[C+C][WIP] Big Dig and Lil Wig (New To Forum)

[MattB]

Hi Pixelation! I'm new here and want to share some character art for critique. These are characters designed by my friend, Eddie, for a game we're working on called Trials of Droids. He has no real experience doing pixel art, and I've already touched them up from his originals and added some really simple animations.

I'm mostly a programmer / composer, but for the most part I'm going to be taking over the art for the game as Eddie just moved to Texas to attend The Guildhall @ SMU. He'll still be making levels, but doesn't have time for much else.

First BigDig


BigDig (1/22/12)


First LilWig


LilWig (1/22/12)


Also, here's some art of my own for one of the bosses:



Critiques and comments requested and welcome.

[pistachio]

BigDig: Palette lacks value/variety, and much of the sprite is pillow-shaded (mostly the cockpit/head). Pillow-shading is when there's no clear light source, but lighter colors just radiate from the center. Design seems pretty generic...

You're essentially making a mech walker, there are really many possibilities and a lot of creative freedom for that. A quick google image search validates this. (It's actually a pretty good idea to use those as reference, that's what I did in this edit.)



1. Blocking out major forms like head, body, limbs, etc., getting a bit creative here.

2 is just roughing out ideas for detail. That's much like the first step, but on a smaller scale.

3 = cleanup, refining details, paint job. Note it's not just the colors straight gray/blue, making the character warm or working on a warm background helps it pop out from its surroundings, as well as more contrast.

4 = shading job and finishing touches.

Note your end result doesn't have to turn out like mine, this is just a method that lets you explore more possibilities.

LilWig is pretty unreadable unfortunately. The concept behind the boss is cool (bird/insect/worm hybrid alien?) but it's also a bit confusing. Again, reference could be useful here and give you ideas for design.

[MattB]

Thanks for the feedback. Here's what I think is an improved LilWig:



Big Dig is intended to be just a clumsy, roller-bladed, worker robot with a goofy dome head, but I like your take on it, especially the feet and arms.

Here's a revision. I let my self use more colors for shading and AA (16 to be exact). I'm trying to stick pretty close to my friends original designs.

[Phlakes]

That's waaaaay too many colors. Don't even worry about AA yet, there are some foundational problems that need to be fixed first.

And don't be afraid to start from the ground up. That would probably be the best idea right now, go back to the line art and build it up again using refs and all that. It can be surprising how much better something turns out the second time.

[MattB]

  Are they really so bad I should just redesign them? I actually felt pretty satisfied with Lil' Wig.

Re: the rules of this form...

If your art suffers from fundamental errors, please work on those either in private, or with the help of other, specialized fora. Whereas the odd anatomy crit and the odd light crit will show up, they're not the point of the forum. We discuss pixel-specific techniques foremost. So if your art shows little to no understanding of more basic artistic concepts, we can't help you, yet. Peruse tutorials, art classes, and other fora as needed. Here be for pixels.

Honestly, I don't think I understand lighting /perspective that well. I'm mostly a programmer/designer and not an artist. But now I'm slightly worried these poor robots are completely deformed.

Also, I feel obligated to stick to my friend Eddie's original design as the whole game was his brain baby. I don't want to radically alter the protagonists too much, and I want them to still fit in with all of the other (maybe-really-bad, I now worry) art for the game. In addition, I can't alter their size too much, because of the mechanics of the game. Lil Wig needs to have a 38x38 bounding box and big dig in a 40x80 bounding box.

Here's Big Dig again, back down to 8 colors and hopefully a little less misshapen.


Also, here's the game for context, (still a work in progress):
http://fyfth.net/bitner/TrialsOfDroidsTest.swf

Controls are Z,X,Arrow Keys.

Short of scrapping the character design completely, what areas just seem wrong?

[Phlakes]

Made a quick (and very dirty) edit to show things easier, tried to stay as close to the original as I possibly could-



1. Original
2. Reverted back to lines
3. Edited the lines. Machines are (mostly) angular, and that's a good way to get the design across, as well as being much easier to work with because of the grid. Original was very off balance, fixed that, made parts fit together a little more practically, that would be a good time to use reference.
4. Made a new palette. One of the most important parts of pixelling metal is contrast, so I got that in the values of course, and shifting the hue a bit (you can see the second grey shade is blue and the fourth is yellow), which also makes it a bit more visually appealing than a straight grey scale.
5. Details and shading. I did a really, really fast job with this so it's far from perfect, but you can see how the angular lines really helped. Went with two light sources because of how strangely it's shaped, and partly out of laziness, but anyway, don't just use your colors to shade regions, use them as accents and to bring out certain areas.

It's 2 AM so I'll leave it at this, and to be honest, take most of what I say with a grain of salt, I'm much less experienced than most of the people up here.

And like I said before, don't be afraid to start back from the lines like I did. It'll do you a lot more good than editing the structure you already have.

EDIT: ...I've really made 111 posts here? ...Really? It feels like I've made maybe 50 at the most.

[MattB]

Thanks! That actually helps a ton (I think. We'll see). Especially regarding the palette.

[Edit]
New Big Dig:

[nornagon]

He's still off-balance. The line art needs fixing, like Phlakes said. He looks like he's about to fall over backwards

[MattB]

I tried to balance him out a bit more in the newest version (displayed up top), but I didn't return to the line art. I have 30+ other sprites I need to go back and redo/update to match the quality of the new big dig and lil' wig. I'm satisfied with these characters for now. I may return to them when the other sprites are finished.