2D Artist Guidelines

A collection of sources, tips, and styles for 2D Artists.

Documenation

• GoA Artwork, a list of artworks used, their authors and status.

Tools

• Game Icons, a site with free game icons of any kind! Very useful!

CoA Workflow

1. Open the work directory, Warcraft-Guardians-of-Azeroth-2\gfx\coat_of_arms\colored_emblems.
2. Create an image file, 512x512 pixels.
3. Every CoA has 3 colors: blue, cyan, and magenta defined in HSV format, NOT RGB. You're free to change V, the value, it will allow you to create shadows and light.

• Blue, 240H, 100S, 50V, the 1st color.
• Cyan, 150H, 100S, 100V, the 2nd color.
• Magenta 330H, 100S, 100V, the 3rd color.

Example

4. To make sure your CoA is visible, try to fit it in this mask so it touches the black borders. At the same time, it should be centered around the image center. Note: Due to the bottom being cropped badly, you may make so the lowest part of the icon touches the lowest black border.

Mask

5. Save it in the work directory, in .dds format.
6. Implement it in-game using CoA Tips or call a coder.

CoA Tips

• Coat of Arms Modding, a full guide to adding new CoAs for dynasties or titles.
• To make a title CoA work in-game you should add this template in common\coat_of_arms\coat_of_arms\00_wc_landed_titles.txt:

Template

k_gnomeregan = { #Put title name from common\landed_titles\01_landed_titles.txt
	pattern = "pattern_solid.dds" #Plain background
	color1 = rgb { 80 60 125 } #Background color
	colored_emblem = {
		texture = "ce_gnomeregan.dds" #Name of image file
		color1 = rgb { 210 155 115 } #"Blue" color
		color2 = rgb { 75 55 65 } #"Cyan" color
		color3 = rgb { 120 80 110 } #"Magenta" color
	}
}

• To make a dynasty CoA work in-game you should add this template in common\coat_of_arms\coat_of_arms\wc_dynasties.txt:

Template

10000 = { # Put dynasty ID from common\dynasties
	pattern = "pattern_solid.dds" #Plain background
	color1 = rgb { 80 60 125 } #Background color
	colored_emblem = {
		texture = "ce_gnome_eagle.dds" #Name of image file
		color1 = rgb { 210 155 115 } #"Blue" color
		color2 = rgb { 0 255 144 } #"Cyan" color
		color3 = rgb { 120 80 110 } #"Magenta" color
	}
}

• You can force specific cultures or faiths to use specific colors (like green for Kul Tirans). First, declare new named colors in common\named_colors\wc_colors.txt. Go to common\coat_of_arms\template_lists\color_lists.txt. You will see 2 big blocks, normal_colors (usually dark ones) and metal_colors (usually bright ones). The same or similar colors can't be on both lists.

Trait Icon Guidelines:

• Trait background are in Warcraft-Guardians-of-Azeroth-2\.artist_resources\icons\traits.

Save Formats:

• .dds, 3D textures: DXT5 compression, with mipmaps
• .dds, transparent: DXT5 compression, without mipmaps
• .dds, non transparent: DXT1 compression, without mipmaps
• .dds, small images, 150x150 and less: no compression, without mipmaps

Styles:

Lifestyle Tree Background

In GIMP choose Colours > Levels...

Images

Click Auto Input Levels, set White Output to 125.

Images

Open Filters > Blur > Gaussian Blur, set Size to 15.

Innovation Icon

In GIMP choose Filters > Artistic > Oilify.

Use Default resettings except for Mask Radius set to 2.

Images

Doctrine Icon

In GIMP choose Filters > Blur > Gaussian Blur....

Set Size X and Size Y to 1.

Artifact Icon

By MemeWizard, ping me if you have questions or want me to do icon I'll be using GIMP to make them

Firstly, lets try to remove one dimension from the model and make icon more 2D-like

Lock the alpha layer and Filter->Artistic->Oilify the image to remove superfluous details. Use whatever "mask radius" that you think looks good and maximize "exponent" and "number of intensities" to make image less blurry and more sharp.

Images

Use Filter->Artistic->Cartoon or Filter->Enchance->Sharpen to add cartoon-like black line No exact values, play with it until it's enough, add it or not depending on how it looks

Images

Grab an icon from \game\gfx\interface\icons\artifact and use colour->Brightness-contrast to set it similar brightness level

Images

Use unified transform tool (and flip tool, if necessary) and size them down to the artifact size.

Images

Use paintbrush tool and ctrl+click to pick colours and smudge tool to remove light reflections where they looks weird. Use Colors->Colorize to change parts color to make it looks more simplistic.

Images

Use 1-2 pixel wide paintbrush tool with black (and smudge tool) or darker variations of colours to highlight important parts

Images

Create black outline

Images

Create gold (cec9a1) outline if it is a unique artifact

Images

That should be more or less done.

Images

Don't forget about asking other people's opinions about the result, because it's actually really easy to miss some obvious details while working on other details or the whole image.

Images