Skeletroids dump - Update: You've got friends!

[Helm]

Both Knytt and Cave Story do not look flat at all. Depth is implied best with levels of priority, not 90 degree block z-depth. I think for your game you could try 45 degree or 33 degree 16 pixels of depth. Personally I'd go with no perspective and just parallax a few layers of background behind.

[Ben2theEdge]

While I'm working on the backgrounds I figured I'd post this - the full slash combo!

[Helm]

Function and flare in equal amounts. Excellent. Looking forward to seeing new tiles, as you got this animation thing down way better than me so I can't really give you useful critique.

[PypeBros]

excellent! Great job on legs poses! any chance that "sword" could be equipped with a device that allows throwing and catching it like a deathly boomerang (e.g. in "fury" mode) ? Just out of curiousity, are you still using the same kind of animating technique you presented in last augustus ?

e.g. --> --> --> --> ?

[Atnas]

In my opinion his face is too static. From my skimming of The Animator's Survival Guide last year, his blows need more impact and depth! shoutshoutshout



boop-beep-beep-booo :3

[ndchristie]

In my opinion his face is too static. From my skimming of The Animator's Survival Guide last year, his blows need more impact and depth! shoutshoutshout



boop-beep-beep-booo :3

in my opinion this is a good start at a great idea that takes it about half as far as it should.  subtle movement, although sophisticated and bler bler, is lost in-game.  if he's going to scream, which i thing he could, make him really scream - break the jaw off.  and lots of tiny squinting and then bulging eyes.  that's pretty much the only way to have it visible.  river city ransom, woo!

[Ben2theEdge]

Atnas and ND, you guys are right on. Now I'm thinking I should probably animate his hair a little while I'm at it.

excellent! Great job on legs poses! any chance that "sword" could be equipped with a device that allows throwing and catching it like a deathly boomerang (e.g. in "fury" mode) ? Just out of curiousity, are you still using the same kind of animating technique you presented in last augustus ?

No plans for a boomerang attack at this point  There are ranged attacks in the game and they are very powerful, but you only get to use them a couple times, kind of like bombs in a sh'mup.

And yeah, I'm still using the same technique to animate, which I learned from Richard Williams' book the Animator's Survival Guide. I kind of just adapted his techniques to pixel art (it's not a big leap at all). So far this is the most effective way to animate that I know of, and now I'm just trying to get better at it. If people want I'll be happy to post some in-progress stuff.

[QuickSilva]

Yes please do. It`s always good to see the work in progress stuff, especially with animations as cool as yours.

Jason.

[Mike]

And yeah, I'm still using the same technique to animate, which I learned from Richard Williams' book the Animator's Survival Guide. I kind of just adapted his techniques to pixel art (it's not a big leap at all). So far this is the most effective way to animate that I know of, and now I'm just trying to get better at it. If people want I'll be happy to post some in-progress stuff.

Don't forget that he also goes over how animating straight ahead can lead to some cool things too.  Also please do post more W.I.P stuff but go over how you pick colors too.  Whenever I start on a new sprite I get color locked into high saturated basic colors and it makes me sad ;_;  So any help for that would be greatly appreciated.  Keep up the good work Ben!

*oh and one more thing, how do you animate in graphics gale without a white background.  Whenever I switch a color to transparent it switches it to white, which is extremely blinding.  I want to be able to onion skin with any background color like you can with MMF2.

[Atnas]

*oh and one more thing, how do you animate in graphics gale without a white background.  Whenever I switch a color to transparent it switches it to white, which is extremely blinding.  I want to be able to onion skin with any background color like you can with MMF2.

You should be switching on transparency via frame, not layer. Layer gives you the white background, and it also loses it's transparency when saved as gif. Frame, however, maintains the transparency as well as allowing you to keep the background within your workspace.