Undeadprotoss
07-06-2017, 10:10 AM
So I was gonna post this on the official forums and try to send it to the art team, but I wanted to show it to you guys/ get your opinion on it first.
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One of the recurring issues we've talked about with some of the new portraits is how similar so many of the Protoss look. The team went back and gave a lot of the portraits yellow eyes again, which is awesome, but a lot of the portraits still look a little too similar. For comparison, let's first look at a collage of all Protoss portraits in SC1 that have their faces visible.
2537
In SC1, Protoss had a wide variety of skin tones/colors. We have a whole spectrum of muted colors, in the words of someone I can't remember, we had "the calico, light green, bage, solid blue, white, dark grey, etc". Not to mention, many Protoss like Aldaris, Tassadar, and the Scout had unique facial features. Like dark brown spots or the "crown" on Tassadar's skull. This variety helped the Protoss feel diverse, and made each portrait stand out. Just as how you need to have people look different from one another to make them recognizable as individuals, the same needs to be done with Protoss.
Now, since we've talked a lot about SC2 influence in the remaster art, let's compare the SC2 Protoss to the remastered Portraits we have so far.
2538
Quick Note: In SC2, eye color depends on the faction the Protoss in question is a part of. All Khalai have blue eyes, all Dark Templar green, all Tal'darim red, etc.
If we shut off all other details for a second, and we look closely at the skin, what do we notice? Pretty much all SC2 Protoss have the exact same skin tone of light, bluish grey, and none have any truly unique facial features. It's also hard to glean any real expression from the portraits, not to knock SC2 too much, but they all do kind of look like statues sometimes.
Now, let's look at the remastered portraits (minus the Dragoon as he's underwater and a bad representation of the skin point).
2539
(That is in fact Tassadar at the bottom left, I made a mistake in naming the picture)
We notice two very important things with these portraits.
1. The skin tone/color and facial features of the remastered portrait don't necessarily match that of the original.
2. Most of the portraits still have similar skin textures/tones/shades, and so they feel homogenus.
A key part of the SC1 experience was having portraits that all felt unique and interesting, while still being part of a race that was fleshed out. In order to preserve that and the recognition of the old portraits, we need to make sure the remastered Protoss don't share the same problems that their SC2 cousins do.
__________________________________________________ __________________________________________________ __________
One of the recurring issues we've talked about with some of the new portraits is how similar so many of the Protoss look. The team went back and gave a lot of the portraits yellow eyes again, which is awesome, but a lot of the portraits still look a little too similar. For comparison, let's first look at a collage of all Protoss portraits in SC1 that have their faces visible.
2537
In SC1, Protoss had a wide variety of skin tones/colors. We have a whole spectrum of muted colors, in the words of someone I can't remember, we had "the calico, light green, bage, solid blue, white, dark grey, etc". Not to mention, many Protoss like Aldaris, Tassadar, and the Scout had unique facial features. Like dark brown spots or the "crown" on Tassadar's skull. This variety helped the Protoss feel diverse, and made each portrait stand out. Just as how you need to have people look different from one another to make them recognizable as individuals, the same needs to be done with Protoss.
Now, since we've talked a lot about SC2 influence in the remaster art, let's compare the SC2 Protoss to the remastered Portraits we have so far.
2538
Quick Note: In SC2, eye color depends on the faction the Protoss in question is a part of. All Khalai have blue eyes, all Dark Templar green, all Tal'darim red, etc.
If we shut off all other details for a second, and we look closely at the skin, what do we notice? Pretty much all SC2 Protoss have the exact same skin tone of light, bluish grey, and none have any truly unique facial features. It's also hard to glean any real expression from the portraits, not to knock SC2 too much, but they all do kind of look like statues sometimes.
Now, let's look at the remastered portraits (minus the Dragoon as he's underwater and a bad representation of the skin point).
2539
(That is in fact Tassadar at the bottom left, I made a mistake in naming the picture)
We notice two very important things with these portraits.
1. The skin tone/color and facial features of the remastered portrait don't necessarily match that of the original.
2. Most of the portraits still have similar skin textures/tones/shades, and so they feel homogenus.
A key part of the SC1 experience was having portraits that all felt unique and interesting, while still being part of a race that was fleshed out. In order to preserve that and the recognition of the old portraits, we need to make sure the remastered Protoss don't share the same problems that their SC2 cousins do.