Hello! I am Nacho Ayala, a 29 year-old "artist" from Benidorm, Spain. Excuse my English, it's far from perfect.
I have been in the AGS forums for years... I firstly joined for the critics lounge subforums, but, while I still love AGS, critics lounge is not longer "good" enough for me.
I have been thinking in joining PixelJoint for years, but I was not really convinced of the environment over there... But then I found Pixelation.
Meeting Ptoing and Helm in person also helped buuuuuut... I am not sure if I should mix my name with those two, they are still lightyears away from me :'( Anyway, I am quite sure that joining here will give my art a boost for attempting an approximation :lol:
So... Here it is: My art so far. I don't dare to post it in the pixel art forums since most of it is not really pixelart, and they are finished/abandoned projects that doesn't really need more crits.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/MM3.png)
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/ScanandColour.png)
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/GB3.png)
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/penalty.png)
The beginning... Basically painting over scanned pencil art and resizing to 50% for getting AA. I had no idea of what "pixel art" was.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Aria.png)
First attempt at "pixelart". I was aiming for "pixel art looking", but I had no idea of what limited palletes were. I think I even used the bluring tool... :-[
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Explorer.gif)
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/ShuttleLand.png)
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Lance.png)
Other attempts to do pixel art... I was realising that limited palletes were a help, and not a restriction... I was using too many colours still...
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Lennon.png)
Another step into, IMHO, the right direction... I was copying Big Brother' s (Ian Schlaepfer) style... Some days after I learned that "16" is a very acceptable amount of colours for a sprite.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/BigGB.gif)
Some random sprite in 16 colours, finally!!! (traced over a redouced Guybrush Threepwood in MI3)
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Lance-1.gif)
What I consider my "first" pixel art... It won a contest! ;D
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/AoK.png)
Sprites for Amulet of Kings... Yes, it' s Jamie Hyneman.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/ParAntTrooper.png)
A set of sprites for a game I wanted to make... I am very happy of the result BUT... In the two last images there are some problems still... I am copying palletes from old games or pixel art images I liked (This last pallete was taken from a piece from Buloght... It can be seen here: http://www.pixeljoint.com/files/icons/full/skavenbattleline1.gif (http://www.pixeljoint.com/files/icons/full/skavenbattleline1.gif) Choosing colours is still a problem.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/DaveTest.gif)
A "Flashback cutscene" style attempt... I tried to chose the colours alone and here you have the result... A big eye-ache.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Apollo.png)
Unfinished mockup for a game I planned to do. I copied the palletes from "The Dig", basically... :-X
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/EarlyLucas.png)
Some attempt of getting the FoA style... It was going fairly well, but then I discovered Misja Van Laatum's http://www.miez.nl/ (http://www.miez.nl/) techniques (which basically are "Use zillion colours if you need them") and went a bit mad about the colour restriction... Not a bad BG, but a step in the opposite direction of the Pixel art Holy Grail.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Scofield.png)
Scofield in Sprite Art... Pink flesh, courtesy of Lucasart' s early 90ies pallete...
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Baxter.gif)
Baxter... Bloop pattern analyst by day, serial killer by night. I copied the pallete for the flesh pallete from Monkey Island again, I think, but I was not happy about it and altered it... I was getting annoyed of pink characters. I started to realised that I liked too much marking the muscles (or boobies, in female characters) with dark outlines...
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/NewLucas.png)
Experimenting styles... Now "Full throttle". Again, I used the pallete used in the game and (:-[) traced over Maureen.
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Vader.png)
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Smurfs.png)
My latest work... I understand the principles of pallete limitation and I "think" I am not bad at lineart, but still a lot of work to do for improving my election of values for colours, banding redoucing, less "outlining" tendency, etc...
And... my latest project: I can' t reveal or show much, but here it is:
(http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a214/La_Lore/Pixelation/Indiana.png)
http://www.barnettcollege.com/index2.htm (http://www.barnettcollege.com/index2.htm)
So, thanks for the warm welcome (given "in person") to the forums. I feel very happy for being here :lol: I will try to learn as much as possible and help when I can.
-Ignacio.