Pixelation

Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: Beoran on June 18, 2009, 08:03:14 pm

Title: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Beoran on June 18, 2009, 08:03:14 pm
Edit: Latest version is on the right:
(http://img91.yfrog.com/img91/2716/spritebasefemalepre20.png) (http://img8.yfrog.com/img8/8530/spritebasefemalepre21.png)(http://img395.yfrog.com/img395/7228/spritebasefemalepre22.png)(http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/7228/spritebasefemalepre22.png)

Edit: Progression from the beginning to now:
(http://img8.yfrog.com/img8/2070/spriteprogression.png)

Hey, I'm still working (very slowly) on my big Action RPG, and I'm currently refining my RPG base once again. I've finally decided to follow the advice I got before, and stop faking depth. In stead, I focused on making the character readable, feminine, and as attractive as I could within the style I'm looking for and within my skills. I'm fairly happy with the result you see above, but I'm open to any suggestions. I think I really have to learn how to be less perfectionist, though, as I'm still working on the same sprite frame I was working on 6 months ago >_<  see http://www.wayofthepixel.net/pixelation/index.php?topic=7075.0 (http://www.wayofthepixel.net/pixelation/index.php?topic=7075.0)).
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: blumunkee on June 19, 2009, 12:49:50 am
Looks good.

I think the transition between the upper and lower legs should be less pronounced. The knees look too dark and segmented. Also, the second darkest skin tone could be warmer. It looks a bit muddy. Finally, there's some pillowing around the hips and thighs. Watch out for that.
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Scribblette on June 19, 2009, 01:35:23 am
I've been slowly learning anatomy in my attempts to work up good sprite bases too - still struggling with shoulders too broad, breasts that'd break anyone's back and feet that look like fat kit-kat type biscuits you'd split and dip in tea as a kid, personally.

Is it possible you've given your lady there too much leg above the knee?

That last thread you were in was pretty fantastic for all the critique you were getting in it, plenty of good reading material. Might get more bites if that was updated instead for showing the transition from where you were to where you are - and then I could post in it without necro-ing. XD
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: ndchristie on June 19, 2009, 03:08:22 am
I doubt that the legs are too much above the knee, but i would say that there is probably an issue there.  the knees, the division is too much, and there's no actual knee.  insert one to boost the length and shape of the leg I think, only a few pixels...

There's also some issue with the shapes.  there's a bit of bandy pillowy stuff as have been talked about, i suggest reading up on threads about developing shapes and forms without jagging up stuff. :).
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Scribblette on June 19, 2009, 03:10:08 am
I'm struggling with legs myself. Will have to make another topic.

Question: Is the belly button really that high up?
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Beoran on June 19, 2009, 07:01:22 am
blumunkee, and ndchristie, yes there was some banding/pillow shading going on around the hips, but I didn't think it was that noticeable. My current stab at it (see above) should be an improvement. Although it corresponds to reality and the references I'm using, the lower legs were indeed a bit too dark and pronounced. I have to remember I want to go for a symbolical representation character style, and not a realistic one. ^_^ So I lightened them up and gave more distinction to the knee. As for the colors, they will be palette-rotated anyway (to make Asian, African, etc, characters) so they're less of an issue now. I'll optimize them once I really can't improve the shapes anymore.

Scriblette, I moved the knee up one pixel and it seems to come out rather well there. Nice find about the navel, it was too high up by 1 pixel! I lengthened the arms and torso by 1 pixel, but I forgot to shift the navel down. In my latest try, I shifted the navel down again. I'd love to see your try, so, please do make that thread! ^_^

Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Scribblette on June 19, 2009, 07:10:55 am
You could possibly even lower it one pixel more - but it looks better than before. :)

I might suggest that if you're setting out to create a whole bundle of sprites and aren't planning on having a naked lass leap about, you may want to use even fewer colours to speed up the process (or use existing colours differently). An example is how Alisa Christopher (aka Tana) did a set of large sprites here (http://www.alisachristopher.us/pixels/index.html).

My thread is under YARBLE in this forum, around yours. :)
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: st0ven on June 19, 2009, 07:53:17 am
(http://www.spriteart.com/edit/feminine_compare.gif)

Just wanted to give a little edit to see what it might look like with the shoulders pulled in a bit and the hips pulled out a bit and separating some of that space in between the crotch.

just trying to soften the figure a bit. at the moment from my perspective its looking a bit androgenous. shoulders looking a little big and calves are a bit thick. I know its a bit tough at that size but perhaps try toning some of the masculine features down a bit?
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Beoran on June 19, 2009, 10:00:51 am
Scriblette, if you read the old thread you'd see that I do not exclude nudity, so, I can't simplifying anything. But the link you gave is useful, it helps me keep in mind which positions and frames I'll need. I also answered in your thread.

st0ven, I can see your point about my sprite being somewhat androgynous. Perhaps the shoulders have to be less wide, however it's difficult to do whilst preserving the outline. I'm going for that classic outlined style (reference: http://www.videogamesprites.net/ChronoTrigger/Party/Marle/Marle%20(Front).gif) Unfortunately, what your doing loses the outline, which means it doesn't quite work against a light background, IMHO. (See below) Also, I think the heavy eyebrows and open, thinner legs make it look more masculine again. Women tend to have have rather wide thighs and hips. ^_^

(http://img13.yfrog.com/img13/79/femininecompare2.gif)

However, I do like the improved breasts of your edit.  The shading you use is very soft... perhaps I should work on my shading a bit more. I also kind of like the main skin tone you've used. I'll wait for some more comments and make another edit based upon your and other people's comments.

Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: ndchristie on June 19, 2009, 05:06:18 pm
I agree with what st0ven's doing in terms of pixelwork and the upper body, but at the same time I think the adjusted legs are going to be hell for a number of reasons.  1 - the space between the legs is going to make animation awkward, it's really better just to lose it.  2 - those straighter legs give you no room to have good outlines, as evidenced by that wicked jag.  it's a lot easier to move 4 pixels over a given space than 2.  I still think there's a little awkwardness in the leg shape but it's nothing that can't be settled.

Here's a shot, i sorta spliced the edit with the original.  At this size it sounds funny but i actually do recommend these penguin-flipper arms, they have nice curve, animate easy, and take away the incredible bitch that is drawing hands at medium res.

(http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/4127/spledit.png)
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: skittles.loli on June 20, 2009, 03:02:48 am
I think it looks great. I would suggest using the less saturated color pallet of the girl on the left though, this new one seems a little bright.
I like her curves, she looks more realistic but not fat or "chibi" or anything, more womanly. Its great!

EDIT:
Actually, I love the splicing ndchristie did there, I'd say that's the best so far.
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: st0ven on June 20, 2009, 03:41:45 am
So jut to clearify this a bit, i wanted to point out that you can still keep the legs "skinny" and have more of that sexy anime gap near the crotch and still maintain outlines. As ndchristie would suggest it can be tricky but certainly not unworkable. I hadnt considered the outline on my first go at it and thats my mistake, but ive edited it slightly again to include the outline and the skinnier legs and hopefully you can agree that its not impossible for that to work if in fact thats what youd like to achieve.

(http://www.spriteart.com/edit/feminine_compare2.gif)

notice that not all ofyour outline segments have to be the same darkness, so long as it maintains a contrast between your sprite and environment, this can vary where needed.
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Beoran on June 20, 2009, 08:54:09 pm
st0ven, Ok, I misunderstood the point you're trying to make. With your new edit I think I can better see your intentions. You seem to suggest making the sprite more slender in general, right? I can see now your approach is workable, but I have to admit I may not like the resulting look too much. You're right it's possible to open up the legs, but I think women don't generally seem to stand at rest with their legs open. But I do agree that it's better to use more than one outline color. I like how you use a light outline on the non-shadow sides of the sprite.

ndchristie, I'm trying to balance anatomical realism with characterization. That's why I've done the two versions on the right by tracing over an appropriately scaled down reference, except for the hands, feets and face. Check out this link for my references: http://www.fineart.sk/index.php?s=0&cat=2. Hence, these two on the right have body shapes that are mostly anatomically correct. It does look more slender and feminine, but I think the slightly wide character(as it was) seems to fit better with the face. The right version is based upon my original sprite, but has arms that are more "flipper like". What do you people think about it?

(http://img3.yfrog.com/img3/8530/spritebasefemalepre21.png)
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: ndchristie on June 20, 2009, 09:12:53 pm
i think she's still got cankles which i see as a problem if you want this to be a generic base.  you may also want to thin her by 1 pixel at least because while you might think the edited versions are too thin, the girl you're presenting is decidedly heavy-set.  Roy Krenkel would be proud, but I think most people are better served by basing their characters on an athletic type rather than curvier.

the love of my life is slightly curvy :P.
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Beoran on June 21, 2009, 06:18:39 pm
(http://img395.yfrog.com/img395/7228/spritebasefemalepre22.png)

Finally, I decided against shaving of one or two pixels in the width, because, no matter how I tried, it just looked to scrawny and weak to my eyes, not to mention it didn't fit with the head. I was from the beginning dead set against presenting my women like barbie dolls, so I feel like i'd rather have my character look too portly than too skinny. Remember, it's not fat, but muscles! ^_^ I also decided against the flipper arms, as they aren't the style I'm looking for. Also, the face looks exactly how I want it to be, so I'm afraid I'll have to reject the heavier brows, which look more manly to me.

However, I lengthened the torso to give a more vertical, slightly thinner feel. I think this works better than shaving off pixels. I also straightened out the shoulders. I updated the outline to use two colors more effectively. I also borrowed st0vens hand  and texturing/shading technique, so I feel it looks a lot better, now. I also tried to make the ankles look more narrow, but I refuse to make either the arms or legs 3 pixels wide because it just look too thin to me.

Anyway, I'd like to thank ndchistie and st0vens for your contributions, although I didn't heed most of them. I'm thinking I have a more clear idea now about the style I'm going for. 

And Roy Krenkel? Now there's a woman:
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_zD76GyK9Tjo/Sfu6ydyVLvI/AAAAAAAAAtE/BKtNFCOv11g/s1600-h/tv-rgk1.jpg
^_^
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: ndchristie on June 22, 2009, 12:03:34 am
Well, the slight increase in height does help.  I would strongly urge you to reconsider the manly shoulders - they at least can be bought in without ruining the size/weight.  The alternative is to give your male base huge manly shoulders I suppose, as long as there's some contrast.

last but not least, there's a couple of pixel no-nos left here:

(http://xs140.xs.to/xs140/09250/justathought456.png)

top circle - false incision.  Where a band intersects two otherwise identical shapes of color, they become the same form, as you get with those 4 steps above and below the band that dakens each by 1.  change the top or the bottom slightly so that the shapes become their own.

middle circle - textbook case of banding.  where two shapes of two shades (here, that 2nd-to-dark brown shade gets you nothing), you get this jaggy, distracting form.  I suggest pulling the middle shade orange down 2 pixels.

lower circle - another textbook case of overly-independent shapes.  also jaggy.  I recommend having those two columns of the lightest shade gain one bit of length each so that the one on the right goes down 1 pixel further and the left goes up one pixel further, joining the highlight shape rather than creating jagginess.
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Beoran on June 22, 2009, 07:34:26 am
(http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/7228/spritebasefemalepre22.png)

OK, I think I understood what you meant about the banding. I'm not quite sure I understood what you meant by "false incision", but I hope I solved it. Is my pixeling better now? If you could point me to more examples of false incision I'd be grateful.

As for the shoulders, I think this is characterization versus anatomy. In all the references I saw, female shoulders are just as straight as the male ones. But most people seem to /think/ that women have small, round shoulders and men have big straight ones, so I decided to give the smaller, rounded shoulders you see above a try. I'm not sure if it is an improvement or not.
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: ndchristie on June 22, 2009, 08:02:11 am
I think it is.  An it's not a common misconception that woman have gentler shoulders, as you say - it's accepted by every anatomy text i've ever read and extensively documented at the wax/cadaver museum in Florence, Italy, where I spent a semester.  Those crazy Italians had it measured and averaged mean, median, mode for over 600 skeletons and casts of both sexes with about half of them non-Italian and at least a few of them non-white. Oddly enough, another big one was that women averaged much smaller fibula/tibia sets, which i would not have guessed.
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Beoran on June 22, 2009, 08:55:38 am
OK, thanks for affirming that. Maybe I'll try to shorten the lower legs one pixel and see if that helps too, or not. However, this thread has already taken me a bit too far,  I feel. So perhaps, if no one else has any edits to contribute I'll leave it as is for now. I've got a whole lot of other fish to fry to make my game, I can't "yak shave" every detail, I'm afraid. ^_^
Title: Re: (Nudity) Back with my female RPG base, better and improved... I hope!
Post by: Scribblette on June 22, 2009, 09:03:28 am
I was struggling with that too - the references have the arms going straight down and shoulders just as wide as the males, yet all depictions show them as lithe little anorexic things miraculously not falling forward and bouncing along on their breasts.

Good luck, Beo, and cheers for garnering all the useful information in your threads from the pros! You'll probably discover all sorts of edits you'll end up doing as you start to clothe them, I suspect. :)