In the world of gaming, your visual style is everything. It’s what makes your game unique and compelling and draws people in—whether they’re playing your game for the first time or the hundredth.

This is why when commissioning art for your game a well-written brief is vital to ensure smooth collaboration between you and the artist and avoid any arduous back and forth.

We briefly covered the important aspects of an art brief in our definitive outsourcing guide 2023.

If you’re part of a game development team looking to produce effective art briefs for freelancers or outsourcing studios, this blog post delves deeper into the essential components of an art brief for you to enjoy.

Among other important elements, your art brief is your opportunity to clearly define the scope, style, deadlines, and deliverables specific to the creative part of your game.

Game Background And Audience

To create a compelling visual style for a game, providing your artist with a summary of the game’s narrative, themes, and goals will align them with your vision. This background will give a better understanding of the overall context of the game and provide insights into the visual elements that are necessary to create an immersive and engaging gaming experience that fits with the overall game’s vision.

It’s helpful to give your artist an understanding of your target audience to really nail artwork fit for your intended audience. Be sure to describe the persona, including age, gender, interests, and gaming experience preferences.

Additionally, providing information on the game mechanics, controls, and camera positioning ensures the artwork produced aligns with the game’s ratios and highlights the focal points. These aspects of the game are especially important for rigging artists and animators.

Game Art Style

Communicate your preferences clearly. This includes visual styles you like or dislike. Providing a mood board that includes colour palettes and references for art style and detail level with annotations is an invaluable resource for artists. We’ve included some tips on creating a mood board a little further down the post.

We recommend you go the extra mile and provide information on the desired fidelity level of the game’s visuals, such as the level of detail, texture, and lighting. Providing information on the game’s world design and environmental factors, such as the setting, atmosphere, and mood can also help determine the appropriate colour schemes, lighting techniques, and overall aesthetic of the creative assets.

If you need help with what to include in an art style guide, check out this thorough art style guide we recently made for a client.

Not sure where to start?

Getting started can be a daunting task but break it down. Use the example above as a guide.

✔️ Include a list of do’s and don’ts for the artwork, outlining specific stylistic elements that should or should not be included.
?Attach an annotated mood board
✏️Napkin doodles and stick figures can be surprisingly helpful in communicating ideas and the desired style.
❌ Show what you don’t want – this can be more helpful than showing what you do want.
? Use a scale, such as a 1 to 10 rating system, 1 being cartoony and 10 being realistic, as a useful way to communicate the desired level of realism or stylization, with examples to illustrate the specific points on the scale.

All these techniques will help when it comes to creating artwork that aligns with your vision and expectations for your game’s visuals.

References

When providing references for the required work, be as thorough as possible. Use annotations or callouts, like the ones shown below, to highlight specific aspects of the reference that are relevant to your game’s art style.

If you’re referencing a game with a particular lighting style, include annotations on screenshots of the game to highlight the areas that you want to emulate. Similarly, if you’re referencing a movie with a particular colour scheme, you could use a colour picker to extract the exact colours used in the film and include them in your creative brief (Google Chrome’s Web Extension ‘Chroma: Ultimate Eyedropper & Color Picker’ is one of our favourites!), which leads us to talk about mood boards.

Mood Boards

Mood boards are a particularly useful tool for conveying the overall aesthetic and tone that you’re looking to achieve in your game.

These can include images, textures, colour palettes, and other visual elements that evoke the desired atmosphere. By providing comprehensive mood boards, you can help the art team to create artwork that is closely aligned with your vision and ensure that the game’s overall style is consistent and cohesive. You can use the mood board example above as a guide for the level of detail you should aspire to include.

These are our top five tips for building a comprehensive mood board:

?️‍?️ Start with a clear vision: Before you begin, make sure you have a clear idea of the overall style and aesthetic you want to achieve. This will help you select images that are in line with your vision.
?️ Select a variety of images: Your mood board should include a mix of images, including artwork from other games, films, and books, as well as photographs, textures, and patterns. Aim to select a range of images that capture the overall mood and tone of the game, as well as specific elements you want (or don’t want) to include.
? Consider the context: Think about the game’s narrative, gameplay, and overall aesthetic when selecting images. Make sure the images you choose are relevant to the specific elements you want to showcase.
? Be specific: When selecting images, be as specific as possible. Rather than choosing images that are simply “cool” or “interesting,” focus on images that convey a specific mood or style you want to achieve
? Provide explanations:To help convey your vision for the game, provide explanations for each image on your mood board. This can include notes on what you like about each image, how it fits with the overall vision for the game and any specific elements you want to incorporate.

Goals & Objectives

Goals and objectives are integral to any game development project as they provide a sense of purpose and direction to the team. They also set expectations for the artist concisely.

Being clear on what the goals and objectives are when outsourcing your game art will be directly linked to the quality of the artwork created.

Example goal:

“I need to have 3 characters designed within 3 weeks so I can hand them over to our 3D character artist.”

Objective

“Create a character design sheet for each of the 3 characters. They must be realistic in style and include views of the character from the front, back & side, as well as close-ups of the face & any key focus points or accessories. These must be completed within three weeks of the start date.”

A Deliverable List

You may be thinking at this point that you’ll overwhelm the artist with all the information we’ve already outlined here, but trust us, they’ll welcome it heartily!

Now’s the time to work on making a deliverable list. When providing an art brief, you can expect a variety of deliverables depending on the specific needs of your project:

Primary Game Assets

Some common deliverables can include character designs, environment designs, 3D models, textures, animations and promotional assets.

Secondary Game Assets

In addition to the primary game assets, there are several secondary assets that may be required, such as marketing materials like key art, concept art, and UI design. Other specific visual elements such as cutscene animations can be included in this list.

Marketing materials can include promotional images, videos, and other visual assets that are used to generate interest in the game. Concept art provides a visual representation of the initial ideas and concepts for the game, allowing the client to see what the final product may look like. UI design encompasses all of the visual elements that the player interacts with in the game, including menus, icons, and other graphical elements.

Be sure to clearly define your expectations and desired deliverables in the art brief to ensure that the final product meets your needs and vision for the game.

Technical Specifications

Don’t forget to include technical specifications that will guide the artists in their work; This includes:

? The required file types for the deliverables such as PSD, PNG, or JPEG
?️ Any specific in-game limitations that need to be considered.
⏳ Optimization requirements to ensure that the assets are optimized for the target platform and can run smoothly in the game.
?️ Software limitations should also be included, such as whether the art team should use specific software like Unreal Engine, Unity, or Maya.
? The version of the game engine that is being used, as this will impact the compatibility of the assets and how they will be integrated into the game.

Providing these technical specifications will help ensure that the artwork produced is optimized for the game and is compatible with the game engine being used.

Deadline & Budget

Including a timeline and budget estimates in your art brief is crucial for managing expectations and ensuring a smooth workflow between the client and the art studio.

If there are hard deadlines or milestones that must be met, it is essential to communicate these upfront to avoid any delays or issues down the line. Even if there is no hard deadline, providing a rough timeline can help the studio to prioritize tasks and allocate resources accordingly.

You should be able to provide a clear outline of the project milestones and when you expect each deliverable to be completed, as well as a rough estimate of the budget available for the project and how it will be allocated across various stages of the process. If the budget is limited, it may be necessary to adjust the timeline accordingly to allow for more time to complete the project.

If you’re unsure about your budget, it’s fine to give a rough range. This will allow the artist to advise if they can provide the expected work within that budget.

We recommend adding in some contingency budget, as depending on feedback loops, the creative process can sometimes take longer than expected. However, a clear and concise brief should result in fewer revisions, not to mention better results from the start.

Striking a balance between the timeline, budget, and quality of the final product is key to ensuring a successful project. A good studio or artist will be able to help you prioritise the deliverables needed.

Distribution Process

Your art brief should also provide details on the distribution process for the artwork. Particularly if you have a preferred delivery method for the artwork. At MLC we use OneDrive, other artists and studios may have their own preferences, so be sure to highlight any specific requirements.

Don’t forget to clarify if there are any restrictions on the use of the artwork, such as whether the studio or freelancer can showcase the work in their portfolio or use it for self-promotion. If there are any restrictions, they should be clearly outlined in the brief to avoid any misunderstandings.

Conclusion

Creating a comprehensive art brief is an essential part of any successful game art outsourcing project.

It allows you to clearly communicate your vision, requirements and expectation to the art studio, ensuring that everyone is on the same page and working towards the same goals from the start.

By following these guidelines and working collaboratively, you and the art studio or freelancer can create a successful and engaging game that meets your objectives and stands out in a competitive market.