Procedural Illustration

3D shaders and 2D kernels to simulate hand drawn illustration

Efficiency required

Based on an experimental post processing effect I had posted online, illustrator and friend Keith Lowe contacted me about producing some work for the role playing game Myth on Kickstarter. He needed a large number of environmental pieces produced efficiently, and my work in illustration-like 3D renders was a great solution.

Refining my original experiments into brand-new code, I created an effects pipeline using Quartz Composer that gave me control over every aspect of the illustration output. Line weight variations, dynamic line colouration, depth based outlining, and the Crimmins-inspired detail reduction I developed and have now used on several productions.

Trees and vegetation were designed and procedurally modelled in a combination of NGplant and Lightwave 3D, with all shading, lighting, and rendering in the native Lightwave engine. By designing the shading to work in conjunction with the post processing, I was able to create leafy trees with a balance between illustrated detail and artistic shape grouping, often a key challenge when developing non-photoreal effects.

The pseudo-illustrated elements were then composited in Photoshop along with the ground and architecture illustrations already produced, and delivered to the client for further tweaking. In all, hundreds of tree, shrub, grass, rock, and boulder variations were created and used in the final artwork.

Results

Although my artwork was part of the final product, not the campaign, the board game Kickstarter was an overwhelming success of which I am immensely proud! The team went on to successfully kickstart an expansion pack as well.