Create art for Wish Dragon

Visual development artist Kun Vic breaks down the process he uses when creating a key scene for the animated feature film Wish Dragon

Visual development artist Kun Vic paints a key scene for the animated film.

This tutorial will show you the painting process I used while working as a visual development artist on the animated film Wish Dragon.

I call it sequence painting, and it involves capturing the emotion, mood and tone during certain sequences of the film. Here, I’ll reveal the ideas behind successful visual development and illustrating a key moment in terms of developing the composition.

It’s important to note the involvement of Arthur Fong, who was Wish Dragon’s art director. Visual development is a team effort and Arthur got involved at each stage, giving feedback that ensured each story moment was strong and met the film director’s expectations.

I always spend time trying to understand the key aspects of a scene. I find reference material and plan each character’s actions so that everything syncs with the story.

Try out composition options

I start with a line sketch in Photoshop to find the relationship of the character Din (the young boy) and Long (the Wish Dragon). I explore camera angles and the composition to find the one that best serves the story moment, trying out medium, wide and close-up shots. Art director Arthur advises me to improve the shapes and forms within the composition. This includes adjusting the position of Long by placing him over the taxi so that he stands out more, and use perspective to lead the viewer’s eye towards the characters stuck in traffic. I also do a value study to make sure the focal point reads well.

Exploring the layout and camera angles

Sometimes I start looking for layout options using line-art. Other times I’ll begin by blocking in black and white shapes. My aim is always to maintain focus on the key story beat, while using value to emphasise it.

Set the mood of the situation

Once Arthur approves the sketch I continue doing some colour key experiments to set the mood and tone of the situation. I sometimes use film stills as reference for this stage. I paint directly into the image and because this scene it set around midday there’s a strong, direct light source with desaturated cool, shadow. The lighting helps to accentuate the discomfort of those caught in the busy traffic.

Play around with colour and light

Lighting and shadow are the best tools for setting up the composition. In this case, I use bright light to indicate that the yellow taxi and its occupants are the most important objects in the scene, and place everything else in shadow. Thus I’m able to accentuate my focal point.

Using adjustment layers to manage local colour

Next, I paint the local colour for every object in the scene. This will make it easier to subsequently alter the colours of light and shadow using adjustment layers. In Photoshop you can change the lighting with Soft Light or Overlay layers, and use Multiply layers for adjusting the areas in shadow. Taking this approach means it’s straightforward to change the colour of objects – just adjust the local colour layer. Once I’m happy with the composition I add some detail, and apply a little blur and other photo filters.

Strengthening the focal point

There are a lot of lines – both visible and invisible – that point to the two main characters: Long and Din, and in particular to Long’s body and face. The dragon’s expression is the key to making this scene work. The world has changed significantly since Long was last in it, and it’s important to convey his shock and surprise to the viewer as the dragon rises out of the taxi and surveys the city.

Adding secondary detail areas

I want to make the image more fun and relatable to daily’s life. I want to show the effect of the traffic jam on people stuck in cars, buses and so on. I add detail to these elements, but take care to follow my black and white block-in so that the values of these secondary features don’t overwhelm those in the focal point.

Using a blur filter to maintain a strong focal point

There are a lot of elements in this busy composition and I want to make absolutely sure that Long and Din stand out. So I use a blur filter to reduce detail in the surrounding elements, and manage depth by blurring the foreground and background area.