Project: Horse Crazy
Description: Art Assets needed for v1 of the iOS app, Horse Crazy
Overview
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I’m creating an iOS game called Horse Crazy that will work on iPod touch, iPhone, and iPad. I need drawn artwork of horses, stables, and tack (horse equipment). It should be 2D art, not 3D models, and sized for an iPad with double screen resolution (2048×1536). Pics will be scaled down for iPad 1 & 2 and for iPhone and iPod touch.
The game will be submitted to Apple on July 29 so I need a first draft of the artwork by July 15 with the final artwork delivered by July 22.
This document details the artwork needed. Think of the app as kind of a “paper dolls” dress-up game. 🙂
Style
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Looking for a style that’s a little more realistic than cartoony, but not photo-like. It needs to look fun rather than stodgy.
Here’s an example of something I think of as kind of cartoony:
http://jayjennings.com/horsecrazyapp/images/example-cartoony.png
And here’s something I think of as more realistic (but on the stodgy side):
http://jayjennings.com/horsecrazyapp/images/example-serious.jpg
I’d like something in the middle and if it leans one way or the other, I’d lean toward cartoony.
The horses themselves should look something like this on the “realistic scale”:
http://jayjennings.com/horsecrazyapp/images/example-morganhorse.jpg
Could be a little less real than that, but a bit more detailed than what you see in the cartoony example above.
Horses
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The first version of HC will include a Friesian (black), an Arabian (white), and a Morgan (brown). I need side views of each that are not animated. Left or right side, doesn’t matter, I can flip horizontally.
Also need their heads as seen coming over a stall door. Looking forward you’d see the Friesian sticking his head out of a stall to your left, the Arabian sticking his head out straight ahead (facing you), and the Morgan sticking his head out to your right. The left and right stalls are at an angle, not along the left and right walls. It should be like this / \ — those horse heads should be animated, but not much, just moving their heads a little, blinking, etc.
Finally, I need two views of a hoof for each horse (6 total hooves, but they’ll really only differ in color, so 2 views duped and recolored should do it) — looking at the hoof from the front, and looking at the hoof from the bottom. When a player taps on a hoof if will come up to fill the screen so they can paint it (the front view) or use the hoof pick to dig dirt and rocks out from the bottom (bottom view). The hoof should be shod (have on a horseshoe).
Generic Parts
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It would be nice if a blank button was created that could be easily made larger and smaller. Text on the button should/could be a font instead of drawn so I can make changes and new buttons without a hassle.
A blank panel would also be cool that could be used for dialog boxes, messages to the player, etc. Again, created in such a way to be able to make them larger or smaller would be nice.
Screens/Scenes
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– Main Menu – Picture of a horse (head?) on the left, column of buttons on the right. The horse could be animated a bit like pawing the ground, tossing his head, etc. Column of buttons are Choose Horse, Share Your Horse, Horse Show, The Tack Store. Buttons should not be a part of the drawn screen, space should be left for them. That way I can easily change wording, order, etc., easily. In the corner of the screen will be a smaller round ? button where I’ll pop up help screens, credits, etc.
– Choose Horse – Three stalls, left and right at about 45 degree angles (as if you’re standing in the middle of a semi-circle). Above each stall door is a space for the horse’s name. Stall doors are half doors, so the horses mentioned earlier have their heads sticking out and looking at you. This is where the user taps a horse to choose which one to work with.
– Tack & Groom – Inside a stall, the horse will be standing in the middle taking up most of the room (horse is not part of the drawn picture), along the top are three tabs – Registration, Tack, and Groom. Tapping those will cause it to pull down to show different items so some kind of background will be needed for that. Possibly could look like a wooden shelf – players will scroll the items on that shelf to choose the one they want to use. Shelf doesn’t need to animate, it will just drop down when the user clicks a tab.
A quick & dirty screen put together with some online clip-art (that I can’t use, it’s just for showing what I mean):
– Share Your Horse – The player can choose one of their horses, type in a message, and then click a button to add the horse to a web site. No ideas right now for a background, could just be wooden walls, could be horses in a pasture, etc. Just need space for a small picture of the chosen horse on the left and a text field and Send button on the right.
– Horse Show (Contest) – There will be a scrolling horizontal row of horses that are entered into the contest. No artwork needed for that other than a horizontal divider splitting the main part of the screen and the scroller along the bottom. The background of the upper part (about 2/3 of the screen can be anything — a larger version of the horse chosen in the bottom scroller will show here.
– The Tack Store – Looks like an old-west store with a counter, a couple shelves on the wall, and a couple barrels standing in front of the counter. A shopping cart or basket is standing in front off to one side. I’ll be positioning pieces of tack on “top” of the shelves and the barrels. Sign at the top of the screen should show this is “Chelsea’s Tack Shack”
Those are the main screens for the game.
Horse Tack
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There are many pieces of tack required for this game and they need to be created in such a way that when positioned on top of a horse it looks like the horse is wearing the tack. This might require two pieces of tack — for example, a bridle when not being worn, would show the left and right sides but when on the horse the back side would be hidden from view. A saddle, blanket, etc., would probably only need a single view.
Tack can be easily scaled (down) or rotated slightly to fit each horse, so the horses themselves can be different as long as tweaking the tack can make them fit any horse.
These are the following pieces of tack needed — should be created so different colors can easily be generated. Some horse-crazy kids will want blue bridles, pink hackamores, etc.
– Bridle w Bit
– Bridle w/o Bit
– Hackamore
– English Saddle
– Western Saddle
– Saddlebags (at least two styles)
– Saddle Pad (at least 4 styles)
– Blanket (at least 4 styles)
– Mane and Tail Brush
– Mane and Tail Comb
– Soft Brush
– Stiff Brush
– Hoof Pick
I think I’m missing 2-3 pieces that I’ll need for the first version, but that’s basically it.
Misc
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Dirt 1 – When the horses come in to the stall the player will need to brush the horse to clean it, so I’ll need patches of dirt and straw that I can stick to the horse. Nothing big and weird looking, and I can play with opacity to make it look better if need be.
Dirt 2 – Clumps of dirt that will be “packed” into the bottom of the hoof. I can scale and rotate so just 2-3 clumps is all it should take. This dirt will be more “dirty” than then dirt that needs to be brushed off the horse’s coat.
Stones – 2-3 stones that will also be packed in with the dirt on the hoof. The hooves will be drawn clean, I’ll put the dirt and rocks in place during the game when the horses get dirty.
Trophies – A 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place trophy that someone might win in a horse show.
Icon – Also need a 512×512 icon for the app.