Essential Skills of a Concept Artist
A concept artist is an individual who uses the talents and tools at his disposal whether traditional, digital or otherwise to bring an idea to life. The primary role played by a concept artist is to give shape and form to an initial concept or idea in such a way that the idea can be visually communicated to others. This can be done in a variety of ways including; traditional or digital paintings, sculptures, vectors, blueprints etc. More often than not, a concept artist would rely on digital or traditional paintings to visually bring the idea to life.
In order to be successful as a concept artist there are a few abilities and specific knowledge that one would need to sharpen:
(Note: For the sake of simplicity, it is assumed that the concept artist has some aptitude towards painting and related art forms. What shall be discussed here, are mainly the CONCEPTS that an artist should learn before pursuing a career as a concept artist.)
1. Sound knowledge of relevant subject matter:
Concept artists are mainly classified into Character concept artist and BG (Background) concept artists. It can be derived from the names themselves that one is primarily responsible for character creation while the other creates representations of concept BGs.
One of the main abilities that a character concept artist would find relevant is a sound knowledge of anatomy. This includes human anatomy, animal and bird anatomy and more importantly stylized anatomy. Stylized anatomy is the study of traditional anatomy that has been modified to fit a non-existent creature. Most fictional creatures such as werewolves, dragons, etc. were created by taking the anatomy of animals such as wolves, lizards, snakes etc and modifying and combining them to create the creature in question. A concept artist who is well versed in traditional anatomy will find stylizing anatomy to be quite fun and creative.
A BG concept artist on the other hand, would do well to look into more advanced forms of perspective and relative scaling. Perspective as every artist is sure to know is the process of using a 'vanishing point' system to recreate how an object would look from a particular perspective in relation to the viewer's point of view. This the fundamental basis for all BG creation and an artist who is lacking this knowledge will seldom be able to create believable BGs. Secondly, another skill related to proper perspective to create objects that have proper scaling in relation to each other, this is again accomplished by using the 'vanishing point' system again as a guide.
2. Psychology:
Both character artists and BG artists will find that they gain a lot of insight and subsequent improvement in the quality of their work, if they dabble in some psychological studies. A brief note of caution; Psychology is in itself a vast and engaging field and the potential for getting lost in it is very likely. Keep only to basic psychological study such as character traits, physical manifestation of character traits, how individuality affects preferences such as color, food, clothing etc. While a Character artist would gain the ability to shape and mold a character according to her/his individuality, a BG artist would gain greater insights into what makes a BG more appealing or believable to a viewer.
3. Color Theory:
One of the most ignored and yet fundamental knowledge required to be a good concept artist is to study color theory. Whether character or BG or any other subject matter, the proper use of color -one will find- will mean the difference between accurate and inspirational visual communication, or a disastrous rendition of the concept. Fortunately, today there are many websites offering insights into color theory and one only needs but to fire up ones favorite search engine to gain access to them.
In closing, equipped with the aforementioned knowledge and an aptitude for drawing/painting, an individual will have no problems finding themselves engaged as a concept artist. One word of advice, is to always consider the mood and tone of the underlying storyline while developing a concept. Wish you all success and recognition in your endeavors!
