What’s this all about:
During the last several weeks I have noticed that there are several people who wander from one collab to another trying to join but most of the time collaboration proposal is too vague, too massive for starters or something else so I have decided to try and assemble another open collaboration specifically for those who just want to practice and create something together. I've been observing free collabs for a long time, analyzing what worked and what didn't and why and I think I have an idea how to make it work out:
General project prerequisites:
Summary
- First of all, let's try not to shove anyone's 300 chapter masterpiece into an open collab and start from scratch. I have enough experience to direct and control the project but if someone else wants to do it – you're welcome.
- Participants may have any skill level in any area but one main requirement will be consistency – if you are busy and cannot do your part in time you should inform the rest of the team at least once in a couple days or at least inform that you are busy for indefinite period of time. An extremely important thing in an open collab is to keep the momentum so we can work in a relaxed manner but we must keep going, do at least something regularly and keep constant communication.
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Let's set page count to 10 in order to make it tangible but large enough to tell a coherent story in a tight and dynamic manner. Each page will contain 6-8 panels on average so the total amount of panels will be somewhere around 70.
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Our genre will be fantasy because it offers maximum flexibility for visual designs and storytelling.
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Soft logic (no long worldbuilding, no laundry lists or rules) but the story will have to be consistent and look plausible.
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Same working formats - .PSD for exchanging working 2D graphics, .DOCX through Google Docs for text, .BLEND or .FBX.DAE for 3D assets, .SVG for vectors and page assemblies, .JPEG or .PNG for final output.
- Many of you know that my turf is R rated stuff but I'm willing to keep it safe for work just for the sake of the project itself (I can add all the R-rated goodness myself later anyway).
- Just as usual, our current working platform is CAOMouse Discord server plus we can start working right here in this topic so people would be able to see actual progress and join right away.
So here's the possible premise for the story:
Summary
- A typical small fantasy village and a cave nearby, a monster appears in a cave and starts stealing stuff from the village.
- Villagers hire a hunter, promise some payment and mention that there is something valuable inside the cave and hunter proceeds to the cave.
- After an encounter hunter finds out that the monster is sentient and it is collecting items in order to create something that will heal it from something or turn it into a human or something else of that sort.
- Monster explains that it tried to communicate with villagers but they refused to deal with it, instead they decided to kill it and hired a hunter to do so without telling the hunter that the monster is sentient.
Anyone can propose changes or even a whole another block but the requirement is that it must be presented in the same manner – brief, clear and coherent set of events and not just a vague “Character with powers travels around and does things”.
This setup has relatively simple and straightforward logic, minimal amount of locations and characters, maximum focus on implementation: minimum boring dialogs, maximum action and atmosphere, high dynamics. Just like any Skyrim-style quests it allows for multiple setups and outcomes and both styles of story-making – we can plan some general points beforehand and use discovery writing to implement the rest. We can also divide roles between co-creators: for example, one person will “play” the hunter, other person will be in charge of the monster, third person will take care of secondary NPC's and so on.
Process of creation
Summary
Process of creation can be simple and straightforward and can be done in “one-two-one-two” fashion:
- We choose basic points for the story
- Make a general outline
- We decide which character to use as a hunter
- Make some drafts
- Choose the monster
- Make drafts
- Choose the cave layout
- Make drafts
- Choose the first event
- Make drafts
And so on. This will allow anyone with any skill to join and leave at any time and our workload will be distributed more or less evenly. In a nutshell it will be a mix between a text game and free-for-all like Endless Winter but with more organized structure and will also allow writers onboard.
Possible graphical style
Summary
Since we may have different people onboard with vastly different graphical styles, I think we can use traditional lowpoly as a common style for the final graphics, it's not suitable for every kind of story but it's easy to make, colorful and most importantly, can be done by literally anyone, even those who never worked in 3D before (if you don't believe me ask our first course students). Here's some random pictures from Google just to illustrate what I'm talking about:
And so on. Just Google "low poly art 3d".
Now if you want to join the project
Summary
Do the same thing that I did when we first started our first Evotale collaboration – instead of saying what you are willing to do, just do it and post it here! If you can write a story - expand my premise or write and propose something similar, if you can draw characters - make a simple doodle for any of the characters, if you can make environments\backgrounds - make a quick sculpt or a drawing and so on. We don't have to go all the way and create elaborate graphics or comprehensive story right now but I want people to put some actual effort because saying “I can do X” is not the same as actually doing it.