Anti-Aliasing Help! [W.I.P]

[Hydra]

Sorry if this is long as I will include my introduction towards this website and post something I have been working on.



Hello everyone of Pixelation, I am not new to this forum as I have joined earlier. . I haven't been here for some time, so let me reintroduce myself. I am of 14 years of age and want to become a better spriter/pixel artist mainly because I enjoy and appreciate art. I was mainly inspired by some members on these forums like Helm for his skill with palette and artwork, Ptoing, who is also very good with palette and art, Big Brother, who is very good with anatomy and life drawings, and more. There are very good pixel artist here who I know can help me, also Panda and Snake. (If your name is not included please don't take this as an offence)

I came here specifically to become a better pixel artist; I have been doing it for some time, so I am no beginner. I need help with a piece that is shown below mainly with AA and palette, shading if necessary. What I post or sprite is of what I like, respect that as I respect all of you. 

In the future I would like to receive hard comments and critique as that helps most. As for this I tried to go low colors and a nice smooth piece. I always practice the pixeling techniques but know that critique boosts your skill higher and you learn faster by it.

Here is the piece. Keep in mind that this is DB/DBZ/DBGT related, so the anatomy is supposed to look like what it is. (Lol, I not a fan boy if that’s what you’re thinking)



I think the AA looks bad because of the palette.

If an experienced pixel artist could help me I would much appreciate it. Thanks in advance and hello everyone!

[Helm]

Is there some reference for this we should know about?

A good first step would be to merge those four near blacks, as they're all about the same value and indistinctive between themselves. Don't you feel that you have so many minute jumps between near blacks, but then you go from flesh shade BOOM to full white? What is the concept behind that choice?

You're over AAing, in my opinion. Not every edge needs to be buffered so extensively.

Why highlights only on the face and neck?

And again, I'll ask you, if you've traced this from some sort of captured image to supply that as well as the artwork. If somebody finds it before you post it, you'll end up banned.

[bengo]

Due to me used to loving the Dragonball series, I do know who that is, could've been traced, not sure, could just be fanart(http://www.sprintusers.com/wallpapers/uploadedfiles/032006ssj4-goku-vegeta2.jpg Not that this is the picture, but there's plenty of shots like this out there). Also, Vegeta's fur is more of that color, Goku's is a pinkish color: http://supersaiyan.oldiblog.com/sites/images/photos/289/photo_289977.jpg. Hair's way too big aswell.

[Hydra]

My reference was a lineart i traced that I made through photoshop. Here is the result when I inked. (yes I am very bad at it).

Click Here for reference

That was based off of official artwork that was on a japanese site. I was confused and did not know that you can post artwork without a source. I read the rules, but misunderstood one.

Here is the link to the original artwork.

Click Here

[Helm]

Alright I talked with Hydra on msn and he was just genuinely confused about the ruleset that governs the posting of references. So let's not have any OMG RIPP0R!!1 in this thread. However nobody is pushing any user to post critique on a heavily referenced piece, I personally won't be giving any further critique no non-original work. Others might, so the thread stays open for now.

[Feron]

u quite like the shading style you chose, its quite dynamic? ... it jumps out at me a lot.

your AA isnt bad, as helm mentioned you have perhaps gone a bit overboard, but at least you havent got a lot of jaggies.

I would remove the shiney white highlights and perhaps use a couple of the AA colors to actually shade the skin.