AuthorTopic: Steampunk Character  (Read 2721 times)

Offline JoeCreates

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Steampunk Character

on: May 03, 2014, 09:18:54 am
Hi guys! Here's a steampunky character for the menu screen of a game I'm working on. Any tips and suggestions are much appreciated. Thanks!

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« Last Edit: June 07, 2014, 11:10:46 pm by JoeCreates »

Offline Wes

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Re: Steampunk Character

Reply #1 on: May 03, 2014, 02:53:15 pm
I love the style and the design of the character. This seems like a great base. Your light source appears to be nice and consistent, too. I love the big light circle-eyes. Cute style. I saw the smaller sprites in irc and loved them.

What's going on with the right (his right) arm? Is it like a baby hand or something? Similarly, his left leg seems strange. At first glance, it looked like he was missing one foot and had a baby arm. But the more I look at it, I think that he's intended to be in some kind of half-running pose. I think that it has to do with the width of the crotch, which makes it look like he's sitting down.

Other than those structural things, it needs some refining. There are lots of jagged lines, and some banding here and there. It's particularly noticeable around the chin area, and the brim of the hat, around the crotch, etc.

Offline JoeCreates

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Re: Steampunk Character

Reply #2 on: June 07, 2014, 11:14:08 pm
I've tried to tidy it up a bit. I'm really stuck as to what to do with the right foot, though. Also, I'm not quite sure about the shadows on the chin. Any suggestions would be much appreciated.

Offline astraldata

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Re: Steampunk Character

Reply #3 on: June 08, 2014, 05:28:24 am
Hey, I remember this guy! :) Glad to see you're still working on this game! No idea what it's called, but it looks neat. :)



Anyway, I suggest doing something more interesting with the arms sort of like they're doing here with mario -- perhaps lift that foot on the left up a little higher and bend the knee a little. You could leave both his hands open and facing forward (as if he's trying to grab you or someone else he's running after) to make him look a bit more creepy if you like, since I feel 'creepy' is the vibe you're going for. Overall, his silhouette is just too uninteresting -- his characterization is just not very clear in this image without something going on with his hand(s) or face. Since his face seems to need to be blank for the omnious look, his hands need  to do the talking (or something else prominent in the scene at least needs to 'talk'.)

As far as (what *looks* like) his cheekbones/chin-shadows are concerned -- I suggest either making the 'bones' in the cheek more prominent or mixing them in with the overall shape of the round light on the bottom of the face because, currently, it just doesn't look like they know what's going on with the light source (i.e. is this ambient occlusion or is this a cast shadow?) Although, realistically, the shadows from the collar would cast a little on his face due to the direction of the light source, it's better to simplify details like this, emphasize them, or remove them completely in the case that they're not adding anything significant to the overall characterization or are simply muddying things up. In this particular case, they're not adding anything, and they've got the potential to be confusing to (most) people not savvy with lighting or cast-shadows.

Just some stuff to think about...
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