Look dev/ ART DIRECTOR-
2XKO: Ties That Bind
2XKO :
Fighting Game
ANIMATED CINEMATIC:
Marketing
VENDOR:
Squeeze Studio
PROJECT CHALLENGE: 2XKO is Riot’s first foray into the fighting game genre. This cinematic was intended as the first official cinematic connected with the early access launch.
Tackling pre-production early, this was one of Izzy’s first projects on the RIOT Marketing Creative Services team as a veteran art director and illustrator. Starting initially as a look dev exploration project, as production continued Izzy was tapped to create look pipeline files and art direct shots for lighting, color, and atmosphere. Several shots made it into the final product.
PRODUCT:
4.9m+ views
FRANCHISE:
Player count TBR
Revenue TBR
Sometimes the most challenging art direction happens when there is a strong franchise aesthetic that needs to keep its defining style in a totally different medium.
This was precisely the case on the launch cinematic for Riot Games’ 2XKO.
The game style has deep roots in anime and comic books. With cel shaded characters contoured in crisp black linework. The flat anime styled characters fight on a single plane in painterly environments which lets them pop perfectly for the game. This beautiful and decisive direction in look and inspiration is perfect for this fighter, but would present unique issues in a fully narrative cinematic.
For the music video; clarity for longer narrative sequences of action, visibility, and cinematic storytelling would lean heavily on lighting, extreme character staging, atmosphere, and camera work that would ultimately lose the game styled characters in the scenes.
Izzy was called on to solve the unique demand of these stylized figures reading during cinematic action and emotional performance in a fast paced music video.
Screen caps from the game, during standard combat and more cinematic special moves.
For this music video, izzy was tasked to be extremely subtle in the art direction shift. He employed Precise control over value & atmosphere, color theory, and deep knowledge of lighting behaviours to help the animation vendor tell their story without losing the core style from the game.
Raw images will be followed by those adjusted by Izzy.
Raw Render.
Adjusted by Izzy.
Where necessary, Izzy created clarity by augmenting background, lighting, and effects.
