Viking sword (wip) .

[Fredde]

I'm trying to learn pixel art, so I'm am doing some small things on diffrent pieces.
Here's my viking sword with some dithering and AA.

[LuciferianSoul]

It's decent for a starter piece, so I think it's fair you get some good C+C on it.

Firstly, with dithering, the shades would be higher contrast (you can differentiate between them alot easier).
It's generally a low contrast picture, I think you should try to make sure when you are picking colours that the colours flow smoothly from dark to light (depending on how many colours you use) rather than picking very close colours, or extremely different ones.

Also the golden part of the hilt is a little thick (height-wise).

And for the anti-aliasing, most of the time you shouldn't be blending those other pixels into the white, but rather darker to outline the sword more and make it stand out and look better. I think that's a major problem on your piece.

Perhaps the blade itself could be a little skinnier, and longer.

Good luck with your future pixel art, hope that helps.

[Sawtooth]

quick crits:

The antialiasing is more or less unnecessary here; usually it goes into the interior part of the object (positive space) rather than the exterior part (negative).  It's also not implemented the correct way.  Here's a good tutorial I found through the pixipedia wiki: http://www.rpi.edu/~laporj2/essays/aa/

The dithering is okay on the handle, since it's a rough, wooden/cloth-y part of the item.  Avoid dithering on shiny objects, though, as it makes them look fuzzy rather than metallic.

Increase your contrast, as well, it's very pastel-y.

[Fredde]

I removed the AA and the dithering also I changed the contrast.

[Panda]

First of all, what I think you are in need of, is some kind of reference to base you pixels on, since it doesnt really look like a sword.
IMO what is going wrong here aint nor AA nor dithering, but just a matter of composition and wrong palette usage
Here is one, fastly googled: http://www.northlandgifts.com/images/items/VA54100A.jpg
Now stare at the ref., and squint your eyes to simplify the shadows, and pixel and shade the sword as what you see.
Dont pixel from the top of your head if you arent really sure of what you are doing.
Use a reference to base on and as said before, pixel what you see, and not what you think it might look like.
And same with the palette, pick it according to what you see, similar tones to what you see.
Not trying to sound harsh, but you might want to consider repixelling the whole thing rather than just editing.

Just my 2 cents, and hoping to see more updates.
Good luck

[Fredde]

Thank you panda, I'll do my best.

edit: Does this look more like a viking sword?