Be brave. Be kind. Be infinite.
Be brave. Be kind. Be infinite.
Flowers on the Battlefield is a love letter to my time with Final Fantasy XI. The experience of meeting new friends to exploring the breadth of Vana’diel was always deeply profound. The worldbuilding and lore was especially rich and vast that it was disappointing so much of it was left to be desired from the elusive nations of the Far East to the southern lands of Olzhirya. Flowers on the Battlefield is my attempt to fill in a bit more of the immersive world that felt larger than life and so easy to live in.
Creative Direction & Visual Design:
Bien Pham
Art Direction Special Thanks:
Magda Ploszkiewicz
Tools:
Adobe Photoshop, Cinema 4D R21, Octane Render
“Wars come and go, but grief stays with us as a testament to the bonds of brotherhood and camaraderie.”
Jeuno is one of the major zones in the game, so visualization was quite easy. While I could’ve built out the city by hand, there was a lot to be desired since the original assets and references are quite dated. Set-dressing with Kitbash3D’s Gothic and Dark Fantasy sets was quick and painless and was essential towards building out Jeuno and its gates.
Ideation for this piece came rather easily. I drew a lot of atmospheric perspective from “Reflections” by artist Lee Teter. Lee’s work had always struck a personal note since my family had escaped the Vietnam War early on. I wanted to tell a story that evoked similar feelings as well as Lee does through Reflections.
Hunting down authentic references for distilled information is challenging this late in FFXI’s life cycle, which made it tough to emulate styles of the original artists under Ryousuke Aiba’s creative direction.
That being said, I wanted Flowers on the Battlefield to be able to stand on its own, without being an overt Final Fantasy work. I took liberties on expanding costume designs a bit while remaining true to some aesthetics. The Mithra’s armor is based on the Orison Bliaud set while some colors pay respects to early Noble attire. Aside from classic White Mage dedications, true fans would be able to point out homage to XI through the city of Jeuno in the background and discern the Bastok colors and emblem on the flag held by the Elvaan.