The Challenge

The outsourcing studio worked a near-opposite time zone, where our night was their day, and was burning through revisions trying to nail each concept. A shared documentation template already existed, but between the language barrier and the asynchronous schedule, design intent kept getting lost. Every misread meant another round trip, and round trips were costly when feedback could only land once a day.

What I Did

I rebuilt the documentation from the ground up. Instead of a generic template, I created a per-design guide that paired sketches and reference with specific “red flags”, calling out exactly where each design was likely to go wrong: where a cape would clip, where a model’s limitations would fight the silhouette, where a material needed special attention. I front-loaded the research, pulling reference from Marvel’s comic catalog at every angle and spotting where a comic look would resist 3D before the vendor ever started. That step is where the time was saved. It answered the artists’ questions before they had to ask them. It also let me work directly with the artists, not just their lead, so they could ask the right questions early instead of guessing and reworking.

Scope & Cadence

I directed roughly five designs a week across two to three artists, coordinating through their lead by email across the time-zone gap, which meant every brief had to be airtight enough that they could start with zero open questions.

A Piece I’m Proud Of

Iron Man’s Prime armor. The comic version had a very specific illustrated style, and I wanted players to instantly recognize that iconic mask and silhouette, so the real work was translating the comic artist’s style into Crystal Dynamics’ grounded, realistic direction without losing what made it read as that armor.

The Bar

Marvel’s approval standards are high, and every design I guided went through Marvel’s team for sign-off. Clearing that bar consistently was proof we were nailing the comic-to-realistic translation.

Outcome

The workflow I built became the studio’s standard for concept art and drove some of the fastest turnaround the team had seen with the outsourcing studio. Concepts started arriving faster than they could be built.

Perfect Dark

On the remake, I helped redesign the iconic Falcon 2 pistol, Joanna Dark’s signature weapon, exploring fresh designs and functionality that made it feel unique while keeping the silhouette fans know from the original. Traces of that exploration carried into the final design the team landed on.