Harry Potter sprite

[Malor]

Honestly, the greatest position for his wand.. EVER!

The light seems to shine side on on this arm, and that makes it a little hard to make out.

he he. It looks good, but I'd fix the wand, it looks both semi phallus like, it also looks less....relaxed? I'd have it slanted downwards.

[Rox]

The way you've got it looks more like a side scroller than the top-down 3/4 view shown in the GBA example.  Was that intentional?  If not, his left foot should be visible.

It's intentional, as made clear by Kame's second post in this thread.


Now for the point of this post, though. Standing stance! Yep, it may seem like a person that's just standing around, would just.. be standing around, like that. Like some sort of dummy. But that's really not true. That there's of the most uncomfortable positions to stand in, in fact. Humans really suck at keeping their weight on both feet at once for some reason, so we always tend to lean to one side, and one of the arms usually wants to counterbalance that somehow. I either cross mine, or let one hand hang from a pocket. Now I don't know anything about Harry Potter at all, but that may not seem like a fitting stance, but consider the options. You could let one foot rest slightly behind the other. You could make him hold the wand with both hands when standing still. Like, try crossing your hands over your stomach while standing still. One hand holds the other, and that other hand holds the wand. That could work. Just try to get rid of that unnatural standing-straight-up pose. People never actually stand like that. Unless they're in the army or are trying in vain to look particularly macho when Hermoine meanders by or whatever.

Also, now that I look closer, he looks incredibly.. wide. You might want to tone down the sticking out-ness of his front a bit. He's just a boy, right?

[Faceless]

Harry's into Ginny, not Hermione.
Anyway, his shoulder seems too far forward, and as Rox said, everything looks too stiff.

[Ben2theEdge]

One problem (and this is a problem with the reference sprite as well) is that his pose is incredibly rigid, as if he's standing at attention in the army or something. Always take the opportunity to use a character's pose to tell us something about them. Is he in the middle of fighting monsters? His pose then would be different than if he's hanging around Hogwarts or whatever. Decide what you want to portray and show it though his stance.

I thought of that, but I wasn't sure what position someone would normally stand in. We normally just.. stand. relatively straight, arms hanging, which I tried to make it seem like he's doing. I think I pushed his chest out a bit too much. I also just realized his wand should hang, not stick up, if he's just standing around. He's only harry potter, so I didn't want him in a fighting position or anything.. well, I'll fix that stuff tonight.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contraposto
Check this out, it will help you out immensely. The concept Amon is talking about is called Contraposto. It dates back to Greek art where they figured out that the human body naturally rests with one leg rigid and the other leg bent, causing the waistline to tilt. Not only is it comfortable, but a human in this position can instantly move to a running, jumping, walking, etc. position without losing their balance. It's a simple concept but understanding it will make a huge difference in your work.

[Rox]

Harry's into Ginny, not Hermione.

Hey, be glad I know the names to begin with! I've never read or read about any of the books.. or seen, or seen anything of any of the movies. I think I saw a horrible commercial for the games a couple of times... with some weird wizard dude trying to appeal to kids with those weirdly named spell thingamajigs.

Don't think I've ever heard of a Ginny. Meh.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contraposto

Oh, hey, it's got a name and all? Cool.

[Kame]

I know I've been absent for a while, but to reply to some of the posts..

To answer all the posts about positioning, yes, I know. Here's the thing. People only really switch to a more comfortable standing position if they've already been standing around for a little bit, or if they simply expect to be. Since this is for a fun little platform-game side project of mine, players will far more often be running or jumping around or spell-casting, all of which will, of course, have to have separate, and definitely more dynamic poses. If you run, or walk across a room, then stop, you'll start off standing in a blanced position, then switch to contrapposto after a little bit, not long though. Maybe what I should do is rather than have the standing position as contraposto by default, have an idle animation (which'd be a nice nod to old-school platformers IMO), where Harry switches to contrapposto, then fiddles around a bit, I dunno, maybe chucks his wand in the air and catches it or something. Doesn't really matter yet.

So, uh, I have no idea how to portray contrapposto in a limited-profile view. Anybody got any ideas?

Also, yeah, the wand is retarded, I'm gonna fix it.

[Rox]

A really easy way is to not have it a strict profile view. Platformers actually tend to avoid a straight on profile, because it's ugly and limited. In fact, let's dig up a personal favorite of mine when it comes to side-scrollers...

MegaMan X!

Oh yes... abysmal compression and all... But the point is the poses. Those are all the respective idle poses of the respective characters. You can even tell their personalities somewhat. X is standing back there and looking all ready to blast something. Zero just looks cocky and self secure, and he has the right to be. And Vile just wants to show off that... bounty hunter armor he stole... He actually looks a little insecure considering he's the bad guy there. But that may be because he always sits in one of those mech things when he has the chance.

Go for a view more similar to that and you'll have many more possibilities and a much more interesting looking result. Also, I get your argument about him having to be ready to run and jump around because it is a platformer after all. But the thing is, that contrawhat'sit deal is the ideal position to be standing in if you need to be able to hop off somewhere quickly. With all your weight already on one leg, it's just a matter of pressing down a bit and off you go. In fact, try it yourself! Run in circles in your room for a bit, then screech to a halt and observe what position you end up in. Then get ready to run off again and watch yourself do it. You'll keep your weight on one foot all the time, which means you're also leaning slightly to that side, which may mean your arms might move up or down to balance that out, especially if you're holding something. Contraposto.

[Kame]

OK, you're definitely right, but I haven't a clue how to sprite it.