[CC] My first ever pixel art - Anger from Inside Out

[Rapkannibale]

Hello all,

I've never done pixel art (or any art really other than back in highschool - I'm 35 now) but Stardew Valley inspired me and I love to express myself creatively so I thought I would give it a shot.

I wanted to share my first creation which is Anger from the movie Inside Out. Why this character? Well my kids have the Infinity Figure so I thought it would server well as a reference plus the shapes are fairly simple (although it ended being a lot harder than I thought it would be to get it somewhat right).

I would love to hear some feedback to help me improve. I am pretty sure my shading is pretty crappy as I have no real experience yet with creating proper palettes and what tones to use exactly, so I was just winging the colors.

Its a small image 52x48. Weird format I know but basically I started with a 48x48 and ran out of room for the arms. Rookie mistake I guess.

Anyway, I look forward to hearing feedback, good and bad. Cheers!

[Pusty]

Hello!
I really like figure! The whites need higher contrast tho'. I can barely tell it
Also the top left eyebrow looks off because it's a single pixel line.

[Rapkannibale]

Thanks for the comment Pusty! I will try to add more contrast tomorrow. I found shading the white pretty challenging. Any tips?

[kilenc]

my biggest tip: mess around with different combinations of hue, saturation, and lightness in your colors, to create what's called a color ramp, a series of colors which conveys differently "shaded" parts (your highlights, your midtones, your shadows). keep in mind, as areas get darker, they tend to not only become less light, but more blue/green, too.

also, don't be afraid of high contrast between your different colors. a lot of your colors blend in (you have 4 reds, i can barely make out 2; you have 4 grays, i can again make out 2; etc). zoomed out, i can't tell them apart, and so really they don't add anything! contrasts between your colors flesh out a piece, and give it a lot more depth, since the eye easily picks up "ok, this part has a deep shadow, it must be ..." and then fills in the blank.

if you have trouble, report back. i think that you seem to have a pretty good grasp on shape, and so picking up color shouldn't be too hard, but better to experiment first so we can help you more in depth

[LeafyMystic]

That's Anger alright! I really love the figure itself and the definition of the eyes, but I feel as if a higher degree of contrast between all of the shadows and highlights could help more. The best advice that I could give (that I need to apply more myself) is to not be afraid to experiment with colors! See a color for the shading you like? Try something a touch darker and see what happens. The same goes for highlighting. All types of experimentation will help you achieve the desired results.

[Decroded]

Hello and welcome 
First just wanna say ur off to a really good start here.
I dont know anything about the character but i hope u stick with the pixel art.

Some good advice above.
I'm also finding the white just glaringly bright so some hue shifting and control of saturation levels will help (can't edit right now).

[Rapkannibale]

Thank you everyone for the great feedback! Very welcoming community for sure!

As kilenc said there are certain shades I'm using that I could see when I was zoomed in but cannot be made out at original size. I guess shadows need to be more exaggerated?

Are there any good resources you guys can suggest to learn more about how colors change when in the shadow. Does red shift more towards a purple tone?

Regarding contrast: I was using the original color scheme as a reference and there aren't any more colors that I can see (with my untrained eye). Do you have any suggestions for how specifically I could increase contrast?

Cheers!

[Pusty]

Just experiment with the colors. In the end the only thing that matters is that it looks good.