Let’s play dress-up! Creating Léa’s bar outfit

Hello everyone!

As you may have noticed by now, as the story evolves: we change locations, introduce new characters, stir things up a little bit. We also update the girls’ wardrobe to fit these new scenes.

After the scene has been written, we make an overview of the visual assets required for the scene. In this case, the locale is a bar. Is it expensive? Is it dirty? Is it in the city? Would Léa dress conservatively or in a more revealing way?

The focal point of the game is the girls, so what they say and what they wear goes a long way towards building the proper atmosphere. Figuring out what would convey our thoughts the best is the hardest part and requires the most attention. 

 Léa outfit suggestions and notes. 

 I start by doing research on different outfits that we think would suit the occasion the best – this helps narrow down our search a little bit. After discussing the selection for a bit, we make our own top 5 lists of the best candidates.

This is often the point where we realize if something that we’ve previously envisioned works or doesn’t work, either prompting us to move on to the next bit or pivot to something else entirely. In the case of Léa, we pivoted once to an entirely different outcome. 

Sometimes it is very difficult to foresee the result without attempting to put down something concrete first! 

 Léa outfit colorways

Next part is my favourite part of the process: I make sketches of our favourites, and if necessary, make alterations and iterations until we hit something that we think works out nicely. Sometimes we stumble onto something that doesn’t fit the given scenario, but can inspire us on another one further down the road. 

When we have the design that we are both happy with and have settled on the appropriate colour (another point of fervent discussion!), I move on to creating the actual asset itself.

 Léa dress progression

First, a base sprite is created from the existing sprite. This is the stuff of true eldritch nightmares. Only areas that are visible under the clothing are fully drawn at this stage, which makes the entire character look like a sexless Barbie doll from the 90s. 

Lineart is then created from the sketches done earlier, often in stages of varying polish. If I slacked off when creating the sketch, this step can take me a while, as I figure out the anatomy and weight of the garments. 

Once done, I move on to blocking out the chosen colours, shading, adding lights, reflections, details. Sometimes once finished, the colours might not look as intended, so I go back and tweak until I have come to a satisfying result.

 Léa pose 2

 Léa is a very special character, as she has two different base poses to reflect her bubbly, vivacious nature.

There is no need to repeat the entire process for this second pose as we will be illustrating the same outfit from a different angle. Instead, I can jump straight to sketching and drawing. I like this pose the best, as it allows for the introduction of some really cool lights and shadows. Plus there’s more cleavage  :-)

 Léa expressions

The final step is to make variations for each of the expressions, and create new ones if necessary for both of the two poses. For this scene we had already decided that Léa would wear contacts and leave her trademark hair clips at home. 

The look is completed with some “generously applied” make up. I wonder if anything is up with Léa..? Once all of the files have been finalized, ok-d and extracted, the job is done! 

Congratulations if you made it all the way to the end, and thank you very much for reading! This outfit is part of a particularly spicy story, so be sure to look for it in the coming builds.

See you next time!
Marjaana