Hello and greetings, to all of the amazing community members of the Splinterlands! My IGN is king-arminius, but in the mortal realm, the name bestowed upon me is Dennis, and I hail from the lands of Germany.
Since discovering Splinterlands last August (2021), this game has continually shown me that there’s truly something special within it. The community’s filled with caring, helpful, and generous people, that are loving and friendly in nature. This is a stark contrast to the behaviours one is typically confronted with on social media and other areas of the internet nowadays; very refreshing to say the least.
And at the helm of everything is the Splinterlands team. A team of individuals, that have completely thrown the typical idea one has of a company out the window, and created something that’s hard to put into words. Splinterlands has become more than just a game, there’s a whole philosophy at its core. It embodies elements of stoicism, egalitarianism, free-market trade, transparency, and democracy; all philosophies that resonate with me on a personal level and are worth promoting and fostering. Some may scoff at this remark, however, even a mere video game can convey an amazing message, and touch people in a positive way. Every story about a person, improving their financial situation, with the help of Splinterlands is just mind-blowing for me.
And the only reason this is possible, is because the team is filled with individuals who do things in an unconventional way and are open to new ideas. And that’s exactly what guarantees Splinterlands success for the foreseeable future, in my opinion. The model of listening to the community and their voices, and actually actively developing the game in response to that, is achieved in such a swift and matter-of-fact way, that the Splinterlands team has definitely convinced me of the high-quality that’s being aimed for. Changes that the overall community wants and up-votes, get implemented within the game, sometimes literally in a matter of weeks or days (that’s insane, you guys @splinterlands are awesome). Many of the biggest game developers in the world can learn a lot from the standard practices at Splinterlands, as they usually don’t have that big an ear for the fanbase and players of their games.
This is my long-winded way of declaring, that I would like to cordially apply for a position at the Splinterlands creative team (working as a graphic designer), as that is the skill that god has blessed me with. :) In this regard, I’ve been working on a portfolio for Splinterlands since last November, completely submerging myself in the Splinterverse in the process. In this respect, I would like to take the time, to present to the Splinterlands team as well as the broader community, the portfolio I’ve created in this regard. I hope it’ll give you an insight into the skills and ideas I hope to bring to the game, doing my part to support the whole team in making this game better with each passing day.
(you can skip the following video, if you would like to jump straight into the portfolio)
To present the results of the portfolio, I reached out to my friend Dwayne Cunningham (infidel1258) about presenting everything on his YouTube channel. I had the idea of gathering a jury of SplinterTubers that would judge the concepts of the portfolio and give their feedback. Dwayne got in touch with Jim Morgan HNH (who’s often a guest on Dwayne’s channel) as well as SteveR82, and I was able to have AfterSound join the mix also (check out all their YouTube/Twitch channels by clicking the link on their names…and leave the guys a sub while you’re at it, they all have amazing content ;) ). Big thank you to each and everyone of them for helping me to present these concepts. You guys are awesome and definitely embody the great spirit prevalent in the Splinterlands community.
Due to time constraints, we were unfortunately not able to go through all the concepts in the video. I will be presenting all concepts within this post though, so you can get a detailed look at everything and even see the concepts not covered in the video (as well as having sound and music in the concepts that used them, since those weren't hearable in the video). Now without further ado, let’s get to the eye-candy!
1st Concept: Splinter Icons Re-Design
The first concept I tackled, were the icons representing each Splinter. I felt some of them were a little rough around the edges, while some needed just a slight modification, to get them all looking like a more polished product. Generally I wanted the splinters to have simple two-tone icons, accompanied by a third colour as an added accent for each.
2nd Concept: Rarity Icons Re-Design
I then proceeded to make new and updated rarity icons using the icons created in the first concept. I also made an assortment of card mock-ups for the new icons, so you can see what it would look like for each rarity and splinter.
3rd Concept: Splinterlands Logo Re-Design
After having made the icons for each Splinter, I proceeded with a re-design of the Splinterlands logo. I wanted to retain the overall feel of the original logo, but optimise it in terms of overall design and proportions. I re-used most of the colors of the original and refined the elements that were already present in the logo. The first element I redid, were the monster jaws, giving me a foundation, on which I could build the rest of the logo.
After that, I brought everything together with the detailed energy orbs from the first concept.
4th Concept: SPS Token Mock-Up
Since I had a good basis for making a token/coin from the re-design of the monster jaws, I decided to make a mock-up, of how an SPS token using the re-designed logo could look like.
5th Concept: Card Stat Icons Re-Design
Similar to the Splinter icons, I wanted to refine the icons used for the card stats, giving them an overall more polished look. I decided to implement the font used in the SL logo re-design, and I feel the icons definitely pop more because of it, than the font used in the originals.
I also made a mock-up of the Venari Bonesmith card, using the new stat icons as well as the updated rarity orb, so you can see how everything fits together.
6th Concept: Splinter Lore Tome/Book (not covered in the video, completely forgot to show the guys this)
I love the Splinterlands lore, the team has done great work in creating a detailed history of the magical Splinterlands realm. However, I had an idea, of making the whole experience a little more special and interactive. Therefore, I wanted to immerse players even more when reading the lore, as well as solving the issue of having to scroll down, when reading character lore that has a lot of text. Initially, I wanted to make the animation more complex and detailed. My hardware, however, isn’t the youngest anymore, and the sheer amount of pixel information and the resolution, made it impossible for my rig to let me animate this part of the portfolio properly and how I envisioned. I apologise for this inconvenience and hope you can still get a feel, for what I have in mind for the lore category. With more time and the proper hardware, this concept can be fully fleshed out.
7th Concept: Land Expansion NFTs
For this concept, I wanted to tackle a topic that has thus far, not been implemented in the game yet. Since land is still a really big unknown factor (at least for the community), I decided to let my creativity flow where it may, and came up with some live-action visualisations, that could be implemented when land is released (or even after the release, with upgrades to the land concept that could be integrated in the future).
8th Concept: Gold Foil Re-Design
The goal with this concept was to make the gold foil effect in Splinterlands look less "yellow", and to achieve a more realistic “gold” aesthetic. In addition to that, I wanted to make the card art look holographic in nature, to accentuate the uniqueness of the gold foil cards.
I hope it has been enjoyable and interesting, to go through the concepts of this portfolio. Humbly, it would be an honour to become a part of this amazing team of individuals and work to help make this game even more amazing than it already is.
If you like the content of this portfolio, I would really appreciate an up-vote on this post, as well as your support for the weekly Splinterlands art content, which I have entered the portfolio into. Also, show my man Dwayne some love, and leave a like and/or comment on the above posted video, so that more eyes see the content. Thanks for your attention everyone and see you in the Splinterlands arena!
