Filed: Bayonetta, Community, Games, PlatinumGames

Hello, everyone. My name is Shirai, and I am a background designer here.
Time passes so quickly… To think it was three years ago that I joined the company… Whenever I think that, I get a bit impatient, and end up working hard every day to create even better things.

I was mainly tasked with background modeling during Bayonetta, and I would like to show a few of them to you in this blog.

Ithavoll Building (Exterior)

According to the background information, the building is incredibly tall, upwards of 3 km!
　
The Ithavoll Building is the symbol of Isla Del Sol. At the time I had just entered the company and was a complete rookie when they told me to model this, so I did feel some pressure, but I was also very happy.
　

This is what the model looks like.

This is what it looks like when textured.

And this is once the shadows are baked in.

At the spire of the building, there is a sphere that floats via a mysterious power. (Perhaps the person inside…)
　
Gjallarhorn Strategic Defense Initiative Building

During the game, these two buildings appear during the final fight with Jeanne.

These buildings have very distinctive sculptures on their front facades. I spent a good deal of time thinking about the feel of the kind of material these sculptures would be made out of.
　

Ultimately, I decided to go with someone very mechanical around the shoulders, and then with something more concrete like as you head downwards.
　

When the defense system is activated, the wings spread out like so. On the wings, written in our Angelic font, are the words: “Our fate rests on the wings of divine providence.”
　

Jeanne’s Last Stand
　
This building is the scene of Jeanne’s last stand…! When I was asked to create this, I proceeded with production with the goal of really wanting to make the building stand out.

The bottom part of the water fountain is broken glass, which allows it to glitter as if illuminated from below.

Water flows down off of the roof.

This is the finished product. Kamiya-san wanted things to pop, so he asked that the small items placed in the area could be destroyed, so I made sure that the water fountain and parts of both sides of the roof could be broken apart.

This is how we went about creating the backgrounds in Bayonetta, in small teams of 3-4 people per stage. Once you put all of these elements into one stage, this is what you end up with.

After this stage, the Effects designers will add special effects, and then I will consult with a programmer to get the stage implemented. Then final tweaks will be made.

I hope you all enjoyed Bayonetta! If you are interested in the game, but haven’t picked it up yet, I assure you that it is really fun, so definitely give it a try!

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Tagged: 3D Modeling, Bayonetta, Cityscape, Jeanne, Playstation 3, Shirai, Xbox 360

Filed: Bayonetta, Community, Games, PlatinumGames

Hi. I’m Kenichiro Yoshimura, Bayonetta’s modeler.

Well… Since Bayonetta is now in everyone’s hands one way or another (released in Japan, and the demo is out worldwide), I thought I would pinpoint a few things on the models I created.

First of all, I wanted to go into the differences between Bayonetta and Jeanne.

Even though the bones (the joints needed to make the model move) are shared between the two, and their bodies share the same basic balance…

…Jeanne’s got smaller boobs!

…And a smaller butt, too!

If you lay them on top of each other, this is what it looks like.

It also seems like Kamiya-san is partial to Jeanne. I’m with Bayo on this one.

Next up is Sapientia.

I took the liberty of throwing in some of the things I like and added a liberal amount of mecha elements that weren’t in the original concept design.

These are the exhausts. I airbrushed on some clear blue and some clear orange to give it that distinctive “scorched” look.

The wings are a brake and clutch setup. When Bayonetta summons the Infernal Demon Madama Butterfly, this is what the demon uses to take hold of Sapientia. (At least, that is how I justified it in my head.)

Part of the head is the command bridge of a warship. There is probably an Applaud at the helm with a crew of Affinities manning the ship. (Again, how I justified it in my head.)

There are caution marks around the body. On the wings, it says “NO STEP.” (But you can’t really read it) The wings are structurally weak, so you can’t stand on them. (Another justification off the top of my head.)

The writing above the heads on each of its legs has meaning. This one says System-E in our angelic font. System-E is the successor to SEGA’s System 16 arcade board. (Or so Kamiya-san devised…) I guess you could say that our mecha-angel Sapientia is powered by a SEGA arcade board.

UPDATE: Sorry! The thing about System-E is actually mistaken!! System-E is apparently the arcade version of the SEGA Mark III (Master System)! What I meant to say was that written on Sapientia’s head (now pictured above) is SG-1000000, which Kamiya-san’s set up as the theoretical follow-up to SEGA’s SG-1000 game system. Never the less, Sapientia runs on SEGA hardware. (And the legs are on Mark III…)

So now you have an idea of some of the small details that I was particular about putting in. If you pay close attention to these sorts of places when playing the game, you might find even more new details. Bye bye!

(NOTE: Higher resolution versions of the concept art in this post can be found on the PlatinumGames Inc. Flickr Page)

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Tagged: 3D Modeling, Bayonetta, Bayonetta's Butt, Character Design, Jeanne, Kenichiro Yoshimura, Sapientia, SEGA, System 16, System-E