AuthorTopic: RPG Pieces  (Read 15616 times)

Offline TheInquisitor

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RPG Pieces

on: March 12, 2011, 12:46:51 pm
Here's a forest background I'm working on. It doesn't look too bad so far, but I'm frustrated at how convoluted and confusing it appears to be when foreground trees start to blend to the distance. An area of difficuly for me is mastering the "less is more" ability for the distant objects. My unnecessary dithering on the skyline horizon probably doesn't help here. Can you guys recommend any pieces that best show me how I should be approaching this or alternative make a few edits as I show more progress shots to see where I'm making mistakes?



Also, what are your views on the palette? Is it too dark, or not varied enough with the colours? I can't help but feel the image currently looks a little flat. I'll post regular updates.

???
« Last Edit: April 03, 2011, 07:16:37 pm by TheInquisitor »
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Offline Greger

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #1 on: March 12, 2011, 12:50:03 pm
I think the mistake you are doing is that the trees get more complex in its colouring the farther away it gets, the trees in the foreground seems to have a very rudimentary shading whereas the trees farther away look pretty complex. It should be the other way around, because you obviously see more detail the closer you are.

Personally I like the palette,I think what you feel comes from that the background have more detail whereas the foreground doesn't have a lot of detail. It messes up the way you look at it and you start to look at it as if the farther away you are the closer it really is,which twists the brain.

« Last Edit: March 13, 2011, 01:02:21 am by ptoing »

Offline TheInquisitor

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #2 on: March 12, 2011, 01:03:33 pm
Actually the trees in the foreground aren't finished. It's a work in progress. Take a closer look at the distance trees are then the 3 slightly larger ons on the right side (not the biggest 3). These for me don't seem as clear as they could be.
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Offline TheInquisitor

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #3 on: March 12, 2011, 10:06:35 pm


To put the piece into better context, as in an RPG battle screen background, I've added in some creatures to help clear up the intentions of the piece. I want the sprites to stand out on it, clearly, but also to look like they are part of the environment. At the moment I'm not entirely convinced that either (or both) the palette or the perspective/detail of the background is creating the right effect. Perhaps someone more skilled or experienced can offer guidance before I blunder into finishing the background wrongly.

This is a larger project than I usually work on, so I'm finding it difficult to handle. Help is appreciated.  :y:
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Offline Dusty

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #4 on: March 12, 2011, 10:29:48 pm
I think something that will help here is giving less detail the farther the trees get(which you seem to be doing already) and having atmospheric perspective. You can achieve this by giving objects in the distance a tint closer to the skyline. However I must say I've never seen such a thing applied to a night scene. You could possibly resolve this by making the farther trees fade into black?

Here's a quick thing I did in photoshop. It's not pixel-work, I just scribbled over it with an airbrush:


However now I think a silhouetted background and having the trees fade to that would be more appropriate, although that might make for a boring scene. Right now it looks as though you could swap out the sky with a daytime sky and everything would still look perfectly normal.

Offline TheInquisitor

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #5 on: March 12, 2011, 11:03:26 pm
That's definitely the idea, Dusty, thanks. I know there are guys such as Fool who are very good at showing distance by blending the skyline colours in. What you've done is definitely on the right lines. I'd love to see an example where that's done with pixels thanks to a well applied palette. I don't think the fact that it's a night scene should make a huge difference from a daytime equivalent as this is more dusk than anything. The skyline gets brighter towards the horizon as I wanted to symbolize sunset. I reckon this might have been made unclear though as when I look I see more of a city scape right in the middle.

Now that I've put the creatures in, what do you think of them within the scene as it is? Do you think the background scene could do with more vibrant colours (especially in the foreground?) I don't feel there's any need to alter the creatures as I quite like them, so I'd rather fit the background to somewhere between them and this accompanying tileset.


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Offline MythiCube

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #6 on: March 12, 2011, 11:04:16 pm
Can't offer much in the way of advice or criticism, but I think your work looks awesome!

Offline EvilEye

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #7 on: March 13, 2011, 12:47:11 am
I tried a sloppy edit on the right side that I hope helps a bit:



Basically as the trees go into the distance they go from green to blue. The biggest problem I had with your original drawing was the fact the trees had no heavy shadows or reflections. It just didn't look like nighttime.
« Last Edit: March 13, 2011, 12:49:23 am by EvilEye »

Offline TheInquisitor

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #8 on: March 13, 2011, 10:43:07 am


Updated it a little. I think some more blue highlights will come into it soon, EvilEye. I will certainly look at that at the end to give the image more punch. Apart from adding in a WIP little hero, in this update I've made some big changes to the problematic distance. I've took the trees on the horizon and made them less blue and more green/yellow to blend with the horizon (that's at the end of sunset). The trees near that have also been give less detail, but perhaps more needs to be done still to make it clear. I've completely removed the dithering as I don't think it was helping. It was making it all too busy.

Do you think this quick redraw for the horizon looks better or worse?
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Offline TheInquisitor

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Re: Struggling with forest fade

Reply #9 on: March 13, 2011, 02:29:30 pm


New version here. I've taken on some your your advice and fadded out this distant trees or blue/lighter green to blur them in with the background. I felt that the tress were getting way out of control back there in the distance. There was just too much unnecessary detail, so I've completely scrapped them and replaced them much with flat colours or, at most, very slight shades. As they come into the foreground I'll give them more. I'm not sure about the blue highlights on foreground trees just yet, EvilEye. I think this new approach has gone some way to remove a lot of the complexities. I think keeping is simple for the most is my wisest course.

I've also added in a little hero, who apart from his hair looks a bit like Cloud Strife.


Oh and thanks, Mythicube. :)
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