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Messages - zeid
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11
General Discussion / Re: What makes a good plot
« on: June 10, 2010, 01:44:16 am »
Personally I think what Gil is talking about is a little to generic for my taste.  Not to say it isn't a good approach or hasn't been done well.

But to contrast it I recall a game where you wake up in a morgue, to the surprise of those around you, (Can't recall what the game was called though) needles to say that was a pretty dramatic and memorable way to start a game.  It also leaves a lot of questions, why where you in the morgue, did someone try and kill you?  Why the hell weren't you still dead?  In another game you had to begin by hiding a dead body, also leaving the player with a lot of questions that can be uncovered as the game progresses.  Why am I hiding this body, did I kill this person?  Why would I want to kill this person?  Why don't I know anything up until this point?  I think it's not a bad approach.  Think of the way Lost was structured, they used this formula over and over (I would argue too much) so that there was always a question the viewer was left wanting answered.

I'm no expert on plots, but I don't suggest looking at the triple A games for clever story structure.  They are very generic and tend to all follow the same kinds of formuala.  That said finding a good plot to follow in an interactive game is fairly difficult.

I also have to say I usually feel a little insulted by the way triple A games go about forshadowing and such, it's usually so obvious what's about to happen.  This being combined with interactivity is just frustrating; think how many times you have said to yourself, "Oh man, I know that guy's about to batray me, why the hell wont the game let me do anything about it."  In a movie or book it just makes you feel like the character is a dumb ass, in a game it forces you to be that dumb ass.

12
Pixel Art / Re: [WIP] Process of a Girl [June 9]
« on: June 10, 2010, 01:14:47 am »


+=

Revisit forms?

Cures's edit fixes a lot of the problems as he follows the forms plus perspective better.

The main things out of wack are the cheeks position/curviture and the chin shape. The hairline is also too far up, as Cure's edit fixes somewhat.

Upscaled:

13
Pixel Art / Re: Facial Anatomy
« on: June 09, 2010, 10:23:09 pm »
Admittedly all the muscles, tendons, etc. of the neck still look like they are showing through the skin, but I soften it a bit more.  Just to show progress:

14
Pixel Art / Re: Facial Anatomy
« on: June 09, 2010, 02:43:36 pm »
The shading is obviously not complete, and needs a lot of reworking in areas.  However I thought I would post this as I'm too tired to continue working for tonight having just finished an exam.  Some opinions on whether this neck anatomy is looking alright would be appreciated.

15
General Discussion / Re: Ramblethread! A brainstorm approaches!
« on: June 08, 2010, 06:53:53 pm »
Just found this thread; I've always wanted to discuss and explore in a more logical and technical fashion the pixel art unique matter helm and others have been discussing at the start.

I also wanted to insert a little opinion and say, the nostalgia associated with pixel art serves to hold it back as a serious medium in the eyes of many.  So I'm very glad that Snake said what he did in that interview, and that a game like that is coming out.

While Owlboy's art might not intentionally be trying to bring a nostalgic value to the game, it is inherent.  Perhaps this is a limitation to some extent of pixel art in games and at particularly low scale.  Good pixel art at smaller and smaller sizes should have a stronger symbolic expression.  going back to your earlier post, and elaborating on some of what you have said, I think it would be safe to say creating pixel art at lower and lower sizes resorts in the need for less realism and more symbolism (symbolism is of course tied closely with abstraction in the terminology I am using).  The cost of not doing so is a reduction to readability.  Too much abstraction and your image may result in an underrendered look.  Too little abstraction and you get 'fuzzy' images.

The last thing to note about this is it is acceptable in traditional media to symbolize/abstract despite the scale of the image so long as it is done tastefully;  This means of course that you can have larger scale images with higher symbolic value/more abstracted features while it still remains acceptably high quality art.  On the other hand you cannot have lower scales without the symbolism, or you aren't using the pixel medium to it's fullest and are just creating down scaled images with the same loss of precision of having resized other art mediums.

16
Pixel Art / Re: Facial Anatomy
« on: June 08, 2010, 11:19:41 am »
well the idea was to get as sharp as forms as possible at this scale to accentuate the planes of the face.  Have read that book, would like to get it sometime.

17
Pixel Art / Re: Facial Anatomy
« on: June 08, 2010, 08:07:16 am »
Anatomy experts please hack this form study apart;


... some features may be a little hard to read.

18
Pixel Art / Re: Facial Anatomy
« on: June 08, 2010, 04:41:08 am »
k took in to account what has been said I think.
->
Eyes, eyelid/eyesocked has been adjusted.  Forehead shading has been adjusted, some adjustments have also been made to the cheeks.

19
Pixel Art / Re: Facial Anatomy
« on: June 07, 2010, 11:48:35 pm »
Colour swap and better lighting approach as per suggestion, I'm a little reluctant to add more colours, but I know what you are meaning in saying it.  Also more cleaning up of the dithering.

forehead felt flat, so I resorted to adding more dithering:

20
Pixel Art / Re: Facial Anatomy
« on: June 07, 2010, 08:22:38 pm »
eyes fixed?

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