending the voting? You think you can end to vote like that, do you? Oh I'm the HOST! I can do anything I want because I'm the HOST. It's not like anyone else wants to vote, right?[/Larry David]

Hmm, I thought was able to do a better impression than that. Yeah, what that meant was that I wanted to vote, but I was putting it off until tonight, and I was surprised voting was closed so early . Ach, I don't mind, but here are my votes anyway:

Idea - Snarky. Cool idea with the AGS items. When you had the b&w thread and I saw the bg first, I didn't really notice the items, but it was cool recognizing them after I found out.
Atmosphere - Neil Dnuma. I think all the entries are quite atmospheric. Loominous and Snarky were very close, but I like Neil's one the most, mood-wise.
Design - Loominous. Yup, very cool stuff.
Composition - Loominous. I was about to vote for Snarky since I saw the composition structured through WIP images, but I guess I gotta give it to Loominous.
Functionality - Neil Dnuma. I'd love to see a game made in this style. It's somehow refreshing from the norm.
Technique - Loominous. Awesome technique as usual. Another contender for the make-a-game-out-of-it grand title.

There! I don't give an ef. You don't know me. You don't know me. Uhh-huh!

[loominous]

Thanks, I'll get the next round up soon!

[Snarky]

Before the thread is closed, I'd like to add my after-the-fact "votes":

Idea: It's tacky, but I'm gonna go with myself. This is the kind of place I like to visit in adventure games, with lots of different objects to inspect and possibly interact with. Close second: loominous for the same reason. (loominous, the idea of my scene is a crypt where AGS characters have been interred, opened hundreds of years later with the old newspaper-under-door trick. The mummy is Roger; his space suit helmet sits on top of his tomb, used as a fishbowl.)
Atmosphere: Neil Dnuma. Love the use of color. Looks very twilighty. It brings me back to the gorgeous palette shifts around dusk in QFG4.
Design: Raddicks. I really like the technique used for the background foliage. Don't care much for the overall blurriness, but good piece otherwise.
Composition: loominous (Great tips on the composition process, BTW! It's what inspired me to enter anything.)
Functionality: loominous. Much as I admire the technique, I often have a hard time imagining loominous's sepia-toned paintings as adventure game backgrounds. The final version with the sprite did a great deal to convince me.
Technique: loominous. Naturally.

It's been fun. Thanks for the votes and kind words. Looking forward to the next round!