I really, really wish there were more hairstyle options for the Sylvari. I have been debating on which race I want to make my Elementalist, but every time I customize a Sylvari I find myself staring at the hairstyle screen.
Customization in this game is amazing, but I certainly have far more options with hair on a Norn or Human.
Actually I designed the Pale Tree’s avatar loosely after the Nefertiti bust than anything, as it’s a great silhouette for Important PersonTM. The concept behind the Pale Tree Avatar was in creating a symbol between the Tree and the Fruit (sylvari). What better conduit than the Flower? :}
As for the face, it was designed to work with the hair, making the whole head one big blossom. My intentions were to create stately features (cheek and jaw structure) with big, big eyes. I didn’t even know to look for Erykah, but to tell you the truth, she really does look like her. Especially the mouth structure. Heh. Funny that.
Just to clarify, the sylvari (and specifically the Pale Tree Avatar) is not directly of Egyptian culture for design as a race. Her headdress answered a good problem: how do you get the feeling of regal in a blossom shape? If I looked at more western designs, they’re typically crown rings or half-moon crescents (Queen Elizabeth style) for silhouette. While those are beautiful, I was hoping for more flower and less peakitten (<— What, seriously this gets censored? It’s a bird.) plumage.
Although, if I think more about it, Egyptian art and architecture has a lovely foundation with plant shapes and the lotus is one of my favorite flowers. However, though it’s not intended as a direct relationship for the sylvari, it does make sense. I just mention the design distinction so it doesn’t get spread into lore bits. (hehe)
As for why there were so many leafy styles at ship, that’s more of a question of schedule. Before ship, we needed to optimize whatever assets we could. Many of the more leaf styles were created from the previous race design and were retrofitted for the new concept. As a race, they are not relegated to a specific plant type. But bear in mind that whatever plants could be used need to look good with both the leaf and bark body skin types. It’s potentially awkward to get seaweed to look right on that, for example, but the concept might allow more brook and stream water plants in theory.
I’ve had many designs in my head and in sketches since even before ship, and have been keeping an eye on the forum posts since then. Players have asked for long hair, for more bark hair, for flower hair (for both genders) that mixes with leaves… I’ve even seen a comment about getting the mohawk ported on the female. There have been trends and themes, but one question makes me curious. I see a lot of folks mentioning what they’d like to see on sylvari, but that’s a different question than what they’d personally like for their own character.
Major disclaimer: no promises, no schedule, etc… But if you were daydreaming about what you personally want for your sylvari, what would it be? :} What would its presence feel like? What style? What materials?
Hello everyone,
It sounds like we’re very much on the same page with a lot of general ideas for the sylvari. Heck, I’ve had concepts drawn up for long hair, flowers and dreads since before ship that I’d love to see. Even palm trees were on that hen scratching sheet. And more. ;}
So long as we’re talking philosophy (because as I mentioned before in the previous disclaimer, these are not promises or schedules: this is a wish list, right?), there are a couple things I though you might like discussed.
In most cases, I personally agree with minimizing the line between male and female styles. In my opinion, males can wear flowers just as much as females can wear spikes. The styles we shipped with were a combination of retrofitting earlier sylvari art direction and creating styles to flesh out the race. If when we shipped we had males and females wear the same styles, we wouldn’t be as able to create varied silhouettes. Creating variety can be more important than hair equality when you have a limited amount of time to build a full race. At ship, of course. :}
Having said that, I do think as an artist there are some styles and concepts that work better on one gender over another. Just because a male can wear a flower, it doesn’t have to be the same design as the female. I believe in tailoring to characters, not being shackled to principles for principle’s sake.
Oh, I wanted to mention that I love love LOVE all the drawings that you guys are doing and would love to see more! But just so you know: mosses, dandelion puffs and other soft forms (pine needles, too) are difficult to create when you only have access to load alpha — as are cascades of flowers or complex blossoms due to poly count. There are certain restrictions in place for creating a hair or face for the game. That’s not to say it’s impossible, however, but it may be impractical.
For the question of hairstyles pulling a lot of skin color, that’s because the first dye channel blends with the skin in order to create the ‘growing from’ look. If I use the skin tone to work with it, the hair feels more complex than just one color shade. This can change from hairstyle to hairstyle, of course. There’s a need for both. But if you have a bark body, I don’t have the channels to give you a color for leaves and a color for flowers. I have to pick one.
I’ve noticed for faces, most requests are at the end of the spectrum… folks seem to want pretty or creature, not as much in between. Interesting. Out of curiosity, why not? The race was designed to live in the in between. Any thoughts? :}
If you guys have the stamina, keep posting sketches! It’s so awesome seeing them and they are inspiring! I’d join you in drawing if I didn’t think it’d be picked up by some article and reported as an official release. ;P Ah well, I can live vicariously through all of you! Art it up, guys!
Ah, now that the livestream and hair release is out, I can get more in-depth with those designs and follow up on some of the topics I’ve seen brought up here. I can’t talk about everything, of course, but I’ll do my best. For some varied responses:
To answer a persistent query: the beards aren’t something we can make mix and match for the sylvari. On the texture template, the varied ear choices take up that particular slot. So this means that any beards or whatnot have to be built with which face it’s designed. If anyone has a particular design to suggest, I’ll give it a good thinking. No promises, as I’m also restricted to the face area on the template. So a big bushy beard probably can’t happen without voodoo and mai tais.
Trehearne’s design was asked about somewhere. Yes, I did his design. (I know how poplar he is. Heh.) He’s based off of devil’s claw thorns. The shapes of those pods are pretty awesome looking (and they’re not leaf based… wanted some material variety). I wanted to make a cool brooding face that swept forward rather than back with its structures. I thought the pocks in the pods were awesome glow points. And now that I type that again, I remind myself to use more fun patterns with face glows. It’s just that it’s so satisfying to have glow coming from in between layers! An addiction, I know… ;}
Yes, I agree that a lot of leaf shapes are oval. With the fern hair and pinecone, I was trying to address some of this by introducing new shapes. Even the flower hair is really new, as we didn’t have both leaves and petal as a mixed material. I’ve been trying to ponder maple leaves, but they don’t particularly play nice as sparse shapes (you guys tend to like full designs). They prefer to be in clumps. That’s hard to do without looking like a raked pile of leaves. Still chewing on it, though.
Other textures I’d like to play with are long grasses, curly vines, weathered leaves and more flowers. The flower hair design was changed up for the male and female versions: I know it’d be a shame if the strapping young lads were denied flowers! However, the blossom design alone really wouldn’t sit well on them. So I thought the more tarzan/rockstar bud design solved that issue… still a flower, but tailored for him. ;}
I see mentions of fruits and nuts. This is a new category of material that I’ve been pondering and haven’t quite settled with it. While the visual idea is lovely, I’ve always pictured the sylvari to be the fruits of the Pale Tree. For fruits to have fruits of their own… not sure that works just yet. It may be a matter of weighing anatomy righteousness against the fashion notion that most people won’t care and just want the cool factor. Hehehe, oh you guys! One day you’re in, the next day you’re out, eh?
Oh yes, curls. I had an old Shirley Temple design way back before the redesign. It was on my character panel for PAX a few years ago. So many possibilities with this… and the cloth physics should prove quite fun! …Or a nightmare with the collapsing polies during jumping animations. Ah, such is art.
Finally, out of curiosity… Zeefa, could you be more specific? I know you wanted a short mohawk from a previous post, but what about the new hairs didn’t work for you and what kind of hairs are more interesting to you? I can’t promise it’ll get made, but I always try to take feedback into account.
Keep up the great posts and sketches, guys! I love seeing what you guys do and it’s always a great window into some of what sylvari players want.
