AuthorTopic: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard  (Read 6934 times)

Offline Nervanti

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Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

on: March 26, 2010, 05:23:11 pm
Hello Pixelation! I'm long time lurker but a first time poster. My pixeling skills have gotten a bit rusty and I need
your comments and criticism to better my works.

I made these four characters for a fictional rpg game. How can I improve them?


Comments?

Offline CodeCriminal

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #1 on: March 26, 2010, 05:58:50 pm
Well, I am by no means a great pixel artist unlike most of the members on here (actually I'm a programmer) however, I think the shades of colour you use do not contrast enough (particularly on the rock monster) making the sprites look more flat than usual :P. Also the colours you actually use (mostly on the lizard-man) are a bit intesive, get some saturation in there.
And one more thing, (hehe cartoon jackie-chans uncle :P ) the rock monsters left-upper arm overlaps the torso to much me thinks, but im not sure.. maybe im wrong.

http://www.natomic.com/hosted/marks/mpat/colours.html - May be of some use. I wanted to link a better tutorial on colours and shading but i cant find the page sorry.
EDIT: found it :P http://rjanes.co.uk/tutorials/introduction_to_pixel_art.php
« Last Edit: March 26, 2010, 06:07:15 pm by CodeCriminal »

Offline bengo

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #2 on: March 26, 2010, 06:27:25 pm

I did an edit on your lizard, the main thing he needs to help him stick out is a good rendering of the form using a singular light source. I would bet this is no happy lizard, probably lives underground, doesn't see too much light, probably has to fight for his food. His colors should reflect this, which I have tried to do, I think you should try and go for more of that dark, realistic feeling in your guys, kinda like the Baldur's Gate or Diablo series, or else it ends up feeling like a kid's wizard's story. Either way, if you don't give form to your creations, they end up feeling flat.

Offline Nervanti

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #3 on: March 26, 2010, 06:39:07 pm
Thanks for the comments!

I realized it's probably better to focus on one character at the time and so I'll first finish the lizard.

I already made an edit to the lizard before I noticed bengoshia's post, so here's my second attempt.

I edited mostly the legs, cleaned some lines and changed the colors.

I'll go back and see if I'll ditch the darker lines completely and try something like bengoshia's edit.


Offline zez

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #4 on: March 28, 2010, 10:46:12 am
I think if you should make more contrast between the highlight and the midtone on the new one, its an improvement, for sure, but still lacking contrast.
(I do like the hue shift, just darken the mid or lighten the highlight and it will do wonders.)

Offline Nervanti

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #5 on: March 28, 2010, 02:08:37 pm
Yeah, the contrast is still an issue in that version.

I got a bit bored of 32x32 size and wanted to elaborate the lizard,
so I completely revamped it and made it bigger.



The new version has an unified light source and and a lizard that looks more vicious. The lines could probably need more work.

Offline Kidfrommars

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #6 on: March 28, 2010, 02:41:52 pm
I think you may want to make the tongue a little less bright. It really distracts me from the rest of the vicious muscles.

I made a quick edit to show what I mean:

 :)

Offline Souly

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #7 on: March 28, 2010, 03:55:19 pm
Youve got a lot of random shading going on on some shapes that dont quite follow your light source.


I'd say go back to when it's only 2-3 colors and fill out those forms better.
His arms and legs are all shaded like one big blob looks odd.
Cant really make out the arm muscles as well.
« Last Edit: March 28, 2010, 04:10:14 pm by Souly »

Offline Nervanti

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #8 on: March 29, 2010, 03:02:36 pm
Thanks for the edit Souly. Your edit has many good points that I tried to follow
in my newest version.

Like you suggested, I went back a bit and redid some of the shapes for a better form.



What I did:
-facelift
-removed the tongue(seems a bit unnecessary)
-improved left leg
-redid toenails
-redid left hand
-tried to make the muscles pop out more

Offline Reo

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Re: Minotaur, lizard man, rock monster and a wizard

Reply #9 on: March 30, 2010, 08:35:12 pm
This has improved 'lots already Keep it up ;D

Still has some problems though, inconsistent anatomy being one of them.

I Think that you didn't really give the Leg behind the arm enough thought and it feels like it was an afterthought, It's important to plan everything out before, now it feels cramped and broken, same with the tail.
Another thing is that his head seems way to small for his quite massive body, I also think what you're having now seems a bit to boxy(but that might be a style choice)



I added further to Soulys edit to get some points across.

You should look up some references, there are a lot of ''Lizard-man art'' on the internet to take a look at, like the Lizardmen from warhammer: http://www.wargamestore.com/images/T/gw8848.jpg
:y:

Another thing that seems a bit cramped is the pose, a bit cramped and random it doesn't really give much of a character.
Also you has some small amounts of banding/pillowshading going on but nothing serious.

Any way keep it up, looking forward to what you'll to do the other characters! ;)
« Last Edit: March 30, 2010, 08:38:29 pm by Reo »