Fallout Developer Profile - Gary Platner

[GameBanshee News]

NMA's newest Developer Profile features Fallout 1 art lead and Fallout 2 art director Gary Platner, who is currently with Blizzard. The profile is spiced up with renders and different promotional materials from Fallout 2, and for Blizzard fans with a shot of Platner's desk.

What's your favourite Fallout memory?

The power armor helmet on the box of Fallout 2. Scott Rodenhizer got to design the box cover helmet. And he was very…’adamant’, about making a better power armor head then Leon! First off, Scott is an amazingly creative modeler, and his redesign of the helmet was astounding! But for a while, it remained uncolored and untextured. He kept adding and editing things, and just never got around to coloring it. I took a render of the helmet and just started painting over it. I had some ideas for color, and wanted to try ‘em out. I added some gold eyes, some rust and put in a foggy dark blue atmosphere with shadows falling over the helmet and shoulders. I showed it to Scott and said ‘what do ya think of these colors for the box cover?’ He looked at it, sat down, stood up, covered his hand over his mouth…he must have looked at it for 5 minutes without saying a word! Scotty was a tough little nut, and he was…let’s say, a tricky artist to work with. But we both knew something…that colored helmet looked f***ing hot! And I know, it took every part of his being to admit, that what I had done, looked pretty good. Hilarious!

I will never forget that. I was mostly just proud that I could actually do something that Scott, reluctantly, actually liked!