Illustration by Salma Hussein

By Bruce Laregina

Video games weren’t always artist game designer Chris Solarski’s passion. After getting his BA, in computer animation and working at Sony Entertainment as a 3D environment and character artist for two years, Solarski started to take an interest in classic art techniques and almost “ditched video games altogether.”

Fortunately, he found a way to combine classical art and video games and he’s coming to Ryerson to share his ideas. Solarski’s book, Drawing Basics and Video Game Art: Classic to Cutting Edge Art Techniques for Winning Video Game Design, is both a reference for fellow game designers and an explanatory text on how video games are created.

In both the book and in his North America wide presentation, Solarski first highlights which visual elements create certain emotions in players and how developers can use these elements in their future gaming designs. As he explains, many current games have a narrow emotional experience and are simply played to kill zombies or compete with friends. He wants to create games that are comparable to music or movies in their ability to evoke emotion in the audience.

Solarski hopes that viewers of his presentation “get a completely new understanding of how emotions are generated in interactive environment.” He presents at Ryerson’s Eaton Lecture Theatre on Oct. 17, from 6:15 p.m. to 7:15 p.m.