🖼️ Insights into the Aesthetic Development of The Sims by Eric Hedman, a lead animator
1. Who was actually responsible for the visual style and art direction of the base game?
The art direction and coalescence of a bunch of the aesthetics, especially the superlative UI was handled by Mr. Charles London. He played the role of confessor and traffic cop across the original game and Livin' Large and helped establish the relationship with New Pencil. We had a few external artists contribute to various bits of things like the general aesthetic of the neighborhood screen and video intro. Generally though, the main bulk of the characters were handled by Eric Chin, and a good amount of scenic art was done by Ms. Jami Becker.
2. What exactly was New Pencil's role in the project? Why is so little known about their contribution after all these years?
New Pencil had an increasing role taking existing assets of defined footprints that Don, Patrick and I were prototyping and making mimic objects and later more fully fledged objects directly from 3DS Max templates I was building. Michael Murguia, Adam Murguia, Scot Tumlin, Scott MacIntyre, John Beebe, and Greg Faillace, were all people who had deep effect on the final product. Some ended up working with The Sims on subsequent projects. Greg himself has made quite an impact at Riot games where his eye and heart make All the stuff he touches there live quite a bit more than it would without him. In the 1990s and the early 2000s a lot of the things that we take for granted like distributed apps for records and social media/archiving were not the rule. One of the reasons the Internet Archive exists is because of the necessity to keep things from disappearing off the face of the digital earth. We had a good functioning BBS at one point which was as a good point of contact with players and developers... but that got thrown away because some folks thought it got in the way for authority and control of process. It had its problems, but it was also useful. I would like New Pencil to get its Laurels more than it has.... and as I do more videos where I can talk directly about how I ended up doing things I did, I will definitely do my best to give my perspective on how people inside and outside the team and NP did their good work.
Object Concept art and development renders, The Sims: Unleashed.
3. What were your main sources of inspiration for the expansion packs' aesthetics? I'm especially curious about influences such as Hayao Miyazaki, textures, visual language, and other artistic references.
Once things were chosen as topics and subjects, and scope was established we just started making stuff. The more time I had before we had to start handing the things off to contractors like NP or subsequent design/art houses the more I could provide more material for the artists and art supervisor folks to focus in on what was required. Before the ubiquity of internet art resources I generally relied on large amounts of art and design book reference. This is an admission that I used to be kinda ashamed of, but,... he goes... I am a bit of a weeb, except that I grew up around Japanese Americans, and Japanese nationals here in the SFBay Area... so they were always around me, and I them. My first college roommate was a guy whose parents both worked for JAL. One of my first crushes was a J.-A. girl in elementary school, just because she was so dang nice...and had the best lunches to trade with. :) . I was never an Otaku per se.
My own inflated ideas about Japan and Japanese culture did not survive past meeting people and knowing them as people. Hayao Miyazaki is a great influence as are Yoshitaka Amano, Hiroyuki Yamaga, Mahiro Maeda, Hiromasa Ogura, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, Shinji Higuchi, Nobuyuki Ohnishi, Yoji Takeshige, Takashi Watabe and countless other Gainax, SanRio, and general Royal Space Force designers and artists. Also Hideki Kamiya, Mari Shimazaki, Hiroshi Shibata Masaaki Yamada....
So yes I have all the Miyazaki Art books from Japan up through Porco.... and some supplementary material....and I may have used scans from porco and kiki art for inspiration I sent to New Pencil as part of packets to inspire Old Town in Unleashed.... I will talk on this when I start making those videos.
Object and setting concept art, The Sims: Unleashed
Fun Fact: The Sims: Unleashed used Kiki’s Delivery Service (a film by Studio Ghibili) as inspiration for some of the settings in The Sims: Unleashed.
I didn't quite live in Kinokunia in Japan Center in SF, but I did like looking for the books that had the hidden gold in them. I have been accused of have a good eye.... and also that I have a sponge of a memory. (infj-audhd as I am....) I am much better medicated now. :D .... I am responsible for a lot of decision and directions during House Party and after.... I was not taken as seriously at New Pencil until Vacation... so Hot Date has some aesthetic issues that I would never have chosen as approved but that is a subject for another day and....you can see the trajectory and through line to Unleashed and Supestar winning awards and then well... I got kicked out.
4. Where did the Tiki and Art Deco influences come from? What inspired you to bring these styles into The Sims?
Me. I have a full bar and scores of Aloha shirts, and have carved tikis and made 3D rear projected and animatronic talking tiki heads and faces for special events and even a now world renowned Tiki Bar. ALSO I am a California Kid so I grew up around Deco and Art Nouveau in many of its permutations. Before the resurgence of Tiki I would spend my birthday afternoon at Trader Vics in Emeryville for their Happy Hour with my almost birthday twin Marie. A decent part of the success of the Sims Ex Pack design work, Hot Date thru Superstar is my association with Jason Leong, who took the reins on making sure we incorporated the ideas behind my templates and fevered sketches into the Where's-Waldo fever dream of our Old Town, Downtown, Studio Town etc aerial perspective masterpieces.
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/thesims1/s/VuwowV57Xk
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