The purpose of

concept art
By

Caitlin Farmer
Concept Art for the Games Industry

CONTENTS
Purpose of Concept Art............................................................................................... 1
Masahiro Ito .................................................................................................................... 1
Bubble Head Nurses ..................................................................................................... 2
Pyramid Head................................................................................................................. 4
John Sweeney ................................................................................................................ 5
Infected............................................................................................................................ 6
Environments................................................................................................................... 7
Fallout 3 ............................................................................................................................ 8
References .......................................................................................................................... 9

PURPOSE OF CONCEPT ART

The purpose of concept art is not as simple as someone may
think as it has many uses and meanings within certain
situation. The main overall purpose is to convey the concept
artists ideas not only to the development team but also to
the management team and the producers of the game. It
can be used to convey a theme or emotion, maybe even the
genre of the game before they have even thought about
characters or settings.

MASAHIRO ITO
Masahiro Ito is one of the concept artist that worked on Silent
Hill 1, 2 and 3. His main choice of media is traditional painting
and sometimes mixes it with digital media. Masahiro Ito had
stated that when it came to designing monsters in the Silent
Hill games, he tended to remain astray from the orthodox

beasts resembling demons, etc. Instead, he preferred to

make the enemies mostly human, but distort each in a unique
manner to only make their symbolism more morbid and
repulsive, rooted in the idea of turning what human beings
are so accustomed to into monsters. (Octonius, 2014) Ito has
drawn inspiration from a diverse array of artists and
filmmakers. One can see the inspiration of the film Jacobs
Ladder in some of the monster designs as well as the
hospitals in the games. The main character, Jacob Singer, is
wheeled through a nightmarish hospital, strapped to a
gurney. He sees deformed humans and doctors with no eyes,
as well as a lot of humanoid creatures in frames or boxes. It
brings to mind several scenes from Silent Hill, especially the
cut scene of James being wheeled on a gurney in
Brookhaven.

BUBBLE HEAD NURSES

One of the most
notable monsters
within the Silent Hill
franchise are the
nurses. The threat they
pose is not why they
are so memorable,
their costume and the
feelings they inspire
inside of us is. These
particular monsters
represent not only the
http://www.geocities.jp/nobu_hill/paintings/bubblehead20
worldwide shared
13.html
fantasy of hot female
nurses they also have a deeper meaning within Silent Hill 2.

The main protagonists wife Mary is

sick in hospital and James (the
protagonist) after a while projects his
sexual feelings onto the nurses that
worked in the hospital. Everything
about this certain enemy was
designed to be sexual. About Silent
Hill 2 Bubble Head Nurse, my originally
planned for its head is a semiliquid
thing covered with a thin skin like a
condom, and it bursts like a water
balloon, when its shot. For the design
of its uniform, I had these materials,
pictures of the nurse in The Exorcist
III, Jacobs Ladder and bondageinspired fashions one, and she wears
stockings. Also, I was thinking a
packed blood cells-stand as her
weapon, but changed it into a rusted http://www.geocities.jp/nobu_hill/paintings/
nurse2.html
steel pipe. This is homage to the Silent
Hill 1. (Amy, 2013) The image on the left is the 2012 remodel
of the bubble head nurse whereas the image on the right is
the original nurse design. The 2012 remodel serves more to the
original idea that Ito was going for but due to the low poly
count they were redesigned to look like the image on the
right. The nurses may have been manifested by the mind of
James, combining his anxieties surrounding his wifes terminal
illness and the sexual deprivation that came with it, hence the
risqu clothing worn by them. The nurses also die with their
legs widely spread apart, a very provocative scene that
further contributes to the games sexual theme. The bubble,
condom, type head of the nurse is representative of
suffocation. This references the events when James killed
Mary by suffocating her with a pillow; hence, the reason why
their heads convulse violently like somebody trying to break
free from being suffocated. (Shepherd, 2015)

PYRAMID HEAD
Another notable
monster is Pyramid
Head (Red Pyramid)
who is arguably the
main antagonist. They
are envisioned after
the towns old
punishers and
executioners. Ito was
looking for monster
with a hidden face to
make it less human
and more disturbing.
Itos first idea was a
mask but it did not
achieve the look he
was going for, so he
http://www.geocities.jp/nobu_hill/paintings/redpyramidthin
then took the
g.html
concept further and
gave the monster a head in the shape of a triangle with
sharp right angles and acute edges that suggest the
possibility of pain and that the monster itself is in pain from
wearing it. The helmet itself is a 7 sided hunk of rusted metal
grafted onto their head with a single hole drilled into the
upper side which a tentacle or tongue like appendage can
snake out and attack James. The in-game model makes
movements to suggest that he is struggling to wear the
helmet. Since he doesnt have a face Pyramid Head uses his
hands to express himself. His hands were replaced with gloves
due to the polygon count limit. However he can still move his
index finger. There are a few times that Pyramid Head
engaged in an aggressive act with two Mannequin monsters.
Due to their positions, combined with how he is holding one
of the monsters, this scene suggests a form of sexual violence,

although no physical penetration is actually seen. Another

time Pyramid Head is seen holding a Lying Figure in a sexually
suggestive, contorted position, while moans are heard. This
incarnation represents James guilt.

JOHN SWEENEY
Lighting was really important within The Last of Us as they
were creating a calm environment and uses the light to
bounce off of objects and this warms up the scene to give a
sense of comfort to a broken world. His work is very detailed
and has a sense of incredible realism. He is also good at
capturing raw emotions within his concept sketches. Most
concept art is used as guides for the 3D development but his
sketches was used to make direct copies in 3D. Not only did
he draw these scenes he also digitally painted out these
scenes and changes the seasons for different effects.

INFECTED
These are one of the main
enemies within The Last of
Us but that doesnt mean
they are the most
dangerous. The infected
were exposed to a fungal
disease that is spread by
the swapping of fluids
such as an infected biting
a non-infected or the
transference of saliva
between the two. It can
also be released as spores
which will infect you if you
breathe them in. The
disease has varying
combinations or strands
that cause the infected to mutate in several ways. The
infected appearance changes as they become extremely
malnourished, missing limbs and fungal structures appear to
be growing from several parts of the victims bodies. The
fungal disease is based off of the Cordyceps genus. When
the Cordyceps fungus attacks a host, the mycelium invades
and replaces the hosts tissue. Some Cordyceps species are
sources of biochemicals with interesting biological and
pharmacological properties like cordycepin which is the
source of ciclosporin which is a drug helpful in organ
transplants as it suppresses the immune system. These points
prove that John Sweeney did some research behind the
concept of a fungal virus although the strain used in the
game is a mutated strain of the Cordyceps fungi.

ENVIRONMENTS

The environments within The Last of Us are the main focus

throughout the game as they can contradict and depict the
mood and focus of the various sections of the game. Every
environment no matter how small and trivial has a meaning
and a deep concept behind the composition and the colour
pallet chosen. The concept piece above is one of the vital
story points within the game and thats how life and the world
have changed and adapted to the mutated virus. Ellie who is
one of the games main characters is shown the difference
between the life she lives and the worries that she carries
compared to the life she could have lived and that the
worries before the virus were trivial nonsense. Within this scene
Ellie becomes very concerned about the state that her life is
in and that she never had a childhood that would have
been considered normal. The lighting used in this piece shows
us that there is comfort, warmth and hope within a world that
is cruel, harsh and unforgiving. The room in which this scene
takes place in has a very warm pallet and is what you would
think of when someone asks what you think a teenage girls
bedroom would look like. The colour of this room conflicts with
the cool, harsh, icy pallet of the hallway. The composition of

this room is set out really well due to the fact it doesnt look
like it has been touched by the chaos of the outside world
except the glass mirror which is shattered showing us that the
concept of a typical teenage life is just a past memory.
http://www.gamearthub.net/2013/07/13/last-of-us-conceptart-by-john-sweeney/

FALLOUT 3
Fallout 3 is a great
example for concept
art revolving around
weapons as they have
many different types
like pistols, rifles,
grenades and melee
weapons that fall
under different classifications such as standard and plasma.
In the image above we can see many different types of
weapons you can or at one point could make. One of the
larger images shows a shotgun combined with a plasma
weapon. Whereas in the
image to the right you
can see a laser rifle,
plasma pistol and a
minigun. All three of
these guns are featured
within the game. The
gun designs show an
advanced knowledge
in scientific weaponry and scientific design which explains the
complicated structure that they all have. The classes they fall
under also show how advanced civilization had become at
one point as they rely on different types of energy/fuel.

REFERENCES
Amy. (2013). Masahiro Ito on art and silent hill. Retrieved january 22, 2015,
from http://alchemillahospital.net/masahiro-ito-on-art-and-silenthill/
Octonius. (2014). Masahiro Ito. Retrieved januray 22, 2015, from
http://silenthill.wikia.com/wiki/Masahiro_Ito
Shepherd, A. (2015). bubble head nure. Retrieved january 22, 2015, from
http://silenthill.wikia.com/wiki/Bubble_Head_Nurse
http://www.geocities.jp/nobu_hill/paintings/redpyramidthing.html
https://nekrojar.wordpress.com/2014/01/15/naughty-dog-concept-artistresearch-john-sweeney/
http://www.intothepixel.com/John-Sweeney-2013.asp

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cordyceps
http://conceptartworld.com/?p=31734
http://www.creativeuncut.com/gallery-09/fo3-weapons.html
http://www.creativeuncut.com/gallery-09/fo3-homemade-weapons.html

10