Industry Role Models - Viktor Antonov /Trevor Roberts [WEEK 13]

Viktor Antonov https://combineoverwiki.net/wiki/Viktor_Antonov 

My chosen role-model within the games industry is Art director and concept artist, Victor Antonov (Fandom, N.d), Most well known for his design work for Half-Life (Valve 1998) and Half-Life 2 (Valve 2004). My reasoning for choosing Antonov as my role model is that Half life is one of my favourite game series and the general art style and visual looks of the game are something that resonates with me well. His environment work is moody and dramatic and really sets the scene well for the dark sci fi universe of Half-Life (Valve 1998).He works both digitally and traditionally to create his pieces and utilizes canted camera angles and exaggerated perspective to really give a cinematic feel to his art pieces. The main focuses in his art are architectural and environmental scenes combined with designs for vehicles and aliens. His work is fairly geometric at times, and to me almost gives a slight feeling similar to H.R Giger’s work, in the sense that his scenes are highly industrialized and almost dystopian in nature, Especially seen in the pieces below titled Citadel inside (Viktor Antonov 2004) and Trainstation 1 cracks ( Viktor Antonov 2004).

Citadel Inside (Viktor Antonov 2004)

Trainstation 1 Cracks (Viktor Antonov)

According to Viktor Antonov’s Imdb (n.d) page, his first foot in the door for the games industry came with his studies at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena for “ transportation design”. His love for transportation design shines through in the vast majority if his design work, especially work done for the Half-Life 2 (Valve 2004) City 17 artwork which contains many mechanical and industrial elements set in a fictional soviet city, these industrial elements bring a very sci-fi feel to an overall run down and dystopian environment in a way that is somewhat grounded in believability. On top of his mechanical inspirations, Antonov also took inspiration from the world around him. A question on the Lambda Generation website talked about the potential inspiration behind Antonov’s designs for City 17, a user by the name of Bruner (2022) explained that it is possible that his main inspiration was the city he grew up in called Sofia in bulgaria. The user analysed the road layout of the follow up game, Half-Life Alyx (Valve 2020) and noted that it is almost a direct match to the layout of the roads in Sofia. This claim is further backed up by the Half-Life Wiki (Fandom n.d) in which they reiterate the similarity to the street layout and “general resemblance to Sofia” , Bulgaria, in which Antonov was born and grew up in. Another crucial inspiration to Antonov is the architectural and environmental artist by the name of Hugh Ferris (Brown 2013), who’s work also explores the darker themes of urban life, with harsh architecture and imposing silhouettes he proved to be a massive inspiration to many sci fi and action classics. Brown (2013) also writes in his blog that in an interview with Antonov, he stated he wished to use his art to “portray the cultural, and social aspects of the world through architecture and attention to detail.”. It is clear in Antonov’s work that each of these inspirations help him develop a rich and unique world and illustrate it’s many aspects in a way that is both excellent for storytelling, but also visually pleasing to look at. Stepping into his first gig within the games industry, Antonov started out doing concept work (Edwards 2019) for the 1997 Xatrix Entertainment game, Redneck Rampage (Xatrix Entertainment 1997), A comedic first person shooter . Shortly following this, Antonov would begin working for his most well known project, Half-Life (Valve 1998) and Half-Life 2 (Valve 2004), taking place between the years of 1999-2006 (Linkedin, n.d) working as both a concept artist, and later the art director for these projects. His work in these games is iconic and really set the theming for the later sequels in the 6 part series. Well received by the consumer base, Antonov’s work went on to be published in the 2004 book published by valve by the name of Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar (Valve, 2004), containing the behind-the-scenes concept work and early designs for the Half-Life series (Fandom n.d). Following on from this, Antonov took on the role of Visual Director for Arkane studios, most well known for their game Dishonoured (Arkane Studios, 2012), the role of visual director in this case is much similar to the art director role Antonov took for Half-Life 2 (Valve 2004), in which it is his responsibility to decide the overall visual style and look of the game for the production team to follow. He held this position for roughly 5 years, taking up the timespan of 2006-2011, which simultaneously he found himself working as the Production designer for a french media production company by the name of Mediawan kids & family (Wikipedia n.d). There isn’t much information on his specific role at Mediawan kids & family though it can be presumed he had a role in producing assets for some of the companies and projects under Mediawan kids & family’s banner. Another large role in Antonov’s career is his job at ZeniMax Media as a Visual director from the years 2011-2016 in which he produced artwork for Wolfenstein: The New Order (MachineGames 2014.), ZeniMax Media being the parent company of MachineGames, as well as Bethesda, working alongside them to create titles such as The Elder Scrolls( ZeniMax, 2014) and Fallout 4 (Bethesda 2015), Whilst only being part of the Wolfenstein: The New Order (MachineGames 2014.), this is yet another large games company to put under his belt of experience to move forward in the future. His latest stated gig listed on his Linkedin appears to be his 2016-2019 job at Darewise entertainment, a blockchain and bitcoin orentated “metaverse project” responsible for titles such as Life Beyond, Opal, and Wiseworld (Darewise, 2025). His role within this company is chief artistic officer, which also falls under a similar band to art director, Due to his main art focal point being Sci-fi and dystopian topics, his expertise fits well into the projects Darewise are producing.

What element of this person's practice can you utilise in your own? (What practice can you emulate?)

I enjoy drawing scenes and concepts that help build the overall theming of a universe and help tell a larger story. Viktor Antonov is proficient in drawing vehicles, architecture and general hard surface elements, which is something i struggle with in some respects but i do find architecture as a whole a very interesting subject matter and is something i wish to get better at drawing. It is also my hope that my artwork will develop to eventually emulate his very cinematic feeling artpieces and compositions, Looking at his gallery his artwork really envelops the viewer into the universe and gives an interesting and lifelike view into how each setting would work and operate, they truly feel like snapshots into a larger project which is something i would like to convey in my own work. I think to help get me to where i would like to be, i should take a look at some other artists who tackle subjects surrounding environmental and architectural art, and take the time to really study the material so that i have a better understanding and visual bank and feel more confident in this area of focus. Personally, I do see elements of myself in Antonov’s work, especially in his passion for worldbuilding and sci fi as a whole. There is another individual i consider to be a big role model alongside Antonov, though sadly there isn’t much information to write an entire case study on him. The individual being Trevor Roberts, a concept artist and world builder responsible for the project [and now roleplaying game] The Mystery Flesh Pit national park. Trevor Roberts studied design and has a passion for “visual communication and spatial reasoning” (Basset, n.d). I first found Robert’s work through a youtube channel and was immediately captured by it’s unique idea, artwork and storyline, since then his work has been such an influence to me, i have written a small book about the project as well as created concept work for the world that captured me, The Mystery Flesh pit national park. His artwork is a mixture of digital painting, 3D models and photobashing that creates a sense of realism whilst not being photorealistic, this is something i found incredibly interesting and as such is something i have been trying to emulate in my own style. Both of these artists have such a strong sense of how to build believable, unique and interesting worlds and apply them either into digital or written projects. I myself would like in the future to work both for digital videogames and written roleplaying games, these two individuals both cover and inspire me to work towards these goals.

Identify the Job Role of your Games Art Role Model?

The main roles of a concept artist compared to a Art director are quite similar, but ultimately perform different stages of the game design pipeline. For example, an art director’s main role is to set the style and visual elements for a project to create a guide for all artists to follow, they aim to make their IP visually interesting, and set it apart from others, whilst helping other artists in the pipeline stick to their vision. (Kalinin 2024). Concept artists on the other hand will take ideas given to them from programmers, directors and the art director and develop ideas for environments, enemies, and other assets that will be visible in the game. These aren’t final products but merely the starting points for artists to work from, they will utilize the style set by the Art director and use it to inform their design choices. (Screenskills 2025). Searching around for a job application relating to the role of a junior concept artist in the games industry i was able to find an application for a Concept artist to work in office at Climax studios (Climax studios 2025), the company responsible to titles such as Age of empires IV (Climax studios 2021), Exodus (Climax studios Unreleased) and Mafia:Definitive edition (Climax studios 2020). The job role specifies a range of crucial skills they are looking for. In the technical department they require: Proficiency of photoshop, digital techniques such as photobashing, concept art, architecture, anatomy and illustration, Understanding of white box drawovers, Traditional drawing skills and flexibility in styles, a good work ethic and drive to create work, A strong portfolio, and multitasking and time management skills. Comparing what this job application is asking for to my pre existing skills i do feel like i have a good start towards getting my confidence up in all of the required areas, i believe i have some strong points (not perfecting these points but i believe i am somewhat ok in these areas) those being, time management, motivation and drive, anatomy and character design skills, use of photoshop, concept art as a whole and i am working towards putting together a strong portfolio. Some areas i believe i need to work on are my traditional skills, architectural drawing skills, my flexibility in my art style and my compositional skills. As a whole i do definitely identify areas to work on, but i don’t feel that this job is too far out of reach for the foreseeable future.

Bibliography -

Websites - Anon, No date. City 17 [Online] Fandom. Available at: https://half-life.fandom.com/wiki/City_17 [Acessed on: 7th January 2025] Anon, No date. Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar [Online]. Fandom. Available at: https://half-life.fandom.com/wiki/Half-Life_2:_Raising_the_Bar [Acessed on: 7th January 2025] Anon, No date. Mediawan [Online]. Wikipedia. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediawan [Acessed on: 7th January 2025] Anon, No date. Viktor Antonov [Online]. Fandom. Available at: https://dishonored.fandom.com/wiki/Viktor_Antonov [Acessed on: 7th January 2025] Anon, No date. Viktor Antonov [Online]. Imdb. Available at: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1414533/bio/?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm [Acessed on: 7th January 2025] Anon, No date. Viktor Antonov [Online]. Rawg. Available at: https://rawg.io/creators/viktor-antonov [Acessed on: 7th January 2025] Antonov, V. No date. Viktor Antonov [Online]. Linkedin. 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