AuthorTopic: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]  (Read 3937 times)

Offline freespyryt

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Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

on: November 13, 2010, 06:02:50 pm
Hi all! It's been a long time since I posted anything, but I figured it was about time I started again. I'm making a side-scroller of sorts with my boyfriend  and currently am working on the main character. He is a rabbit who has a cyborg eye. Now he's supposed to look cute and cuddly,so if that contrast seems odd, it's intentional, but I worked on him for a few hours yesterday and about an hour today so I feel kind of like I'm at the point where I'm ready to get some crits on him. So let the C&C begin!

Updated: I gave it an outline. I figured that would help it along a little bit. I  also enhanced the shading between the close ear and the arm.
Current:
« Last Edit: November 21, 2010, 01:52:37 am by freespyryt »

Offline dpixel

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Re: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

Reply #1 on: November 14, 2010, 02:01:12 am
Nice.  I like your idea.

Here's an edit:

I would say more a believable eye was the biggest issue.  I looked very separate from the bunny.  I tried to define a head to find a better placement for the eye as far as location(lowered a bit), and shading it as where it would fit best in its eye socket. And I was more aggressive with the shading over all to pull it together as a whole.  Anyway hope it gives you some ideas.   

Offline Tourist

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Re: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

Reply #2 on: November 14, 2010, 02:56:05 am
I agree with dpixel that the eye is a problem.  It protrudes from the otherwise flat face and the round shape could be mistaken for a nose.  I don't agree with dpixel's edit - too much noise was added and it weakens the image, imo.

I think more attention should be paid to the character construction.  Right now the figure is a shapeless form with floppy ears and a pink nose.  Ok, rabbit-ish.  But what else makes a rabbit look like a rabbit?  GIS for cute rabbit:



1) Big cheeks.
2) Big feet to emphasize they hop, even if this character walks like a normal person
3) Large eyes.  I suggest enlarging the eyes quite a bit, since you also want to reinforce the difference between the robot eye and the natural one
4) flat underside of the jaw, and maybe large front teeth
5) Optional puffball tail.

Games commonly put a saturated character over a slightly desaturated background to make them pop.  The pale fur may prevent that.  Or not, depending on background.

Hope this helps,
Tourist

Offline dpixel

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Re: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

Reply #3 on: November 14, 2010, 03:17:45 am
I agree with all Tourist said, including about the edit.

Further edit:


Probably way to noisy especially for animation, but fixed the eye a little more.  Seems to look better a little smaller.  I don't know.  You be the judge.  Just throwing ideas at you.  Kind of looks like a cat with long ears now.  Sorry about that..  lol  :)

Offline freespyryt

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Re: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

Reply #4 on: November 14, 2010, 05:04:45 am
Both of you were incredibly helpful, thank you so much! I took into account the eye (both the robot and the natural eye) and changed them both up a bit. While I don't think I would be able to animate dpixel's shading very effectively, I do think he needed more. He looked kind of boring. So I changed up the shading and made it a bit more intense in some areas, enlarged the eye, made the tail slightly bigger, although that isn't straight from his back so I couldn't make it TOO huge. I also changed the jawline and I loved your stomach, Dpixel...so I  kind of added it to mine. It was wayyy too cute to pass up  :P It's hard to get it SUPER rabbit shaped, since he is not on all fours,  but I did enlarge the feet to kind of indicate a little more that  he is indeed a bunny. I tried the teeth but that didn't turn out well. I made his face look like it got hit with a frying pan when I did that :( I am making the background kind of saturated,  so we'll have to see if I need to make him more saturated or not. I'm hesitant to because we wanted him to be a sort of "White rabbit", not for any particular reason except that they're adorable. This game is probably going to have a lot of over the top violence, so a lot of blood and gore. Thanks again for all the advice, and any continued advice is more than welcome. I did figure out from the edits especially where I was going wrong with the shading. I  was having a hell of a time getting all of that right.  Oh I ALSO gave him chubbier cheeks. He'll be the cutest killer ever.

Offline Stava

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Re: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

Reply #5 on: November 14, 2010, 07:21:51 am

Nice idea!
I edited the shading a little, hope you like it.  :)
Also made it a little shorter so it looks cuter, and added a little different shape to head

Offline Tourist

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Re: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

Reply #6 on: November 15, 2010, 04:35:09 am
Oh, dear.

In the reference photos (or using whatever reference you prefer), the rabbit head shape is triangular when viewed from the front, and oval like an American football when viewed from the side.  At no angle is the head square.

On a real rabbit the ridge between the eyes is both wide and tall, making it difficult to see both eyes at once.  This requires a cheat, because seeing both eyes is important to the character.

Also, curves are more cute than edges and angles.



1. 
The red lines at the top and bottom are the top and bottom of the original head to make sure I got the scale correct.
I started with the eyes to make sure they were visible.  One very large eye and one large eye turned to the side somewhat.  Per the references, rabbit eyes are the same sort of shape as people eyes and the shape also reinforces the oval of the head.
Then the nose sitting between them.  Diamond or triangle shape works.
Then the cheek line. The trick to the rabbit mouth that makes it look different than a cat mouth is that the rabbit mount goes rather far out and then back in towards the eyes.  The cat has a stronger jaw and the mouth would go out less and then just angle back.  This took a bit to figure out.
Finally the head lines.  The rabbit head is very pinched at the top.
The squiggle on the left is notional for the back of the head area, which will get covered by the ears anyway.  So it's just a squiggle.
If you look at these lines, even without the ears, I think it looks kinda like a rabbit.

2.
Pasted this onto the existing body.  The dark line on the left is part of the original ear line.
Added ears.  Real rabbit ears attach farther back on the head (per the references), but I kept the same style you had in the original.  Might be too much like puppy ears?
Closed the gaps in the outer lines and filled with color.
Erased the noisy fur on the belly because I don't think it added anything.
Made the feet a bit bigger.
Colored in the features.  Plenty of tweaking.

3. 
Added more to the robot eye.
Between the first two images I moved the skull line one pixel further out.  On the third I moved it back.  It could still use a little fine tuning.
Eh, good enough.

Note the cheat for the ridge between the eyes.  Using the lightest color to suggest a raised area from nose to crown. 
The highlight on the belly might suggest Bugs Bunny a bit.  Or maybe it's just ugly pillow shading.  :)

Things left out:
I think the ears might work better if they were up instead of down, but I didn't know how much room you have for the character.

For me the main difference is to train the eyes to look at shapes and see what is really there.  The brain often just makes things up, so instead of a rabbit that looks like a rabbit, you get a rabbit that looks like a stuffed animal.

Hope this helps,
Tourist

Offline freespyryt

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Re: Rabbit Laser Beam [WIP]

Reply #7 on: November 21, 2010, 01:52:18 am
Thank you all for your input on this project :) I've taken some pieces from everyone's advice and put it into this latest and (possibly) final update on this current character.
Stava: I love what you did with the ear! It adds a whole new layer of depth. I hadn't even thought to go that deep with the colors, but I think that addition made it look a whole lot better.
Tourist:  Your edit is amazing. I appreciate the input and I did add some highlights to the nose. I didn't change the facial features just because we weren't actually going anatomically correct for the game, so we wanted to keep it so that it's super cuddly looking. I appreciate you taking all that time on the edit, though, and I will definitely keep that in mind for any future rabbits I use in games. You were right about looking at things for what they are. That's definitely a technique I need to develop a littttle more strongly than I have now.
In talking this over with my partner for the game I think we've more or less settled on keeping what we've got, which is....

I am of course still open to input, as I may be tweaking him here and there. But next is the animations so I'm pretty much sticking with what I've got, more or less. Thanks again to all of you for your advice, it was a good learning experience and extremely helpful. Now to work on the monster that is animating this  :D