[COM] Summer School Q&A feat. notMiceElf - Part 1

Promemoria primo messaggio :

Last week for the start of our Summer School Q+A we invited you all to ask one of our resident pixel pushers (that’s a pixel artist for those who didn’t know) anything you’ve ever wanted to know regarding the graphic side of Habbo and we’d force out an answer. Yes, even with red hot iron barbs if necessary and let us tell you, we were itching to use those barbs regardless (moody artsy people pffft, you know you have it coming).  Before we delve into this first Q+A though we wanted to quickly give thanks to all of you for your great questions.  So. Thanks!

Now. Lets get into that delving!  Ah, we should warn you though… this answer is coming directly from the mind of one of those artsy people so we make no claim that it actually makes sense.  Even less so considering it’s coming from notMiceElf.  Good luck dear reader.  Should you make it out consciously intact remember to submit a question of your own for the next round of the Q+A!

How do you go about designing furni so that it is consistent with other Habbo furni?  (question posted by closetspace)
Hi closetspace and thanks for the question.  Actually a pretty cool question if you delve into the historical side of things… which… could be “zzzzz” for some so for those who hate that sort of thing in essence what you’re asking about is the Habbo style and that’s really the tl;dr answer.  So. Yep.  Oh, you actually do want more? Well, grab some popcorn… this could get long winded.

The Habbo style is pretty rooted in isometric game art so the foundation for everything from furni to pets and avatars is going to be based around the rules for that kind of artwork.  For example, check out this screenshot of an old isometric Batman game from the 80s.  Sort of has a hint of Habbo in it doesn’t it? 

Those basic isometric rules dictate the point of view for everything within the Habbo rooms.  They’re really a kind of blue print which gives us a running start for keeping things consistent.  From that starting point we delve into the specifics of the Habbo style which is actually the interesting bit.
I think you can look at the Habbo style as if it were divided into three stages.  The first stage is made up of the original Habbo releases where the style was, in a lot of ways, in its infancy.  It’s this stage that gave us the foundational rules for what everything going forward would look like.  Items in this stage were much simpler.  Inner edges (like those on legs of chairs or beds) were often black, most items generally lacked texture, and the colors were also fairly simple.  It’s the kind of stuff, now, that I’d associate with someone who’s just learning the basics.  Ok, don’t misunderstand and start yelling, “You’re dissing oldskool Habbo! FOR SHAME!”, at me.  I’m just digging into the visual history to give a little context!  PUT THE TORCHES AWAY.

As Habbo made more items the pixel prowess of its designers got better (as did our internal tools for making items… thank you dev) and we left stage one and entered stage two.  There’s much better attention being payed to shape, volume and animation in this stage.  You’ll notice that vertical banding on table tops becomes pretty common place in this stage and those inner edges are starting to get color instead of being black.  Additionally the colors being selected are much more interesting from an artistic point of view which just adds to items looking like completed thoughts.  This second stage, for me, is really in full swing by the time we released Alhambra and goes on for about two years or so.

Eventually Habbo switched platforms from shockwave to flash where stage three and the real “modern” style takes over (though admittedly there was some overlap between the second and third stages as we transitioned our tools).  Stage three is characterized, in my mind, by items having more visual impact from better pixel artistry and attention to mood by way of color.  The color ramps (that’s basically a kind of controlled gradient from one color to the next) for drawing are often a bit smoother and don’t seem as abrupt as those in stage one and the first half stage two which adds to items looking a little more 3D and complex.  Items also get a lot more texture and transparency effects (stuff that wasn’t possible before. For example: water patches would never have been able to be made in stage one or two).

It’s a little more apparent if you look at how the rendering of one type of furni has changed throughout each stage.  Like. A bed.  Don’t look at theme so much but how the items are drawn.  The types of textures and complexities given to them.  It’s a pretty cool transition.

Alright. I can tell your eyes are getting droopy and your popcorn has run out which means it’s either time for me to stop with the history or plant some kind of subliminal message.  What we get from all this history though is that the Habbo style is something that’s been in a constant state of change because of individual artists and the platform Habbo was developed for changing.  There’s a core set of “rules” that were formed as we traveled those style stages to this point that we now follow. A few of those rules for example are: black outlines, light goes top left to lower right (this is an odd one… maybe someone will ask about Habbo light sometime), vertical bands for top sheen, small items being slightly larger than real life, ducks are funny.

To a certain degree that long slow change in style and the sheer volume of items (seriously, we have a ton of items) gives us a lot of leeway in keeping things appearing consistent without needing to redraw everything every few years (yeah, I’m looking at you original Area, Iced and Plastic).  In a way it’s like having a bunch of red crayons of slightly varying shades. Chances are that any new red crayon will fit somewhere in the bunch and look like it belongs.  That is, as long as we follow our style rules of course- ie: make a red crayon not a blue one. So that’s the long way around the Habbo style reason.  But there’s actually a little more to it than “just follow the rules” (see they let me out of my cage, I’ll ramble for as long as I possibly can before I’m pulled back in).  That long history of items I mentioned before also means that, more than likely, we’ve already made something similar and we can go look to it for reference.  The trick there is to copy only what’s needed so items still look fresh.  Sometimes  you’ll see that we take outlines or bits of previous furni and tie it into new furni.  It’s an elegant way to ensure a kind of shared visual communication goes on between furni from past and present (helps keep our crayons red as it were).

So there ya have it.  Our overall Habbo Style and incorporating shared elements between new and old items help keep things looking cohesive.  There’s a whole separate topic concerning keeping items within a line cohesive too but I think I’ve probably bored you enough already :p  Plus I can hear the chains rattling which means it’s time for me to be put back in my art cage. I hope you’ve found the answer as interesting as I do!

Bene! °L°

Bene

Fanno vedere lo sviluppo dei furni nel tempo

Ok, grazie

E' normale che si migliori con il tempo