The Bucket and the Big Momma Pearl

James Hitchmoughart, board games, Dive, thoughts

This post needs your feedback!  My prototype of the game Dive works nicely and we’re working to create a pretty one.  The game revolves around taking a deep breath and diving down to collect underwater treasures.  I’ve finally drafted up my second item, the Big Momma Pearl.

I’ve been using the tools I already have – Corel Painter Essentials 5 and a Wacom Bamboo drawing tablet.  Corel Painter is an art program which simulates brushes (and other tools) and different kinds of paints.

I’m still learning how to use it, but have enjoyed it so far.  I painted(?) the bucket first and will show an earlier draft of it here so that you can see some of the progression.

Prototype Bucket
Prototype Bucket
Early Bucket
Early Bucket

The writing and numbers are just placeholders at the moment.  It’s early days, but I want to settle on a style for the game’s art before too long.  There are 52 cards to design, after all!

Whilst working on the bucket, all of the techniques used were ones that could be done with real life art.  I absolutely love the light effects on the final bucket!  I tried to add some depth by ‘burning‘ to make it darker and ‘dodging‘ to make it lighter.  There are a few small details too, such as a grainy sand effect.

Early on, I lightened the background.  This watery, blue background will most likely be on each item card.

By the time I’d got half way through my second card, the Big Momma Pearl, I had been enjoying messing around with a pattern of working.  I would dump a few colours of paint onto the canvas in the general shapes I needed, then would use a tool called the Impressionist Blender Jitter which gave some nice texture and brought in some extras colours.

Prototype Big Momma Pearl
Prototype Big Momma Pearl
Early Big Momma Pearl
Early Big Momma Pearl

This item has a very different feel to the Bucket – darker and quite a bit busier.  The Big Momma is one of the deepest items to collect and, as such, doesn’t have the same lighting effects as the Bucket.  There are more rocks deeper in this water, and more wild plants.

I found this picture difficult to draw, but I think mostly because I had the option of putting in so many different plants and rocks.  I wouldn’t be able to name many of the plants (yet!) but there are such a great variety of interesting plants that live underwater!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on my art so far.  Bear in mind that the writing is mostly there to give an idea of what it could look like – I’m mostly interested in your thoughts on the graphics.

Is this the kind of art you would enjoy to see when snorkelling into the depths for treasure?