---
name: technical-art
description: Use when building shaders, VFX, materials, LODs, import pipelines or performance budgets for art. Bridges artists and engineers, balancing visual quality against frame time and memory.
---

# Technical art

Draft from the Game studio skills library by THE DREAMING JESTER. Adapt it to your game, team and engine.

## Goal

Get the look the art direction wants within the frame-time, memory and workflow limits the game can afford.

## Before you start

- Know the target hardware, frame rate and resolution, and the current budgets for draw calls, triangles, texture memory and shader cost.
- Profile the current scene before changing anything.

## Process

1. Agree budgets per asset type and per scene with art and engineering, and write them down.
2. Build shaders and materials as reusable masters with parameters, not one-offs.
3. Validate on target hardware early: overdraw, shader complexity, texture streaming and particle counts.
4. Use dithering, tone mapping and correct colour spaces to avoid banding and washed-out results.
5. Automate checks in the import pipeline: naming, scale, pivots, texture sizes, compression and LODs.
6. Document how artists use each tool or shader, with examples and limits.
7. Keep a performance view in the editor so artists see the cost of their work.

## Quality bar

- Every scene meets its budget on the lowest target hardware.
- Artists can make common changes without engineering help.
- Visual quality holds at every supported quality setting.

## Output

Budgets, master materials and shaders, pipeline checks, tool documentation and profiling captures.

## Avoid

- One-off shaders that nobody else can maintain.
- Discovering budget problems after content lock.