redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Ever since the Year 1 Final Major Project I have used lighting as my key feature in my illustrations, which has evolved along with my style. In the beginning, it was a simple fire and white-light-in-the-distance contrast, however, I did not darken it enough for it to have any effect so it just looks insipid. I had also made the artwork more stylised and by adding the fire, inspired by the “Avatar the Last Airbender” comic series, it contrasted with the water, inspired by a popular manga series and anime - “Demon Slayer”. I also added stylised particles floating around the fire and a white light, as well as random straight rays of light coming from behind the character. I later used the same idea of rays of light in the Year 2 “My Zoo” project which ended up much stronger because elf the darker theme.

In the  first Year 2 Project “Once Upon a Time”, I decided to get rid of the background completely and create one intense light source coming from in front of the character. I focused on the light reflecting on the surfaces as well as building contrast. In this final piece, the lightning looks way more realistic than in the previous one as everything is already bluish like the light. The style I used was the same one as in the previous project, however this time I locked the black line-art and shaded it to work on the colour.

In the next project entitled “My Zoo”, things changed dramatically in terms of lighting as at that point I had now studied the Chiaroscuro effect and wasn’t afraid of keeping things dark as it was for a horror theme game cover. In this project, I also used an evolution of the style from the previous two projects, however this time I made the lines far thinner than before.

In the “MARS 2021″ or “Red Pill Blue Pill” project I focused much more on the background than I did in any other project as this time the character only occupied the centre sector of the illustration and the background was not blocked by lighting in any way. This is where I used a completely different style compared to the previous ones as I have now removed line-art altogether and pursued more of a painting like style and approach.

Throughout each of these projects I also started to pay more attention to feet since they were a weakness, and they have always somehow been rectangle blocks. In “Once Upon a Time” I started studying feet, however in the final work they still turned out less than acceptable, but in “Red Pill Blue Pill” I have once again included and focused on bare feet in the illustration and the perspective and composition helped them to turn out much better than any of the previous outcomes.

I also started including perspective to enhance the drama - in the Year 1 FMP there is no perspective what-so-ever - in fact the background doesn’t tell you anything. In the next two works, there is no background as I have focused on using the Chiaroscuro effect so it is suggested but hidden in darkness. However in the MARS project, I have focused more than ever on the background, and I decided that the point of view should be from a low angle, pointing slightly upwards. This way we as the viewer look down on things that are lying on the ground and at the protagonist’s feet gradually looking up at her face and at the wall behind her.

In MARS project I have not just used lighting to add a dramatic effect or to guide the viewer's eyes, this time I used it to inform the audience that there is something behind the camera that we cannot see ourselves but we see the shadow of. There is a shadow of a human-robot on the character as well as the surroundings which explains why the protagonist is cowering and explains why there are random metal shapes heading straight for her.

Whilst m y practical work grows in confidence one of my weaknesses is that in my projects I sometimes forget to reflect on my early research while I’m in the final steps of the project. This is something that is extremely important as by doing this I can elaborate and examine how I went from idea A to idea Z and why that process makes sense and how it may all still be relevant. This will make the evaluation stronger during the project and easier to develop at the end.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Using the research to interpret focus and outcome

In this project, quite a few of my elements have been inspired by the things I researched. Some of the things I researched just so happened to line up with my pre-existing ideas, which gave made it easier for me to imagine a whole alternate universe.

Matrix - robots have headquarters and humans live in a hidden city and ships -Robots have a headquarters somewhere in the city, humans live in hidden societies inside of a large city,

We happy few - parallel timeline to our ( England lost WW2) -parallel time to ours, where humans researched robots more.

Life is strange - multiple endings (destruction of Arcadia Bay or Chloe’s death) -multiple endings of joining robots, becoming neutral or stay on the human’s side.

Irobot & Humans -robotic slave servants - I didn’t really have an idea why the robots would attack humans, so having robots be done with being human servants is a good enough reason

Terminator - human-looking robots - they don’t cause as much panic when spotted by normal people -human-looking robots are used to infiltrate human bases, so they need to look realistic

Ex-machine - human bonding with robot - I wanted to create conflict within the human protagonist and having a robot that ( at least temporarily ) is not hostile was a good idea to do so.

Ghost in the shell - robots are the new law -Well built A.I. can outsmart humans, in terms of physical terms humans have no chance as well - no way to fight the machines

Cyborg - robotic prosthetic body parts -Both the protagonist and some of the lower-powered antagonists ( humans who joined robots ) have body parts that do not belong there

Colossus - human robots -Metal body based on the human anatomy in enemy human-looking robots which have not been perfected yet

If I was starting this project again I would probably head for a fictional universe, rather than a world that is reflecting ours as I want to add more saturated and vibrant colours which do not occur naturally nor everywhere in our world. I explored this idea by colouring the protagonist in an alternative colour scheme.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

First I sketched out three different concepts for this illustration, I reused one of the poses because I realised that this pose has some potential from a different angle and scenario - so instead from seeing the protagonist from below and a robot in the background on a building it would be the protagonist entering a side alley. Then I decided to use the idea of a character being in a side alley and decided that this would be the moment when the protagonist would be first cornered by the robot before running away and then hacking into it.

I created another layer to refine the sketch, then I added flat colours on seperate layers so it would be easier for me to contain things in their designated areas. Then I ignored this and rougly splodged colours where they would be in the future and then I started working on that. When I finished colouring everything, I created a new layers on top of everything to darken some areas as well as correct some shadows and textures.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

The Protagonist

First i rougly sketched out the pose I want the character to be in, showing only the body, backpack and the shovel. Then I turned the opacity down to 27% and added clothes and other details on a new layer. I created a brand new layer which was below my two previous one to give her some colour, I used desaturated colour because they do not stand out so much and during an apocalyptic time stealth means survival, so I created another layer to show how I would like to colour her if she wasn’t bound by the laws of my univere - maybe for my next project I will use highly saturated colours only ?

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Target Audience

I think that my game would be an  action-adventure game, similar to Isomaniac’s “Spider-Man” where you are free to roam around the map and do different events but as story progresses the game play changes -

at first you are limited to human only camps

when you are assumed to be on robots side you can go anywhere where the robots are but not where the humans are

if you choose the neutral side you have to sneak into both 

“Spider-Man” is only 12+ so I think it’s suitable to say that my game would also be 12+, however if this is an apocalypse some people would fall into things as drugs and alcohol which are shown in 16+ games.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Story of the game

Context:

Robots decided that they are done with humans and began a rebellion, they have distributed a virus which has been spread to all electric devices. 

Humanity is being crushed by the machines, those that have survived scaterred around into small groups in big cities while some have started larger communities outside of cities. Majority of the population in big cities have been killed while the rest is trying to flee while some try to wait it out, however after a short time the robots have created barriers which disable humans from passing through as well as patrols that monitor the barriers.

The game takes place inside one of those walls, there are search droids which monitor the streets in search of human life. These droids record everything they see, if something is not usefull it is deleted within 10 seconds, but when they find humans they transmit the location and recording to the main server. 

The machines have been trying to build robots which look excactly like humans so that they can find other human societies, infiltrate them, gather data and then proceed to exterminate the survivors with support of called in robots. The older models of these robots have only a human face while the new ones are indistinguishable from real humans.

There are some humans which decided to submit to the machines, their bodies are heavily modified and cybernetified. They gain a lot of physical power, however they become slaves to the machines, if they even think of disobeying the robots they are electrocuted which causes instant death. All of those humans have switched sides as the barrier was initially created - this is why the protagonist is accused of being a traitor as she was there while the amputee leader was with his group deep inside the city at the time. 

Story:

The protagonist of this game is a female amputee without lower right leg, she has survived the initial attack of the machines and then tried to run away from any civilasation. Unfortunetly she was one of those that encountered the barrier as it was instanteniously built right in front of her eyes, her family managed to get through without her. Majority of the crowd has been slaughtered as she managed to hide in a nearby basement where she waited for a couple of days. 

After a couple of days, she descended further into the city to increate the distance between her and the patrolling robots, she finds a survivour group which rejects her after realising she is an amputee as they assume she is one of the traitors that joined the machines - the people were paranoid and attempted to kill her. The leader of the group decided to have mercy, believing that she is not a traitor and convinced the crowd that kicking her out is good enough.

She travels to find her self a secure shelter, however as she travels she is found by one of the first robo-human units. She is forced to run and hide, however not a day later the robot finds her once again, but this time the protagonist has found a weapon to defend herself - a shovel. The robot experiences a  short circuit, the protagonist attempts to hack into the robots mainframe to make it her ally, however before she finishes the robot wakes up. The first thing A.I. sees is the fake leg the protagonist has, since it’s acess to main server has been jammed the A.I. assumes she is one of those humans that have joined the robots, therefore she does not attack. 

The protagonist travels with the A.I. as she is too afraid abandoning her will make her realise the mistake she made and murder her. Her robot partner grants her an immunity among other robots and they do not attack her, all assuming it is a simple bug that she does not appear in the system. During the days of travelling with the robot, the protagonist starts to understand A.I. perspective more as well as the reverse. 

As it turns out, a human settlement has been found - the one protagonist was kicked out from. With no choice but to follow, she goes there and witnesses as the people who tried to murder her die to the robots. The robot accompaniying her is starting to suspect her as she is just frozen in place instead of attacking, to prove her innocence she is forced to execute the man that saved her from the rage of his people.

At this point the player can either

Attack the A.I. and help the humans, the A.I. get’s destroyed as all survivors flee. Protagonist killing the A.I. proves to the other survivors that she is not a traitor and she is finally accepted. Eventually they meet up with another group of survivors which is trying to fight the robots, once the two groups join they create the rebellion whose leader is also an amputee. Since the protagonist has spent so much time with the enemies, she becomes one of the leading members of the rebellion against robots and accelerates the victory of humans which is achieved by collecting and destroying stray robots and creating an electromagnetic impulse which causes an error in majority of the robots making them weaker - this enables them to storm the headquarters and deactivate the robots.

Refuse to execute him and run away with the leader, however he feels betrayed by her and stays behind as he is killed by A.I. which then goes after her. She eventually gets cornered and questioned by the robot, the protagonist has a breakdown and slowly comes to terms with her death by execution which never comes. The A.I. reveals that she does not wish to kill her as she has got to know her and she is not a monster like other humans who treat robots as slaves, after stating that if all humans were like this then the robots might stop the assault on humans. The protagonist convinced the A.I. to stop living like all the other robots and end this human robot war and they form a pair which vandalises robotic equipment as well as prevents human rebell attacks as they try to show that they can live once again in harmony. Neither of them are able to work on the inside with fellow humans and robots as some people survived the attack and saw protagonist’s face while the A.I. has been completly detached from the mainframe to prevent her from being shut down. Eventually the protagonist and the A.I. are captured by humans who completly hack the robot, erasing all of it’s memories and making her a killing machine, with the robot as their slave humanity completly removes A.I. making them nothing but programmed bland dolls.

Execute the man and become what she swore she would never do, the protagonist proves her self and lives as a traitor without having her body ever modified. Her mind slowly rots away as she ends up being the cause of many human deaths, both of those innocent people trying to live in hiding as well as those that try to rebel. Eventually the robots realise that she is not anywhere in the system. As she is about to be cybernified, humans attack the robots headquarters, the protagonist get’s attacked and murdured by ironically someone who is also an amputee. This attack on headquarters leads to a win for human side as all robots are finally  deactivated and destroyed.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Colossus and Cyborg

Colossus is a character from Marvel Comics who can transform himself into a metallic form at will.

Eventhought no characters in my universe are mutants or have superpowers, I think he is worthlooking at relating to my project as in it there are robots whose bodies are based of human anatomy but replaced with metal parts and wires.

Cyborg is a character from DC Comics who was attacked by a creature from another dimension which killed his mother and injured the majority of his body. The incident hapenned in his parents lab, once his father had returned the creature back to it’s own dimension he used the technology he created to safe his son’s life making him half machine.

Cyborg and his design relate more to my story as I plan for some humans to be working with the robots, meaning that their bodies would be enhanced and modified by robotic technology.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Parkour

My robots need to have high quality movement to be able to catch humans in any given environment. To look at poses and movements they might take I want to have a look at parkour.

Parkour is a sport activity of people travelling the fastest way they can from point A to B, even if the route they take is not safe. It usually takes place in areas that are not safe and people are not designated to be in those in the first place. 

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Ghost in the Shell

Ghost in the Shell is a cyberpunk media franchise based on a manga under the same name written and illustrated by Masamune Shirow. It first serialised in 1989 as “The Ghost in The Shell”.  The story is about a special group of operatives focusing on counter-cyberterrorism.

The protagonist of the series is a synthetic “full-body prosthesis” augmented-cybernetic human - in conclusion a robot which 100% looks like human. What the protagonist of this series is, is essentially what robots in my project want to achieve as this will destroy the remaining bits and pieces of humanity that have survived up to that point.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Humans TV Show

Humans is a TV series released from 2015 to 2018, it has 3 series consisting of 24 overall episodes. Simirally to my projectm this is a prallel present but in this series people have “Synth” which are robotic servants which appear in majority of the families in the world. However it turns out that the robots are starting to feel emotions and they might mean harm to humans.

Trailer:

Trailer basically looks like any drama show trailer to ever exsist, conflict in a family weather or not they should keep the robot, arguing there upgrades are necessairy. Music picks up as we learn that they can think for their own and have emotions, and should not be treated as servants. That’s about it,

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sm23e0a5_w

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Artificial Intelligence

What is Artificial Intelligence ?

 “Back in the 1950s, the fathers of the field, Minsky and McCarthy, described artificial intelligence as any task performed by a machine that would have previously been considered to require human intelligence.”

How is it currently utilised ?

“AI is ubiquitous today, used to recommend what you should buy next online, to understanding what you say to virtual assistants, such as Amazon's Alexa and Apple's Siri, to recognise who and what is in a photo, to spot spam, or detect credit card fraud. “

I think that humans are projecting that the robots will be the downfall of humanity, it’s evidenced by the amount of media which revolves around robot’s uprising and dominating the world.

Throughout history, humans have always acted violently so why would something made by human hands no act the same way ? There have been countless of wars, two of which are World Wars and unfortunetly there is many more to come - humans create discord easily out of greed and fear. Even if robots do not rebel then there is a high chance that there will be a group of people who will believe that someday robots will want to destroy us and this will spark a war against those who wish to live with robots and those who want to destroy them.

Human brains are programmed so that when we perform good actions and bad actions, a chemical is released to make us feel emotions. These chemicals encourage us to perform good actions and not be a horrible person. However a robot doesn’t have anything like this, yes you could potentionally program it to not do things like - do not murder humans - but there are so many different ways that it would be impossible to do so. Even if you could manage a program like that, it’s possible that something could get bugged or someone hacked the A.I. and turned those things off.

source: https://www.zdnet.com/article/what-is-ai-everything-you-need-to-know-about-artificial-intelligence/

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Ex Machina

Ex Machina is a thriller released in 2014, the story follows a programmer who after winning a competition at his company is taken to CEO’s private mountain retreat to interact with the world’s first class Artificial Intelligence which is housed in a female robotic body.

Trailer:

The trailer starts as the programmist is being transferred to CEO’s house and through a conversation we learn how he is able to get there in the first place. The music has a repeated beat and between it’s loops, the screen fades in and out of the mountain retreat until a conversation sparks. We are shown interactions between protagonist and CEO, and how this is not a normal house but also a research facility.

Music finally changes from the same repeated beats which were portraying the tension the protagonist must have been feeling since he is a no one in the company living with his CEO whom he never have met before. The new music is calm, childlish as we meet the A.I. this is a perfect choice since eventhough this is a robot looking like an adult woman it know’s nothing about the world - just like an infant.

Music changes once again as she interacts more with the protagonist, it’s almost like a mixture of the two previous tracks. This portrays the emotional bond that is starting to grow between the man and the machine. A subtle beat starts building up, then it cuts as the A.I. reveals he shouldn’t trust the CEO. Music switches one more time as they try to free the A.I. without rising suspicions from CEO.

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYGzRB4Pnq8

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

How to Paint Backgrounds - Tutorial

source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIvRcXRaPkg

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

How to Paint Metal - Tutorials

Shiny

Old

Dark Metal

sources:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wB5YA8tOVw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcUZYVGkc-s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLcc6y3Vgm8

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

This character is one of the robots that have been created to find any surviving humans, gain their trust, find their hide outs and exterminate them. This is one of the first robots of this unit, therefore it only has a human face. These robots usually use clotching and wigs to cover up the metal parts - but specifically this robot has been re-wired by the survivors to help them survive and they decided its unnecessairy for it to cover. Her eye is glowing red as it’s able to search for any organic materials and heat signatures - a feature built in to find the humans.

First I thought of a pose and sketched it using feathery lines, then I turned the opacity of that later down and fixed up some of the proportions. To make it more robotic I went to look at anatomy sources and I used those muscle structures to create metalic muscles and wires. I also looked up a face online at the angle I wanted to reference the face. I decided that it would take way too long for me to not make it sketchy, while this is only the first concept of this character so I want to leave it at the stage of basic rendering.

references:https://www.instagram.com/anatomy_source/?hl=pl

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

I decided to throw all ideas of humans merged with robots on one page so that it would be easier for me to create a proper design. I looked at reference photos to help me with anatomy, aspecially with the open stomach one in the bottom right.

[redpillwiktoriaizydorczyk]

Front

I painted it so that the front view version is made of really reflective metal since painting this type of metal is the type I love painting the most and is what inspired me to include robots in this project. I decided to have the background sky at sunset because I wanted to have a contrast between the orange and purple as light and shadow. 

Side

 I thought what would the robot look like if it operated outside of big cities, well since plants are green I decided to use that as my main colour. 

Back 

This is the version that would actually roam the cities in my project as it has dull and desaturated colours, enabling it to blend in with the surroundings without fully relying on the camouflaging wings.