Pixelation
Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: Cilein on May 22, 2011, 01:14:36 pm
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Heydy, working on a zombie character here. Looking to finalize a single frame then work on animations for him, here's what I have so far
(left to right shows initial to progressions)
(http://img31.imageshack.us/img31/4413/zomby.png) (http://img585.imageshack.us/img585/5526/zomby1.png)(http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p224/neo-ninja/Zomby_Walk_2_1.gif?t=1306415842)(http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p224/neo-ninja/Zomby_Walk_3.gif)(http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p224/neo-ninja/Zomby_Revamp_Upd.png)
Having a nightmare defining the brain in the little speech bubble, probably worth my using a white tone for the bubble itself too.
[Updated]
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Heya, I tried to give your brain some more definition and clean up some pixels. I think you're antialiasing a bit much which gives you banding and muddles details you want to stick out.
(http://i834.photobucket.com/albums/zz263/ErekT_Pixel/zomby.gif)
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Good crit, thanks! I cleaned up the brain, tweaked the palette and fixed some AA problems. Started attempting an animation for the zomby. Just main frames at the mo, I intend to have twice as many once these are cleaned up,
(http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p224/neo-ninja/Zomby_Walk_2_1.gif?t=1306415842)
[Edit]: seems like imageShack isn't allowing animated gif uploads for free users, moved to photobucket :)
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Any reason to limit the palette so much? I think the pants could use some color separation from the skin, and the purple doesn't look particularly fleshy. The contrast is much better in the latest version!
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Haha I believe the answer is habit! I'll add a color or two and play with my palettes for the next edit, been having trouble using fireworks to tweak the palettes though, anyone recommend either a palette editor or a better mac compatible pixel art editor? I tried Pixen for a while but it kept messing with my palettes and crashing : :mean:
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I wish GraphicsGale was available for Mac! What are you using now? I learned how to pixel in Photoshop, but it's not the best suited program for it.
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I use Fireworks for animated work but tweaking palettes and color selection is rubbish on it (quite possible I'm just bad at doing those things probably..), I use photoshop for static pieces and love that, I know I can assemble animations of pShop but it's quite awkward there. Are you making your animated pieces in pShop?
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Sometimes I use Photoshop for animation because I prefer the way its Layers behave in some ways, but typically I'll just stick with GraphicsGale. Photoshop is great for tweaking palettes though! Hue/Saturation Adjustment is a great tool along with Color Balance and Gradient Map.
Edit: Oh! And if you're animating in Photoshop, be sure to change it from Timeline view to Frame view! Frame view is completely straightforward for this kind of thing.
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Yeah I've used pShop before to animate, thanks for the tips, time for me to get used to it again now!
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Sometimes I use Photoshop for animation because I prefer the way its Layers behave in some ways, but typically I'll just stick with GraphicsGale. Photoshop is great for tweaking palettes though! Hue/Saturation Adjustment is a great tool along with Color Balance and Gradient Map.
Edit: Oh! And if you're animating in Photoshop, be sure to change it from Timeline view to Frame view! Frame view is completely straightforward for this kind of thing.
I have CS5 but I would never use it for pixeling. You should try Pixen. It's a little glitchy, but hey, it's a pixel program for Mac.
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You'd rather be plagued by glitches than use stable software with non-pixel art features? ???
I tried Pixen because it's "tailored for pixel art," but I trashed it after an hour or so because it was so buggy....
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Pixen has some nice features but constant frequent crashing makes it unusable for me, more importantly for me though was that with every save the images lost color information and the image/s become more and more desaturated.
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Pixen has some nice features but constant frequent crashing makes it unusable for me, more importantly for me though was that with every save the images lost color information and the image/s become more and more desaturated.
This is the biggest problem for me; the palettes change and add colors.. lots of inconsistencies there. Occasionally the program will crash (I'm using a beta version, though) but that just teaches you to save frequently, which should be done regardless.
On the other hand, the larger the user base is, the larger the incentive the programmer has to fix the bugs.
Anyway, I'm sorry for going off-topic. Let's focus on your work.
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No need to be sorry it's all relevant, especially with the hassle Fireworks has bin shooting off at me when trying to alter my palette.
I've added more frames, cleaned the hand, tweaked to give some belly flop and the like.
(http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p224/neo-ninja/Zomby_Walk_3.gif)
The movement is smoother but the legs especially don't radiate the stumble/shuffling I'd wanted so I could do more work on them. I know how I want to modify the palette too, just a matter of saving it that way now without Fireworks shuffling my palette :)
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(http://i1229.photobucket.com/albums/ee464/NickTheM91/zombie_edit.png)
Edit; mainly palette suggestions.... and rendering fixes. Also tried to make it so it pops out more.
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My palette tweaks will be pumping the pink/red tones and desaturating and lightening the skin tones a bit, similar but not as dramatic as your overhaul there. I'm going for a not-so-dark cartoony style though, your version loses a lot of that I think, not keen on the dithering there but the face definitely has better lighting - thanks for the edit and ideas!
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You do need a stronger contrasting palette; regardless of if you change it over to being more dramatic or not. You also need a more definite light source. I was hoping the dithering would work with making the blood look more transparent... Also you might want to look at the sprites from Metal Slug (specifically the zombie ones) for inspiration/reference. Good to hear you're not completely conforming to what I've done; experimentation is always good. Oh, and one more thing I forgot to mention. You should probably get rid of the outside anti-aliasing, imo it doesn't work too well.
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The pants are almost the same color as the skin, and you'll need some differentiation for that. Nevermind (hopefully) if you wanted to keep the limits the same. All I'm asking is to see more shades. Right now you have me thinking I'm partially color-blind.
As well, the zombie's feet never seem to get off of the ground (the closest to that they seem to have gotten is when the nearest foot lifts half-way) yet seem to lack much friction, like the zombie's walking on ice. The only way this could be fixed is slowing this down, I suppose.
Another problem I have is that the the hand of the outstretched arm is tilted the wrong way. Either that or it's a crab's claw. Try tilting your hand that way and you'll find it's rather uncomfortable. Not impossible, just uncomfortable. Besides, since hands aren't positioned like that naturally, try tilting them the other way, at least so the fingers are visible.
Also, perhaps more left/right movement should finish the arm off, less of a feeling of rigidity, and more a feeling of elasticity--after all, it is a zombie, and its arm might as well be falling off. (And maybe more bouncing on the speech bubble while you're at it. And tone down the anti-aliasing if you like.)
Here be edit:
(http://i.imgur.com/k2Xvy.png)
Palette suggestions:
Less saturation. This is a zombie. It's dead, even if it isn't. Try to suggest that with more "dead" (desaturated) colors. Even if it is stylized. Right now, most of your palette's at full saturation.
Exposed flesh tones should have more reds in them. Purple is pretty much the opposite of green. This is further accentuated by the drastic change in value (flesh is dark compared to the light skin, even surrounded by anti-aliasing). After changing it to red, I wondered what it might look like serving as a color for the pants. IMO, it worked out pretty well, but might need to be brighter still.
Made more use of highlights. It may have destroyed the "cel-shaded" look, however, but it does reinforce the presence of an exact lightsource.
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Woah thanks for that awesome crit, - I'm going to redo the animation and fix the core movement rather than build on a bad foundation now. I like how using the blood colors worked on the trousers too, palette fixing and light source issues on my list too. That hand has been gradually coming round to a natural position, I see what you mean though - not there yet! Right - off to work just wanted to thank you first for that effort!
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More changes to the palette, cleaning up, re-doing the lighting, adding a color , more emphasis on the reds, fixing the awkward hand and such.
(http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p224/neo-ninja/Zomby_Revamp_Upd.png)
The brightest red might be too saturated, Ill try adding a color and using separate highlights for blood and trousers for the next update