AuthorTopic: Rock tiles, Over detailed? (Read 9265 times)

Ovyx · **on:** April 24, 2011, 07:03:49 am

I have this terrible habit of over detailing pixel art, and I'm afraid my sidescroller rock platform (which is in very early WIP stage) Is suffering from it. I simply cannot move on, I keep thinking that I should scratch it for a more simply shaded and texturized style, but I feel I should get a opnion before doing so. So, any opnions?

Geti · **Reply #1 on:** April 24, 2011, 07:12:24 am

It looks cool, but it sure as hell doesn't look like it belongs in a platformer. I'd suggest blocking out your lighting before going into such detail and forcing yourself to work at a much smaller scale to get into the habit of abstracting your detail.

Ultimaodin · **Reply #2 on:** April 24, 2011, 11:30:49 am

I see nothing wrong with going for that detailed style it's more the angle you have it at. It's looking very 30 degree and if this is a side-scroller platformer it seems unsafe for the player to be running across such a steep angle. The top/flat of your rorchs need to be much thinner ellipses so more of a 15 degree angle.

Elk · **Reply #3 on:** April 25, 2011, 09:56:34 pm

It's not overdetailed...but you focus too much on detailing, it has many many mistakes in terms of simple shading

... you try to make it correct and lose control of the absolute form...you should probably, as you said, block them out first... the pure form, try it with 2-3 colors
white, gray and black

or so

Ovyx · **Reply #4 on:** April 26, 2011, 01:00:58 am

Hmm, I guess I should block them out before detailing.. I really need to improve my methods.

crab2selout.png · **Reply #5 on:** April 26, 2011, 08:45:05 pm

It would probably be best to rough out a scene with each of the layers(foreground, back ground, etc) before going into the details. I think you'd find this a better workflow. It's hard to say if something is overdetailed without knowing how it's supposed to fit into a scene. I find perception of detail is relative to the level of detail around the object and the layer it belongs to.

Ovyx · **Reply #6 on:** April 28, 2011, 02:21:21 am

Good Idea, any software suggestions for animating? Any that use layers, I mean.

Gamer36 · **Reply #7 on:** April 28, 2011, 05:11:16 am

Quote from: Ovyx on April 28, 2011, 02:21:21 am

Good Idea, any software suggestions for animating? Any that use layers, I mean.

Photoshop =p

ErekT · **Reply #8 on:** April 28, 2011, 05:36:17 am

Frankly, Photoshop is sh*t for pixelling. 850 dollar-price tag for functionality you don't need. No animation capabilities as far as I know, either.

Graphicsgale is really good, and free too. I hear Promotion is great but I could never get used to the interface.

Mathias · **Reply #9 on:** April 28, 2011, 06:20:59 am

People hate on Photoshop but then praise Paint. Photoshop has all of Paint's tools. Plus it has great color altering adjustment capabilities for fine-tuning palettes. If you don't need the 3D tools, just don't use them. Certainly don't buy PS for pixelling (Thomas Knoll still doesn't know what pixel art is), though.

Anyone that uses Photoshop for pixelling needs to be ready to do almost everything from scratch. I use PS for pixel art, and everything else, and we have a great time together. Just me and PS. Together. Happy.

Ovyx · **Reply #10 on:** April 28, 2011, 09:19:55 pm

Well I use Gamemaker for pixeling, but I should learn how to use photoshop. I'll try and get ahold of. Thanks!

Elk · **Reply #11 on:** April 28, 2011, 09:40:25 pm

Quote from: ErekT on April 28, 2011, 05:36:17 am

Frankly, Photoshop is sh*t for pixelling. 850 dollar-price tag for functionality you don't need. No animation capabilities as far as I know, either.

Graphicsgale is really good, and free too. I hear Promotion is great but I could never get used to the interface.

Thats very rude for you to say, I only use Photoshop for pixeling and animating and nothing else

...

ErekT · **Reply #12 on:** April 29, 2011, 04:54:09 am

Well isn't it?

Photoshop is the industry standard for image editing but for pixelling it is, in my own personal humble opinion, shit. That's just not what it was made for. You use Photoshop and you prefer it because you're familiar with it and know all you need to know to work with it. That's cool. Of course it is. I'm happy for ya!

But when someone asks for recommendations about pixelling programs that has good anim capabilities and layers then is Photoshop reeeally the first thing you'd recommend? 850 dollars? No animation timeline? No good palette control? Etc etc...

Elk · **Reply #13 on:** April 29, 2011, 05:29:22 am

Quote from: ErekT on April 29, 2011, 04:54:09 am

But when someone asks for recommendations about pixelling programs that has good anim capabilities and layers then is Photoshop reeeally the first thing you'd recommend? 850 dollars? No animation timeline? No good palette control? Etc etc...

850 Dollars...

on the Adobe website it says US$699 for Photoshop CS5...and you don't even need that ALL...never
and if you're not using it commercially...well...you know the trick -.-

Photoshop ImageReady (comes with version 7.0) is very awesome and has everything you need for pixelart, and has very good animation capabiities aswell...

Also, to not go off-topic again...

http://www.wayofthepixel.net/pixelation/index.php?topic=11619.0

Ovyx · **Reply #14 on:** April 29, 2011, 05:58:05 am

Well, ImageReady sounds lovely, but unfortunatly I have CS3, which does not come with ImageReady, or so I think.. Iv'e never explored it throughly, it is kinda intimidating.. O, and uhm, sorry for being off topic.

ErekT · **Reply #15 on:** April 29, 2011, 06:19:51 am

Uh? The Adobe page tells me 849$ excluding taxes.

https://store3.adobe.com/cfusion/store/index.cfm?store=OLS-AP&storeRegion=HK&nr=0#

Anyhows, 700$ or 850$, it makes little difference. It's still astronomically over-priced, at least for pixelling purposes.

On-topic: Agree with the suggestion to block out the scene beforehand. It's somewhat difficult for me to make out what I'm looking at right now. The perspective looks like 3/4 top view but it's for a side-scroller, rite? If so then it might be good to put detail mainly where you want the player to focus, that is the platform where the hero guy is running around. Background layers and that area below the platform where you have lots of detailed rocks and stuff right now shouldn't steal too much attention.

blumunkee · **Reply #16 on:** April 29, 2011, 06:29:50 am

You can still animate in newer versions of Photoshop, using layers as frames. It's a pain compared to programs with a concept of separate frames and layers, but the help files are there if you need them.

Yes. I think you are over-detailing (a little, not a lot). Look at the backgrounds here:

http://www.neo-geo.com/reviews/neo-reviews/lastblade2/lastblade2.html

Subtle shading, minimal anti-aliasing. Background details are meant to be just that, background. Let the foreground objects capture most of the player's attention.

pistachio · **Reply #17 on:** April 29, 2011, 01:39:05 pm

Off-topic, anyone?

Oh, good, it's getting back on track. Me? I don't have anything much to say other than what everyone else pointed out. Especially Blumunkee.

One thing I might suggest, though, is to bring the values down a notch. It seems pretty distracting about now what with how bright it is.

Mathias · **Reply #18 on:** April 29, 2011, 01:48:58 pm

Quote from: ErekT on April 29, 2011, 04:54:09 am

. . . No animation timeline? No good palette control? . . .

Yes, animation timeline.

Not a big Photoshopper are you? PS has always had indexed color mode, too. Allows palette control, but disables things like layers and all other RGB mode functions. Beyond a shadow of a doubt, PS is NOT intended for pixelling. But I do all my pixel work in PS and so does Elk. We both get decent results I think, hehe.

For the record, I recommend Pro Motion for pixelling. Not PS. Most are overwhelmed by scary ol' PS.

As for the rocks. I say yes; they're over-detailed. Mainly I say that because you admit to a bad lack of control when pixelling, as if the end-result of you pixelling isn't what you want. You even posted the rocks image here for feedback. Obviously then, there's something wrong. You don't need us to tell you that. The fact that you felt compelled to post here for crit is evidence enough that you need to change something, is it not? You need to be happy with your own work.
And unless your foreground stuff is super high-contrast and bright I doubt the OP's bg tile is working. Post a whole scene so we can see it in context.
Garish palette too, dude.

ErekT · **Reply #19 on:** April 29, 2011, 02:00:48 pm

evilDan · **Reply #20 on:** April 29, 2011, 05:23:57 pm

Hmmm... It's a little hard to tell without seeing the full context. I've found that you make detail work great so long that the color contrast doesn't conflict with the interactive components of the game.

Ovyx · **Reply #21 on:** April 29, 2011, 08:25:29 pm

Mathias, I really just posted here so I could figure out how to improve my work, And I have learned from everyones comments that I need to use a better method to keep the form and I should simplfy a tad. I don't actually have a full scene, I only made the rocks. Perhaps the pallete was rather garish, It was going to be a desert scene, but I'm rather sick of them so I'll just move on to something else (It's not for any project, just practise). I'll try out Promotion as well, but I think I should learn how to use Photoshop now, seeing that how many of you skilled people use it. Well, and I want to get into other graphic design mediums as well, So Photoshop will be a necessary skill later on, but thats another story. I'll Take what I learned here and implicate it in my future works, Thank you all very much.

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AuthorTopic: Rock tiles, Over detailed? (Read 9265 times)