'Last Flight Out' Adaptation Initial Ideas

I have decided to adapt a short story by the author Colin M. Drysdale titled ‘Last Flight Out’. The story is set in a modern day apocalypse situation in which an unnamed pilot describes his attempt to evacuate Scotland and escape to Hadrian’s Wall. Hadrian’s Wall has become the front line defence against an unusual virus originating in Glasgow, which turned those infected into zombie like creatures, and brought those who are dead, back to life. During his attempt to fly to Hadrian’s Wall, his plain runs out of fuel and he is forced to crash land upon a highway, where he is attacked by the infected.

The short story by Colin M. Drysdale is available at this link with a downloadable PDF version, I was unable to post this on my blog due to copyright.

http://cmdrysdale.wordpress.com/2013/01/21/last-flight-out-a-short-story-set-in-a-post-apocalyptic-world/

I have decided to adapt this story into a Digital set for game as there is a clear definition of a story and a definitive goal in mind. This is a great basis for the development of a game narrative for a Horror-Survival genre game. As for the adaptation process I am going to focus on an earlier time frame and set this story in the 1950’s. This offers up an ability to use a nicely stylised art style which fits with the time, such as bleached out colours, sepia tones and even black and white.

I have begun to collect some materials that show the design and style of the 1950’s for inspiration and design ideas. As the main object in the scene will be the crashed airplane, this has become my main research subject. In the story, the pilot describes the plain he is flying “It was a little four-seater Cessna, the kind where the wings were fixed above the windows.” After researching the Cessna planes I found that this model of plane with the wings attached above the windows has been in production since the early 1920’s with multiple variations. The model I have focused on is the Cessna 195, which was commonly used both as a civilian and military aircraft and was in production through the 1940's and 50's.

The Survival Horror genre also has a very distinctive art style which I think will be interesting to combine with a 1950's style designed world. After researching some design influences I have started to sketch out some thumbnail images in preparation for concept design.