GR#123 - Pixel Cars - Sideview

[Lachie Dazdarian]

Hi! It's been a while, I know. Got sidetracked by RL. But still trying to dabble with pixel art from time to time.

Anyway, I'm working on a game where a car (several will be available to choose from) is driving in front sort of parallax background, but this is only the backdrop for the game objective. Can't go in more details ATM. It is a great project to practice one skills on simpler pixel art (at least when it comes to complexity of outlines and animation), until I muster up my energy to get back to this:
http://www.wayofthepixel.net/index.php?topic=14226.msg132760#msg132760
http://www.wayofthepixel.net/index.php?topic=14567.msg134786#msg134786

My progress so far on this project:



Blueprint used for outlines:


Photo of a model used to get a better idea of shapes:


Any advice on my design so far, color usage and shading is more than welcome.

Please help me improve this!

Thanks!

[Yngar]

Its really good, I like the dithering. I think some AA would go a long way on the hood and roof, and maybe more shadows in the wheels.

[wurfle]

I would really push the highlights, it will give the body a much more glossy look. Don't be afraid to push the brightest parts all the way to white.

[NaCl]

Don't be afraid to mess with the perspective a bit. These perfect side perspectives look lifeless. Like a blueprint or instructional diagram. You can rotate it just a little bit, not enough to mess with the gameplay, but enough to breathe life into it. Short of that, you can change the perspective for animations and such.

[Lachie Dazdarian]

Uh, again so little time to pixel. :{

But had time to make some edits:

New:

Old:


Hope you approve the changes.

Still having troubles with the roof and transition from windows to hood. Any tips?

NaCl, I appreciate the suggestion, but I am afraid. I am very afraid. Tried originally. I just think it's a too big bite for me ATM. I want to keep this simple and finally finish a game. It's been years for me and mostly because I increased my pixel art standards, but didn't acquire the needed pixel art skills. Now this concept finally seems like something I can use to break this blockage.

[Phlakes]

I'd suggest cutting back on the dithering, actually, or at least the way you're using it now. With random patterns like that it adds a very rough texture, which I'm guessing isn't how the car's supposed to look. You can still use it to buffer transitions, but it needs to stay smooth and deliberate.

[Cyangmou]

Hi Lachie,

You did quite a good job with capturing the proportions, that's great. And
your main colors are also quite good - I really have to say I like the contrast of the tones.   

The bad thing is that it looks more like a junker than a car fun to drive - which is mostly caused by your wrong use of dither. 

In detail I think there are several things to think of if you want to improve the whole sprite.

At first your wheels aren't exact circles, if it's sideview stich with them as circles, at least for the wheel rims (the wheel itself can be a bit squashed)

The other points are: Your sprite has lots of Jaggies, Sel-out, and no AA (or if you'd call some parties AA'd I'd recommend to look up the technique, there was a good tut sheet flying around). The dithering isn't structured and makes no sense and the shading of most of the details is wrong or off. Another huge point is that you dob't give any material information or form wit hyour shading which let's the whole sprite look flat.

I made a gif with some steps to solve some of the problems and added a few own ideas too. I used both of your references.

Let's talk about the process of pimping ya ride:


You'll have to open the gif in your graphics programm to follow the steps in detail.

1 - First I looked at your sprite closely and removed the whole shading, I also worked on the jaggies here and there and tried to remove those I reminded.
I also changed the shape of the bumpers to add a sense of form (it'd be wrong for this perspective but it looks better imo - artistical choice)

2 -  I added a main lightsource and a few more details to have a basis to work with

3 - I started with improving/ working on the shading and shaded the bumpers (tried to achieve the metallic material look)

4 - Mostly reflections, I also improved the form of the car roof part and the side details

5 - fixed some proportions and details regarding to the photo and worked on the wheel

6 - made some tonal improvements regarding to the brightness composition and worked on a lot of smaller details

7 - small detail adjustments

8 - I added a cast shadow to giv it depth, although it's a sideview car.

9 - more detail adjustments, shading of the front wheel regarding to the photo reference and added the palette

Now it'd only need some small tweaks regarding to AA, details and clusters, but all in all I'd call it done. Over the whole process I changed and adjusted some colors, but both versions have exactly 15 + bg (transparency) - I don't know if this is a limitation though.

Here is a comparison for a better illustration of the changes:



And here is the pimped sprite of mine as static image:



Try to work on your forms and jaggies and you'll achieve by far better results. Good Luck 

[Lachie Dazdarian]

Wow! You destroyed me.

But you showed me what needs to be done in so much detail.

I was pretty sure I knew AA. Oh, well.

I love you Cyangmou. We should be together.

Anyway, will try to replicate your suggestions and approach as soon as possible.

Thanks once more!

[PypeBros]

That's stunning and instructing. Chapeau, Cyangmou!
Yet, there's a little something about the horizontal lines for shading that disturbs me. They work very well on the car's door, but they're not doing as good as could be around the wheels. (time is missing for an edit, unfortunately).

[Cyangmou]

That's stunning and instructing. Chapeau, Cyangmou!
Yet, there's a little something about the horizontal lines for shading that disturbs me. They work very well on the car's door, but they're not doing as good as could be around the wheels. (time is missing for an edit, unfortunately).

Right, the form aroud the wheels - I also thought that there is something off, but I also thought nobody'd care ... meh even the quietest thinking about a probably issue is too much... 

Now as I overslept it I saw a bunch more things, I fixed some more details, added an windscreen wiper and edited the shading of the wheel rims. I think this was the final layer of polish the graphic needed. Now I really like it 



And Lachie, I really don't wanted to destroy you ... I just wanted to share some thoughts. Cars are things I usually don't draw and so they are a really interesting subject for studying to me.