- Let's Talk About is a new is a new topic for my blogs where I talk about CG series. If you have any requests, put them in the comments -
Wowza. I am sure you have heard of this show, if not consumed this entire series at this point. What a beautiful labor of love.
Based on the League of Legends IP by Riot Games, Fortiche in France created this ambitious show over the course of 5 years (some sources I even heard up to 7 years). For 9 episodes, that's a looong time. Of course, to the untrained eye, one may think this is normal animation, but its far from it.
Fortiche specializes in blending 2d and CG to create a special style. There is so much to try and guess at with how they created Arcane.
There are shots where the reflections on the eyes are clearly hand animated to show emotion, then other shots it seems like it must be in the texture maps. And talking about those texture maps, its so hard to do this handpainted look well! Arcane's artistic eye for how to paint in shadows and highlights, without making things look too static is perfection. They also manage to integrate real 3d reflections on glass and metal in shots that need it seamlesslyl.
Whatever they did, its a new gold standard for the creativity of what we can do if we have a huge budget. If more studios could give creators the money to make something that is quality, and the time the time too, maybe we can keep pushing this medium forward.
Until that time, I shudder to think how many future projects will say "we want to make Arcane. But we only have 1 year and a fifth the money."
Trust me, there willl be alot of those requests.
Let me know what you thought of the show and if you have any ideas on how they achieved the amazing look!
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