Task 4.1 - Final Evaluation

For this project, the theme I was working with was 'Medieval'. Some of the most prominent elements of a medieval theme I thought of when brainstorming ideas were different medieval occupations, such as farmers, knights, blacksmiths, etc. I also was interested in the different props related to these occupations, as these would be helpful in giving context and information in my final piece, such as tools, weapons and equipment.

I also researched different factors in how the environment and structures would look at the time. For example, I found lots of buildings made of wood and stone built in countrysides and open plains. The examples I found were a lot less sturdy and durable compared to structures from today due to their reduced technology and tools. Some things I found interesting from the research I did included frequent motifs of wooden planks used to make up most objects with metal strips and plates used to hold them together.

My final product fits the theme of 'Medieval' as it showcases the interior of a blacksmith's hut styled after the medieval period, with a mostly wooden interior as well as some stone and metal used to make up or reinforce some of the props included in the design.

The original proposal I had for my project was a 'Deteriorated Medieval Blacksmith'. My final product showcases a diorama of the interior of a medieval blacksmith's hut.

Some elements of my plan that remained the same include two of the main themes, being medieval and blacksmith, with features such as a furnace, an anvil and weapon/armour showcases being present in my final design. Furthermore, most of my research into designs similar to the product I wanted to create showed medieval interiors to be wooden and messy, which both also apply to my final design.

Some elements that changed between my proposal and my final design include the deteriorated aspect I originally wanted to go for. I had originally wanted to make my diorama appear abandoned and unkempt for years, with cobwebs and moss growing around the structure, as well as cracks and breaks in the furniture and walls, letting in sunlight. I didn't end up doing these due to both time constraints and struggling to design these elements in a style I was happy with. Another feature that was cut from my final design was a lot more assets included in my diorama, such as a stairway, doors, a workbench and pots. These were mainly removed due to me deciding I had created too many props for one single diorama and I am quite happy I did as the final product already looks quite cramped and I don't think I would've been able to fit all of these different assets in if I had kept them.

In summary, the main ideas that were kept the same between my proposal and my final product are the medieval and blacksmith themes, whilst some elements that got changed included deteriorated features and removed assets.

Some of the research I did for my project included moodboards, mindmaps and finished examples of dioramas/level designs. I also researched the different preferences for target audiences and used some online tutorials to aid my work.

Most of the moodboards I did were centred around themes relating to my project, such as medieval structures and blacksmith interiors. These were very helpful as they gave me numerous images and examples of medieval architecture and items, allowing me to see how they were made, what they were created with and what they were for. Furthermore, compiling all of these images together helped me to see common general patterns amongst the themes, such as staples of blacksmithing interiors including anvils and furnaces.

This research was used in my final product to help me deduce the common themes that I would need to include in my design for it to be instantly readable and recognisable, as well as to give me lots of references I could use to ensure my designs stayed interesting, accurate and realistic.

Something I could have done differently is incorporated more elements from my target audience research, as this was not something I considered too heavily when designing my assets and props. However, I found it difficult to find a good middle ground between my medieval blacksmith theme and my target audience's preferences. Although the genre worked very well, with action and RPG being two of the most popular themes for my chosen demographic which worked very nicely into a medieval theme, I wasn't able to incorporate much of their preferred colour schemes as the most popular colours were blues and greens which weren't very prominent colours in most of the interiors I found in my other research.

One problem I faced in this project was being inconsistent in terms of prop sizes throughout my ideas generation.

Because I was just creating assets in a large blank canvas, I didn't have much sense of scale when designing my props, resulting in many assets being very inaccurately sized when compared to each other, such as a mallet being disproportionately almost bigger than an anvil.

To work around this issue, when I began working on my final diorama, before making anything I immediately created a floorplan and covered it with an isometric grid. This way, I could build simple coloured boxes on top of the grid, allowing me to plan out where all of my assets would go and how big they should roughly be, ensuring that no objects occupied the same space or were too inaccurately sized. Furthermore, the grid pattern was very helpful as it essentially gave me boxes to divide up the floor with, acting as an outline I could use to quickly make perfect cubes and edges when creating my assets.

As a result of this problem, I have learned a method to more accurately create isometric objects in proportionate sizes and have been able to experiment with creating assets of greatly varying scale in an isometric pixel art style.

If I were to change anything for a more successful outcome, it would probably be to use this grid method in my ideas generation section as well to get more of an idea for how small or big an object would be and therefore how much detail I would be able to fit into it.