Daniel Dociu is a Romanian video game

art director Art director is the title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, film industry, film and television, the Internet, and video games. It is the charge of a sole art director to supervise and ...

and concept artist. He was the chief art director for NCsoft North America and also worked for its subsidiary

ArenaNet ArenaNet, LLC is an American video game developer and subsidiary of NCsoft, founded in 2000 by Mike O'Brien, Patrick Wyatt and Jeff Strain and located in Bellevue, Washington. They are most notable as developers of the online role-playing ga ...

until February 2017. Dociu was born in

Cluj ; hu, kincses város) , official_name=Cluj-Napoca , native_name= , image_skyline= , subdivision_type1 = Counties of Romania, County , subdivision_name1 = Cluj County , subdivision_type2 = Subdivisions of Romania, Status , subdivision_name2 ...

. He obtained his

master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice.

industrial design Industrial design is a process of design applied to physical Product (business), products that are to be manufactured by mass production. It is the creative act of determining and defining a product's form and features, which takes place in advan ...

at the Fine Arts Academy in Cluj in 1982. Throughout the decade, he taught at the academy as an assistant professor and later worked as a

graphic design Graphic design is a profession, academic discipline and applied art whose activity consists in projecting visual communications intended to transmit specific messages to social groups, with specific objectives. Graphic design is an interdiscipli ...

er in

Athens Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...

, Greece, a product designer and a freelance artist. He moved to the United States in 1990. From 1992 to 2003, Dociu did work for various video game developers including

Square In Euclidean geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral, which means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles (90-degree angles, π/2 radian angles, or right angles). It can also be defined as a rectangle with two equal-length adj ...

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the d ...

, and

Zipper Interactive Zipper Interactive was an American video game developer based in Redmond, Washington and part of SCE Worldwide Studios. It was founded in June 1995 by Jim Bosler and Brian Soderberg. It created many different games, including the ''SOCOM U.S. Na ...

. His face was also used for reference for the character Father Grigori in the critically acclaimed video game

Half-Life 2 ''Half-Life 2'' is a 2004 first-person shooter game developed by Valve. It was published by Valve through its distribution service Steam. Like the original ''Half-Life'' (1998), ''Half-Life 2'' combines shooting, puzzles, and storytelling, and ...

. His son, Horia Dociu, is also an artist and Art Director for the video game company

Sucker Punch Productions Sucker Punch Productions, LLC is an American video game developer based in Bellevue, Washington. It is best known for creating character action games for PlayStation consoles such as ''Sly Cooper'', ''Infamous (series), Infamous'', and ''Ghost ...

and will replace him as the chief art director for NCsoft North America.

Awards

Spectrum, The Best In Contemporary Fantastic Art * Spectrum 19, Silver Medal, Concept Art * Spectrum 17, Gold Medal, Concept Art * Spectrum 16, Gold Medal, Concept Art * Spectrum 15, Gold and Silver Medal, Concept Art * Spectrum 14, Gold Medal, Concept Art * Spectrum 13, Silver Medal, Concept Art * Spectrum 13-19, numerous pieces published

Lürzer's Archive ''Lürzer's Archive'' (also known as ''Luerzer’s Archive'') is a bi-monthly magazine for the advertising industry which features advertising campaigns for print and TV from around the world. The magazine was founded in 1984 and has a global circu ...

* 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide 2011–2012 * 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide 2009–2010 Into The Pixel * 2012 gallery show selection, one/16 pieces * 2010 gallery show selection, one/16 pieces * 2009 gallery show selection, one/16 pieces * 2008 Judging Panel * 2007 gallery show selection, one/16 pieces * 2006 gallery show selection, two/16 pieces EXPOSÉ, Ballistic Annual * EXPOSÉ 9, Grand Master, Career Achievement :Past honorees: Syd Mead, H R Giger, Ralph McQuarrie * EXPOSÉ 7, :Master Award, Concept Art :Cover Illustration, Limited Edition * EXPOSÉ 6, :Master Award, Environment Art :Excellence Award, Science Fiction Art * EXPOSÉ 5, :Master Award, Transport Art :Excellence Award, Creature Design :Excellence Award, Science Fiction Art :Excellence Award, Concept Art :Excellence Award, Environment art * EXPOSÉ 4, :Master Award, Best Environment :Master Award, Best City-scape

Works

* Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge * FIFA Soccer 95 *

FIFA Soccer 96 ''FIFA Soccer 96'' (also known as ''FIFA 96: Virtual Soccer Stadium'') is a football simulation video game developed by Extended Play Productions and released by Electronic Arts in 1995. It was released for the Mega Drive/Genesis, Sega Saturn, S ...

* FIFA Soccer 2002 *

Guild Wars 2 ''Guild Wars 2'' is a free-to-play, massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed by ArenaNet and published by NCSoft. Set in the fantasy world of Tyria, the core game follows the re-emergence of Destiny's Edge, a disbanded guild ded ...

* Guild Wars: Eye of the North *

Guild Wars Factions ''Guild Wars Factions'' is a fantasy action role-playing game and the second stand-alone campaign in the ''Guild Wars'' series developed by ArenaNet, a subsidiary of NCSOFT corporation. It serves as both a standalone game and first expansion pack ...

Guild Wars Nightfall ''Guild Wars Nightfall'' is a fantasy action role-playing game and the third stand-alone campaign in the ''Guild Wars'' series developed by ArenaNet, a subsidiary of NCSOFT corporation. ''Nightfall'' was released worldwide on October 27, 2006 af ...

Guild Wars Prophecies ''Guild Wars'' is a multiplayer online action role-playing game developed by ArenaNet, a subsidiary of South Korean game publisher NCSOFT, and released in 2005. As the original installment of the ''Guild Wars'' series, its campaign was retroact ...

* James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing * James Bond 007: Nightfire *

MechWarrior 3 ''MechWarrior 3'' is a vehicle simulation game, part of the '' MechWarrior'' series. It featured a new 3D accelerated graphics engine at the time of its release. The game contains over 20 missions, with access to 18 different mechs. A novelizatio ...

* MechWarrior: Pirates' Moon * Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 *

Recoil Recoil (often called knockback, kickback or simply kick) is the rearward thrust generated when a gun is being discharged. In technical terms, the recoil is a result of conservation of momentum, as according to Newton's third law the force requ ...

ReBoot In computing, rebooting is the process by which a running computer system is restarted, either intentionally or unintentionally. Reboots can be either a cold reboot (alternatively known as a hard reboot) in which the power to the system is physi ...

Secret of Evermore ''Secret of Evermore'' is an action role-playing game developed and published by Square (video game company), Square for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. It was released in North America on October 1, 1995, and in Europe and Australia in ...

Shadow Madness ''Shadow Madness'' is a role-playing video game (RPG) developed and published by Crave Entertainment for the PlayStation. Set in the fictional world of Arkose, the player takes the role as Stinger, whose town has just been destroyed as a result a ...

(as ''Worlds Within'') *

SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs ''SOCOM U.S. Navy SEALs'' is a series of third-person tactical shooter video games for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable created by Zipper Interactive and released between 2002 and 2011. The title for the series comes f ...

SSX Tricky ''SSX Tricky'', also known as ''SSX 2'' or ''SSX 2: Tricky'', is a snowboarding video game, the second game in the ''SSX'' series published by Electronic Arts under the EA Sports BIG label and developed by EA Vancouver. A direct sequel to ''S ...

SSX 3 ''SSX 3'' is a snowboarding video game developed by EA Vancouver and published by Electronic Arts under the EA Sports BIG label. The game was originally released on October 20, 2003, for the GameCube, PlayStation 2, and Xbox. It was later ported ...

* Triple Play 2003

References

External links

Daniel Dociu's art website

Daniel Dociu's Gallery
with biography and artbooks on Inside Your ART
Daniel Dociu
on Facebook {{DEFAULTSORT:Dociu, Daniel Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Romanian illustrators People from Redmond, Washington Video game artists