AuthorTopic: GR#217 - Character - Sprite Process  (Read 25454 times)

Offline Dyluckk

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GR#217 - Character - Sprite Process

on: May 29, 2014, 06:53:09 am
Hello everyone,
I'm a programmer first but I love art and want to learn more about pixel art!
I was going for a Secret of Mana type of sprite here.

This is a character that I attempted to turn into pixel art.. (not sure if I'm allowed to post these links)
I've drawn him several times to get a feel for him.. these are not all of them, just the ones in my sta.sh mostly all rough.

http://sta.sh/01skawjp7e60 (First time)
http://sta.sh/0uuukm5v51a (sorta Chibi)
http://sta.sh/0229fveyxl8s (Drew him on a note card to work on smaller scale)


As a pixel sprite:

Did him without an outline first


Added an outline just because I felt he did not look very dynamic. (like the first one better though)


I understand my colors are weird.. (they suck)
I feel he doesn't read well, but I'm not sure what to change  ???

Looking forward to being part of this community, and hearing the feedback ;D
« Last Edit: May 29, 2014, 07:46:42 am by Dyluckk »

Offline HarveyDentMustDie

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #1 on: May 29, 2014, 03:06:56 pm
Hi, welcome.

First you need to decide what you want to make, cause you posted three totally different references. Your drawing is not "dynamic" as you said, because lack of contrast and saturation in your colors. You've tried to create shading but colors are too similar so you can't notice it.

I combine couple things from your references and made an quick mouse edit (it's not perfect but I don't have more time  :crazy:), just to show you how can you make it look good at small resolution without switching to chibi style.

Offline Dyluckk

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #2 on: May 29, 2014, 05:02:21 pm
Thanks for the reply  :D

Going to try it again today!
I want the 3/4 rpgs look, but your style was cool too :)
I can see what you meant by the contrast.

Offline Dyluckk

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #3 on: May 31, 2014, 05:06:32 am
Here is the newest sprite!
I feel he pops a little bit more here.. what do you think??
Still think I could fix a few things though. (need moarrrr timee)  :'(

Offline namunamnom

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #4 on: May 31, 2014, 06:35:29 am
Is the blue thing on the last edit a mouth, a mask, or what?

I'm so confused orz

Offline Dyluckk

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #5 on: May 31, 2014, 06:43:48 am
Is the blue thing on the last edit a mouth, a mask, or what?

I'm so confused orz

Yes, it is indeed a mask of some sort.

Offline astraldata

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #6 on: May 31, 2014, 03:21:58 pm
He looks like a martian.

You really need to do something about his head. No sense in having a large head if the details are unclear. If that's his hair stringing out like that, why does it look like tentacles and why is it almost exactly the same color as his face?

These are important observations you will need to be able to suss out for yourself eventually. The key to being able to do that is to look at your pixel drawing objectively. Just because you want it to be hair, doesn't mean it looks enough like hair for others to tell it's hair.

I'd suggest practicing conveying different textures and forms with pixels before trying to convert a drawing into such a low-res sprite. I can't give you a one word answer for how to fix this sprite. The closest I can come to that is silhouette, color-contrast, and lighting-contrast. That is, if your "hair" *looks* like hair in the silhouette (i.e. if your sprite is colored completely black except for the transparent pixels, and the "hair" still comes across as hair), it's easier to add lighting to that to make it appear more 3 dimensional. With that said, no amount of shadow colors can make up for the lack of contrast in such a small canvas area. That means you need a few highly separate gradiations for shadowing/lighting and your colors need to be clearly different at a single super-fast glance. At the moment, none of this is true in your sprite, thus your sprite reads very poorly to others.

You should try again, but do practice the techniques mentioned above if you want to get better at pixel art -- especially concerning the rendering of materials and form.
I'm offering free pixel-art mentorship for promising pixel artists. For details, click here.

     http://mugenzero.userboard.net/

Offline Dyluckk

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #7 on: May 31, 2014, 08:23:22 pm
You really need to do something about his head. No sense in having a large head if the details are unclear. If that's his hair stringing out like that, why does it look like tentacles and why is it almost exactly the same color as his face?

I changed the color of his hair and face so they would have some contrast.
I changed his hair.. is this better? I think it looks more like hair at least.  ;D





What about this?



This is my most recent edit.


This is.
« Last Edit: June 01, 2014, 04:33:08 am by PixelPiledriver »

Offline HarveyDentMustDie

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #8 on: June 01, 2014, 01:19:08 pm
You have 27 colors here, which is a lot. Few of those colors you've used only in one pixel. A lot of these colors are too similar and they can't be noticed here. And why did you give up of his breathing mask after only one comment?

Here is 11 colors edit.

Offline alex pang

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Re: First Pixelation(can I call it that?), [C+C]

Reply #9 on: June 01, 2014, 01:36:34 pm

Your first one was faaaar better than your edits. But here is my edit combining your new one and old one into one + more

updated
« Last Edit: June 01, 2014, 06:10:33 pm by alex pang »