My favorite talk of the day featured Brian Horton from Crystal Dynamics, and Senior Art director of the recent Tomb Raider Reboot.His first section was about 'Creating a believable hero,' and the highlight of BAF. This took us through:
Anthorpology - An appreciation of the past.An Icon Reborn - Designing a human hero.
Visualization - Keeping Lara grounded.
Casting - A new Croft.
and Voice and Performance - Showing Lara's arc through animation.
Anthoropoplgy
This was basically research, and the understanding of the original character. In 1995 Core design and Edios wanted to make a interactive 3rd person action adventure game. Toby Gard created the character and the first game was released in 1996, spinning off sequels, comics, and films. (image on right by Andy Park.)
Over time she became recived as a virtual sex symbol, rather than an attractive, strong, intelligent hero. She then deteriorated as the films become less and less well received and the release of Angel of Darkness was negatively viewed among critics and fans. This caused creator Toby Gard to start to distance from the character as she was becoming something he didn't intend.
Crystal Dynamics took over and released Tomb Raider: Legend in 2006, Tomb Raider: Anniversary in 2007, and Tomb Raider: Underworld in 2008 and were released on the next generation of consoles. This marked the end of the Lara we knew as 15 years of existing the character had virtually not developed and audiences evolved.
It was Darrel Gallagher's (head of studios) idea to reboot the franchise with Noah Huges as creative director and Rhianna Prachett as scriptwriter. They used an often used mechanism in the story based on:
- The preserved youth is called out from a place of comfort to face the unkown
- Inspired by mentors and companions
- Must face trails and temptation and begin a character transformation and development.
An Icon Reborn
Evangeline Lilly's character in Lost (Kate) became a big inspiration, showing likability, emotional depth and someone who could hide dark secrets but over all coming across as someone relatable and human. I personally think she is a great actress and would be perfect to play her in any remake film-wise.
The film The Decent also provided inspiration, ans it was a survival movie about strong and damaged female characters who in the face of fear and danger become summoned to be more.
Visualization
This started with wide exploration and testing ideas, even ones that seem wacky and strange (such as having an Orangutang companion.) I think that these levels of design input and thorough look at every iteration of the character can find exactly the perfect blend. Although sometimes I find them unnecessary, such as cutting off her hair. I think signature things like that should always be kept, its like turning her blonde, she just wouldn't look like Lara anymore, but that said any idea that even has a slight chance of looking good should be investigated fully.
The teams also looked at the island as her enemy rather than a specific person. It could be harsh, unforgiving, brutal, test the characters and contain all the qualities a human form could. It also gave the idea to develop her look to get scruffy, bloody, and ragged clothes through-out the game. This required further character iteration, refinement, and development, to keep her grounded.
Her iconography was also used in her face, her pony tail, triangle shaped face, and m shaped lips all had to be present. I think they did a brilliant balance of changing and rebooting the character while still keeping these signature features. i also like how they kept the pony tail, but loosened her hair to give her 'more of an edge.'Casting
The team used scanning software to scan models faces and bodies to give the cg model a more realistic look. Visual Works refined this further and the team gave her a clean look, and added layers of mud and blood depending on what had just happened in the game.
Performance
The Performances were captures with X-Cens technology, where a suit is wired to a computer and a actress can move about and capture the movements quickly and efficiently anywhere in the studio without requiring markers. Horton also said "If you can make the player feel the emotions the character is feeling, such as claustrophobia or acrophobia (fear of heights) the game has unbelievable power." This also increases the idea of the island as the enemy, putting the player though tense and scary locations. This can make Lara seem very small in comparison to the windy, cold, huge imposing island.
A Tomb Raider sequel has been announced and will use the same budget as the first game did. The story, or idea is that now shes experienced the island she can't go back to the normal world, shes explored a whole new world and only scratched the surface of whats out there. She's survived the Island but now will learn what it takes to be a Tomb Raider.
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