Back in BlizzCon 2019, fans got their first taste of the upcoming Diablo IV by way of its reveal cinematic, which not only set the tone for the new ARPG but also illustrated once again that Blizzard’s cinematics team is full of top flight creators. If you’re the sort who appreciates the process of putting together such a cinematic, then you might enjoy this closer look at how the team did it.
The piece speaks with modeling supervisor Shannon Thomas, lead character modeler Jason Huang, and senior character modeling artist Taso Glonis about how the project team put the cinematic together and all of the technical considerations that came along with it. There’s a lot made about properly creating the character model proportions, facial animation tech in order to deal with the many close shots, and hand-crafting animations across the board. It’s a pretty enlightening look at all of the work it takes for just about 10 minutes’ worth of presentation footage.
This, of course, doesn’t really address anything related to when Diablo IV is launching (it’s an animation breakdown); all we’ve had on that front is a look at the game’s revamped skill and talent systems last month.
