Pixelation

Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: ~*McMuffn*~ on August 13, 2009, 10:58:41 pm

Title: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: ~*McMuffn*~ on August 13, 2009, 10:58:41 pm
this is something that i drew. then i pexeled it. i'll get the original on here before too long.
I always pixel things that represent things i like. I LIKE CARTOONS!! so here is my boo-boo:
(http://i28.tinypic.com/290sgm9.jpg)
but i'm not nearly done with this one. i still gotta clean em up around the edges and shade him.
but for real dont yall think hez cute?? if you say no, then don't bother posting here. :P haha jusplayinwichall

I <3 BOO-BOO!!!!!! (c:)

p.s. simply say yee-haw @ the end of your post if you agree that my avatar fits me real nice!! LOL
(i'm bein for serious now!!HAHA)
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: D~Dawg on August 13, 2009, 11:21:30 pm
You shouldn't have posted him yet if he isn't even shaded.
The only thing I can critique is his fingers. All the rest of him is thick outlined, but the fingers are skinny.

(Yee-haw)
Title: bandier than the average bear!
Post by: Scribblette on August 14, 2009, 12:25:02 am
Actually, it's perfectly fine to post just line art - no colours required. :)

The line thickness is inconsistent. If that is intentional, you should learn what banding is so that you can make those big chunky black lines look smooth and how they could actually belong. :)
Title: Re: bandier than the average bear!
Post by: Crow on August 14, 2009, 04:56:20 pm
If that is intentional, you should learn what banding is so that you can make those big chunky black lines look smooth and how they could actually belong. :)

Don't get the terms mixed up, please!
Banding doesn't work well often, and makes the art/lines look blurry. AA is the way to go here. A good reference would be Panda's work (http://pixeljoint.com/p/2396.htm).

OT: 100th post :)
Title: Re: bandier than the average bear!
Post by: Helm on August 14, 2009, 06:24:37 pm
If that is intentional, you should learn what banding is so that you can make those big chunky black lines look smooth and how they could actually belong. :)

Don't get the terms mixed up, please!
Banding doesn't work well often, and makes the art/lines look blurry. AA is the way to go here. A good reference would be Panda's work (http://pixeljoint.com/p/2396.htm).

OT: 100th post :)

Holy shit, yes. Please, no 'banding tutorials' in the future, please!

Your yogi bear is traced over an original and misses the grace of it because the original is made from tension between straight lines and curved lines coupled to them. Don't just line-tool this, think about what makes it work as it does more. Right now I feel like i'm looking at a low-poly, flat-rendered version of the character.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: D~Dawg on August 14, 2009, 07:24:59 pm
i still gotta clean em up around the edges and shade him.

Did any of you guys by any chance read that? (gez, you guys are so off topic. :mean: )

Anyways, "ontopicism":
I noticed the belly...When it comes down to his leg, it's just straight. Round that out.
And did he break his leg? (the one closest to us) I think it's pretty clear what I'm talking about. ;)
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Scribblette on August 15, 2009, 01:08:16 am
Uh, sorry chaps - I didn't mean AA. I actually meant banding. Maybe I misunderstand the term, but I sometimes see banding when just using a solid thick line of one colour. I thought the black outlines two pixels thick might look better if their thickness was less haphazard - that the lines looked to me as if they created some sort of banding effect with, well, themselves, negative space around them, sort of thing. I didn't know whether she'd know what that was, to then know how to clean them up properly after.

AA I figured she could well avoid entirely if she wanted to as a style choice. Some people insist on using thick lines.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: HughSpectrum on August 15, 2009, 04:06:03 am
AA is still preferable.  You simply AA around the thick edges of the thick line to make the thick black outline blend into the piece better.  Not only that, but you can use AA to control thickness and shape around curves.  Banding does not let you do that.

There shouldn't be any reason to use banding, ever.

Edit to show:

(http://i31.tinypic.com/69erdc.png)

Granted, I'm not the best at anti-aliasing (hair still looks a bit jagged, didn't pay much attention to his left eye, etc) and not every portion of this image is AA'd, but you can see how AA can improve the use of thick lines without resorting to banding.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Gil on August 15, 2009, 04:08:17 am
You need to read up on terms Scriblette. AA works perfectly with thick solid lines, it simply means smoothing them out with buffer shades.

Banding on the other hand is an ugly pixel artifact that appears from time to time. There's tons of threads on how to get rid of it and it's never something pleasing to the eye.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Hatch on August 15, 2009, 04:37:15 am
I think everyone has misunderstood Scribblette. I believe he/she is saying that the thick black outlines convey the same sense of fat pixel banding--not that banding is a good technique that should be applied.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: HughSpectrum on August 15, 2009, 04:43:50 am
Fat isn't necessarily bad if it's appropriate (since this is such a large piece).  The problem with banding is that it blurs your image in a very bad way, while you can still have a crisp image with thickened outlines.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Dr D on August 15, 2009, 04:46:44 am
The banding is being caused by the line starting and stopping in a new column with equal steps, I think. (that's the best way I could try to explain it, sorry.)

Anyways, yeah what Hatch said. I'm pretty sure Scriblette knows his terms, and he was advising McMuffn to research it so she would know when to avoid it.
AA'ing would help to rid of it too, yes.

Anyways, I think that's enough on that.

Post your references if you used one. His belly seems too big.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Helm on August 15, 2009, 02:57:25 pm
Oh yeah, I do see that banding as well. Making the edges not align on horisontal and vertical grid would help, indeed!
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Gil on August 15, 2009, 04:02:28 pm
Yeah, okay, I can see that.

I wouldn't worry about it yet though, I'm sure that with the correct AA the banding won't be an issue anymore, as the AA can redefine the curve and the cluster itself.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Scribblette on August 15, 2009, 11:36:17 pm
Yay, I was quite worried I was renubifying and didn't know it!  ;D Thanks Hatch & Dr D.

*feels very special*

Hopefully it'll come out correct this time:

AA is awesome. Not doing AA can be acceptable in 'simple' pieces. Banding is bad. It's not just caused by equal steps of different colours, but also by those of the same color - thus, thick lines can create banding. What they said. :)
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Gil on August 16, 2009, 03:50:25 pm
I like the thick outlines, there's a lot of potential there.

And how is talking about banding of the thick lines off-topic? It's a mistake that needs to be fixed.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Halloween_Cloud on August 16, 2009, 08:48:08 pm
You shouldn't have posted him yet if he isn't even shaded.
The only thing I can critique is his fingers. All the rest of him is thick outlined, but the fingers are skinny.

(Yee-haw)

Actually, 8-Bit sprites have no or very little shading. They're still sprites, though.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Cure on August 16, 2009, 09:24:15 pm
Actually, 8-Bit sprites have no or very little shading. They're still sprites, though.

what
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: D~Dawg on August 17, 2009, 01:22:07 am
And how is talking about banding of the thick lines off-topic? It's a mistake that needs to be fixed.

True. :-\ But besides, I think she was working on fixing the thickness below the left ear.
Another thing would be to fix the tie. The left side of it is nice and smooth, but the right is all jagged.
((And which of you mods deleted that post of mine? :mean:))
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: ~*McMuffn*~ on August 19, 2009, 04:21:51 pm
hur yall go:
(http://i25.tinypic.com/345ybky.png)

(p.s. i dont thank wut my brother sed wuz n e more rude then sum uv tha stuff that uther ppl say. with that bein sed i dont thank he shouldve been banned.)
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: ~*McMuffn*~ on August 20, 2009, 04:58:06 pm
dont yall have anything to say??
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: ndchristie on August 20, 2009, 05:29:49 pm
Actually, 8-Bit sprites have no or very little shading. They're still sprites, though.

what

I just wanted to highlight this and try to fill in with words what the explosion in Cure's mind may have sounded like:

while many qualities and techniques surely are affected by the media chosen and hardware limitations, and some techniques can only arise out of such, you would need a stunningly small/poorly chosen palette to remove shading.  8-bit includes far, far too broad of a color range to make that sort of generalization.

then I wanted to translate what I think cloud meant, not what he said:

just because an image isn't shaded doesn't mean it's not a sprite.  There are plenty of examples from older systems with strict limitations on size or palette or for their own purposes forwent deep or impactive shading, yet at the same time displayed a certain undeniable quality, including many of our favorite titles.

about the piece, AA doesn't mean simply placing an intermediate single pixel at every step, this only produces a jagged burry line instead of a smooth one.  kittenmaster posted a great reference for you, while at the same time i recommend a hop over to the tutorials section where you can find many, including a nice one by ptoing that comes to my head.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Dusty on August 20, 2009, 05:53:12 pm
An edit is about the most I can do to help, only on the one leg though:
(http://i28.tinypic.com/28iqp3r.png)
You really need to work on your AA, and perhaps look up some of the many, many posts floating on these forums about it. There is even a few challenges all about AA that you can read on, as I'm positive they have a lot of helpful information. AAing is all about blending two colors, and a single pixel on the edges of lines isn't going to do that. More often than not you will probably need two buffer shades, though sometimes a single one can work. However in a piece as low in color as this, there is no harm in adding a few colors strictly for AA, especially when it will benefit so much. You also don't need to use grey for AA on black on white, as sometimes you can pull it off with other colors in the piece like my edit has.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: ~*McMuffn*~ on September 02, 2009, 03:59:35 pm
EDIT: EDIT: how about this, I QUIT THIS FORUM CUZ YALL R A BUNCH OF WIERDOZ!!!!!!!
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: .TakaM on September 03, 2009, 11:38:27 am
Just going to ignore the above post and continue for discussions sake, this topic may be useful in the future.

Anti aliasing:

Step 1:
(http://i26.tinypic.com/6xvuqb.gif)
Here is a selection from your line art, you need to think about the information that these pixels represent.

Step 2:
(http://i30.tinypic.com/ndvhaq.gif)
Here is roughly the information the above pixels should be trying to convey.
You'll notice that even though the image is still broken into "pixels" the actual detail does not obey the restrictions, this is to accurately represent the information and basically how it should be received.

Step 3:
(http://i30.tinypic.com/10y12iv.gif)
The image is now obeying the restrictions of the pixels, each pixel that from Step 2 that contained X% one colour and X% another is now those percentages put together.
This is perhaps the best way to sum up anti aliasing.

Step 4:
(http://i29.tinypic.com/2v923wl.gif)(http://i26.tinypic.com/jpy9gj.gif)
Cutting down on the colour count, there's no reason to have dozens of colours that are essentially the same.



This isn't the work process for anti aliasing, and the final product isn't ideal. This is just roughly how you should be thinking while anti aliasing.
It's not quite as simple as "adding buffer pixels" you need to know how many, what intervals the ramps may be at, etc, hopefully this has helped with that. :)
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: ptoing on September 03, 2009, 08:35:20 pm
She is banned btw.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: decker on September 04, 2009, 02:28:19 am
hmm now im just a lurker, but can you guys appreciate the overwhelm factor that may have washed over this lil girl?
(REM as long as it was not some inside joke meant to be?)
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Dusty on September 04, 2009, 02:31:58 am
Dunno what happened but her loss. I'm sure someone can make use of the help and learn something, hopefully.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Dr D on September 04, 2009, 09:54:10 am
Oh I've learned a good bit from the examples in this thread already. Thanks everyone.

And some people might have to learn the hard way to grow up and act in a mature environment.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: The Mozack on September 04, 2009, 02:40:53 pm
Don't know much about her intentions, but judging by the way she's been behaving as of late, it looks like she was after praises and social networking activities, and doesn't understand an awful lot of C&Cs offered.

You guys did a good job offering help to improve her skills. It's just too bad she took it the wrong way.


That was uncalled for. Sorry about that.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Jad on September 04, 2009, 04:18:08 pm
Err, yes, enough discussing former forum members in an art critique thread.

Got something to say about the piece, go ahead. If not, then please refrain from posting from this post on! Thanks everyone for good critique and patience.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: HughSpectrum on September 05, 2009, 09:54:14 am
That's probably one of the best ways to explain AA for those new to it.  That should be a post split into another thread that isn't going to be eaten by new threads eventually.
Title: Re: [WIP]Boo-Boo~~from YOGI BEAR!!
Post by: Dusty on September 05, 2009, 11:30:34 pm
That's probably one of the best ways to explain AA for those new to it.  That should be a post split into another thread that isn't going to be eaten by new threads eventually.
I dunno, there have been some fairly extensive and AA tutorials and explanations and such on the forums. Hence why since I'm bad at explaining, I only provided an edit and posted that there were plenty to search for. I haven't looked, but I remember quite a few, including a whole challenge revolving around AA and such.

Not saying his explanation wasn't a good one, but that I'd rather see a compilation of all these informative posts rather than just one or two of them. For example, I know Helm has done quite a few detailed posts about banding and other terms that are often confused.
http://www.wayofthepixel.net/pixelation/index.php?topic=4912.0 seems to imply such a thing, but I don't think it's been touched in a while, and seems to exclude techniques and goes for more broad topics.