Gallery of the Mind ~ Microer Looking To Better His Craft

[Xenio]

Hello. I am Xenio. My real name is Joey and I live in Vermont U.S.A. I have 2 sisters who have moved out so it's just me and my parents. A while ago, I got into making micro heroes. Now I'm looking into trying something new. I was hoping thar's what pixel art was gonna be. I do use occastional tools in my microes which I know is bad. I have gone by many names on the web such as Charmed, Xenio, Arduous, Charmed_2, etc. I thought I would post some of my work to let you guys know where my abilities are.





Any advice/comments/criticism is accepted and appriciated. After all, I am trying to improve. I tryed color something fron the line art trade. I did an okay job and got my first piece of experience with dithering. And no tools!

[philipptr]

Welcome to the forum
Nice linearts. In my opinion the shading is the biggest problem about these pieces. Seems very pillow-shaded. Try to use more intresting Lightsources, instead of shading it as if the viewer was the lightsource. Also you could try to find more intresting colour-ramps. Learn hue-shifting and stuff like that.

[Feron]

There just photoshop-colored linearts.  why not try placing the pixels by hand, the results will be a lot cleaner and better.

[Xenio]

There just photoshop-colored linearts.  why not try placing the pixels by hand, the results will be a lot cleaner and better.

Yeah, that is just photoshopping. I tryed placing the pixels by hand but that was before I learned about dithering 

Welcome to the forum
Nice linearts. In my opinion the shading is the biggest problem about these pieces. Seems very pillow-shaded. Try to use more intresting Lightsources, instead of shading it as if the viewer was the lightsource. Also you could try to find more intresting colour-ramps. Learn hue-shifting and stuff like that.

Thanks. Yeah, I need to work on lightsources. And hue-shifts.

Wait one minute, could anyone please tell me what a hue shift is and like a tutorial or something on lights? Thank you!

[DJ gman]

ah i see ya used my lineart for this guy

it would be a good color scheme the they way you gradient dithered it makes it not stand out as much.

[Xenio]

Yeah, found the outline at the exchange. As for the advice, I'm not sure what you're talking about...

[philipptr]

@hue-shifting:
Hue shifting is a common technique to make colourramps more intresting and/or realistic.
Here's an example:

The ramps have colder colours in the darker tones and warmer colours in the brighter tones.

[Xenio]

@hue-shifting:
Hue shifting is a common technique to make colourramps more intresting and/or realistic.
Here's an example:

The ramps have colder colours in the darker tones and warmer colours in the brighter tones.

Thank you very much. I will keep that in mind on the next piece I do.

[Checkworth]

I don't think that's what hue-shifting means 
But the colder-colored shadows is still a good tip. Not to be used in every situation (I've seen people break that rule to great effect) but it's a nice rule of thumb. 

[Gil]

Actually, that's exactly what hue shifting means. Giving blue to the shadows and yellow to the highlights... I would know, since I coined the term at some point in the past...