When Vladimir needed a bridge for a werewolf game set in Alaska, he didn't start with a pretty picture. He went down the rabbit hole of how real railroad drawbridges and their counterweights work, modeled the whole thing in Blender, and dropped it straight into Unreal Engine. That is concept art the way he sees it, closer to UX than to fine art because every shape needs a reason to exist.

Joining us on this episode of the 2FRESH Design Podcast is Vladimir Mokry, Senior Concept Artist at the Canadian studio creā-ture Studios. A trained art teacher and former UX lead in Czech startups, he moved to Montreal at thirty to study concept art and went on to work on Apex Legends, Dragon Age The Veilguard, and Call of Duty Vanguard. In this episode we talk about how game teams actually work, from the big concept department on Apex Legends to a two person concept crew on Werewolf The Apocalypse Rageborn. We also get into why most concepts end up in the bin, and why AI can take over the boring parts, but picking the right idea still takes taste.

📌 Key points:

• Function first – Concept art isn't fine art. Like UX, it starts with purpose, such as why a character wears layers of armor, how the bridge lifts, or where the player needs to go.

• Concepts are made for the bin – Ten sketches on the wall are far cheaper than one wrong level or a film set nobody needed. Discarding work is how the team finds out what's worth playing.

• Small teams, bigger say – On a AAA shooter you dress up the level designers' gray box blockouts. In a small studio you can still ask whether the player should be able to walk through water.

• Taste is the last step – AI gives you endless options, but someone still has to know which one is right, and bring something new that isn't in the training data yet

Who is Vladimir Mokry?

Vladimir is a Senior Concept Artist at creā-ture Studios in Montreal, where he designs the environments for Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Rageborn. Before games, he trained as an art teacher, worked as a UX lead and co-founded startups such as Kdyjedeš and Jack. After graduating from Syn Studio in Montreal, he worked with studios like Respawn/EA, Unity and Volta. His credits include Apex Legends, Dragon Age: The Veilguard and Call of Duty: Vanguard. He also works as an art director on indie games and teaches and mentors young concept artists.

💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vmokry/
🌐 Web: https://vmokry.com
🎨 ArtStation: https://vmokry.artstation.com
🎮 creā-ture Studios: https://www.crea-turestudios.com/en/homepage/