shawn-robertson
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An Irrational fear of monsters
"A good monster is a monster you can imagine in repose."That was the advice acclaimed horror writer and director Guillermo del Toro gave Ken Levine, the creator of the BioShock franchise, during a conversation on the Irrational Games podcast. Levine takes those words to heart in his own creative direction, and before building any terrifying monsters, he makes sure Irrational develops a rich, empathetic backstory that places each of the deformed, viciously homicidal creatures in routine settings, where they perform the most base of actions: contributing to society, petting a dog, relaxing, mourning.Four Irrational members – Levine, art director Nate Wells, lead artist Shawn Robertson, and sound man Pat Balthrop – gave the PAX audience a glimpse into the secret lives and creation of five major BioShock Infinite villains: the Motorized Patriot, Handyman, Siren, Boys of Silence and Songbird.
Lead artist Shawn Robertson talks the aesthetic evolution of BioShock Infinite
It doesn't take long looking at screens or video from BioShock Infinite for you to realize it looks like nothing else on the market. We talked with lead artist Shawn Robertson about how the game's unique aesthetic evolved. When you were building the world, what were some of your aesthetic influences? For me, I kept flashing back to Main Street at Disney World, you know, when you first walk in? Good call, that's the period, that Gilded Age of America, the early 1900s when everybody's so full of hope and optimism. We didn't start there, it's definitely a journey. When we started, when we had the idea of a city in the sky, we were looking a lot at Art Nouveau, and Art Nouveau is kind of a dark, goth movement of the time, swirlies, very organic. The first few maps we built might as well have been Rapture. We brought the clouds in, it was dark and stormy, the clouds had a greenish tinge to them, it was very claustrophobic. Then we started pushing the clouds out. %Gallery-126035%
