Leonidas Wip

[MaReX]

Hey All,

I'm new to this pixel stuff and was wondering if my steps are correct... I'm trying to make Leonidas from 300 and started making it, but i'm at a loss as where to start. Did you guys start in color? I started greyscale but then switched to color and then back to color. I'm basically all over the place. Should I start making it in full color and then downscale it to gif and limit the colors to about 16? Boy, you guys are all good at this and its really frustrating.



Any advice is welcome.

MaReX

[Stwelin]

if by downsize you mean change the image resolution, then no, that is not pixel art. well, downsizing in any meaning of the word is pretty much cheating in pixel art, that is, unless you are getting rid of unnecessary colors. You seem to have a solid base, though i think there may be one (or two) too many shades of gray. Try limiting your palette to only 3-4 shades/tints per base color for a piece this small. If you do greyscale for the entire image, you will find it harder to make it into a color piece because you cannot simply convert it to color with the fill bucket, you'll have to go over it again, that is unless you want a completely mono-tone image.

I'd say go straight for color, or at least block off the color areas, and then refine it. You can always edit the palette from there, it's a much simpler process.

You've got the hard part out of the way, the lineart, at least it's behind you.

[Gil]

If you do greyscale for the entire image, you will find it harder to make it into a color piece because you cannot simply convert it to color with the fill bucket, you'll have to go over it again, that is unless you want a completely mono-tone image.

Photoshop can do a perfectly fine colour job when using a layer that only changes hue and saturation...

[setz]

If you do greyscale for the entire image, you will find it harder to make it into a color piece because you cannot simply convert it to color with the fill bucket, you'll have to go over it again, that is unless you want a completely mono-tone image.

Photoshop can do a perfectly fine colour job when using a layer that only changes hue and saturation...

even MSPaint also has a color replace mode(right click with eraser tool, left color is color to replace, right is color to replace it with). Sometimes its easier to just work in one ramp when you're not sure how the colors should look in the end. I usually switch over to color after I have a good idea on how I want everything to look, and then refine and tweak it more.

[Stwelin]

If you do greyscale for the entire image, you will find it harder to make it into a color piece because you cannot simply convert it to color with the fill bucket, you'll have to go over it again, that is unless you want a completely mono-tone image.

Photoshop can do a perfectly fine colour job when using a layer that only changes hue and saturation...

I meant if he used all the same greys throughtout the image on 1 layer. If they are on different layers, it's fine, but if the entire image is just one layer in greyscale, photoshop doesn't discern between areas once you untick the 'contiguous' option with the fill bucket.

[Gil]

So, it's like 5 seconds of work to create masks... No need for different layers

Ptoing will probably jump in and enlighten us on a Pro Motion function that does it too...

[Zolthorg]

Indexed palette, GG does it too.

[Gil]

And how would indexed palettes help in masking out colour shapes?

[Fool]

Photoshop is capable to work with one specific value if tolerance in tools panel set to 1 (32 by default) with contiguous uncheck. It could be a bucket if you want to fill up certain pixel value or magic wand to adjust hue/saturation, or just cut/paste to new layer... If that's is a issue, perhaps.=)

[Crazy Asian Gamer]

Indexed palette, GG does it too.

He means GraphicsGale, which should be easily found through Google. (And I use it too )

I would avoid starting in full color and downsizing to a smaller palette. Just start with a small indexed palette and add colors as you need them. Or, as an alternative, you can reduce what you have to an indexed palette and adjust the greyscale values. Or something.