Project Eternity Post-funding Update #59: Developer Q&A

We learn about the day-to-day responsibilities and recent workload of Obsidian Entertainment concept artist Polina Hristova in the fifty-ninth update to surface on the Project Eternity Kickstarter campaign. Here’s a little something to get you started:

Q: What other games have you worked on?

A: I’m actually pretty new to the industry. I graduated school in ’09 and I didn’t get my first fulltime game job position until Obsidian (’11), but I’ve had the pleasure to intern and freelance on some amazing projects. I’ve worked on Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 2, PlayStation Move Heroes, some other unannounced titles (some of which will sadly never see the light of day), and the Dungeon Siege 3 DLC: Treasures of the Sun.

Q: What do you like to do when you aren’t creating creatures that haunt my nightmares?

A: I have a massive range of hobbies, from collecting costumes, traveling to national parks, watching movies, playing games, being weird and goofy, swimming, kendo, amateur photography and more. But when I’m not working, or spending time with my family or friends, I still prefer to spend my time drawing and scribbling… especially at the Zoo.

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Q: What is your typical work day like on Project Eternity?

A: I guess in comparison to most, my work day is pretty simple. I get to draw pretty pictures. The days differ based on the assignment and I do sometimes change my methods since creativity does flow differently day to day, but my general pipeline goes like this: I meet with Josh and the designers to get a description on what I’d be working on. Sometimes these descriptions can range from a simple word to an extremely detailed description on facial structure, hair length and color, outfit, tattoos, amount of skin pores… (okay I’m exaggerating the skin pore part)… and anywhere in between. I’ll also talk with the animators if the creatures would share rigs or any other potential problems we can have (it’s best to design with these problems in mind than having to change the design a lot later). After that (and depending on schedule) I’ll do a number of variants fitting the description and summon a mini-character scrum (Josh, the designers, Rob, our modelers, and our animators). Together they’ll discuss any problems or make any suggestions and pick a variant that I’ll take to final.

Q: What are you most looking forward to on Project Eternity?

A: I am really looking forward to playing it. =) But for now I’m really just enjoying watching the game come to reality. I love watching peoples’ creations come to life and I give many props to our modelers and animators for all their hard work. I love how they animated skuldr and his sneaky “I’m gunna getcha!” walk.