The Phoenix Gene – 3D AI Art Direction

Drawing from The Phoenix Gene VR game universe, I developed a series of original AI-generated storytelling and marketing images to work on 3D AI Art Direction and begin visualizing the narrative worlds of the game and its companion novels. Using Higgsfield AI, I accessed a suite of image generation models — including Nano Banana, Seedream, Kling, and Flux — to explore a range of visual styles and cinematic possibilities.

To ensure character accuracy and brand consistency, I gathered visual references directly from our game assets and original concept artwork — which I developed, and Art Directed alongside a team of artists — and used these to guide the models on the specific look, feel, and identity of our characters.

From there, I developed and iterated on a series of creative prompts, refining the outputs through multiple generations — combining the strongest elements from various results to progressively push the imagery closer to the creative vision.

This gallery showcases a curated selection of the most compelling 3D AI Art Direction rendered in an appealing CGI style — a popular aesthetic that further refined the look of the game assets.

The state of 3D AI Art Direction for images is currently moving very fast, but it’s also not nearly as far along as people think yet based on the impression we get from looking at the best of the imagery. It takes a lot of iterations and clever reworking to get the best results and the control the artist has over the results is not as good as it could be yet. I see far better workflows and toolsets coming in the future that will make this better. But in the meantime, it’s still exciting to see what it can do with good inputs, taste, talent, time and effort.

Video creation in AI is heavily reliant on the images you feed into it, which can take longer to produce than the video itself. The results can be impressive if you’re lucky but getting something usable for a narrative with the control you’d want is still in its infancy.

Jackie's Rooftop Chase
The Phoenix Gene – 3D AI Art Direction

Learn more about the VR Game at the official website.