WIP Main character sprite set for the ARPG I'm programming.

[Beoran]

Hi, first submission here. I'm a good programmer but less good an artist.
This is 20x40 Sprite set for the main character of my future action RPG.
I am well aware that these sprites are lacklustre, I want to go for a sort of simple / anime style for my game,
basically something that looks "good enough" to be playable and enjoyable, since I also have to put my time in actually programming the game.

Anyway, C&C please. Should I carry on, or should I look for someone to help me with the artwork in stead?

Also, I need tips on how to construct a nice general palette, that has a cheerful feel to it .
I'm currently using a calculated "evenly spread" 300 color palette (based upon HSL) with many straight ramps. :p I'd like to reduce it to +-64 colors. 


 

[Ben2theEdge]

A word of warning, if you're just looking for "good enough" you came to the wrong place

The advice I would give any programmer making their own art is this: even if you're not a great draftsman (or drawer, but I don't like that term because a drawer is something you put your socks in  ) You can still get by with a little creativity. There is nothing about your character to tell us who he is, where he is, or what he is doing there. He has absolutely no distinguishing features whatsoever. Is he a warrior? Is he a business man? What period is he living in? As it is he looks more or less like Jon Arbuckle from Garfield - a character intentionally designed to be completely standard and forgettable.

I would argue (and some people on this board may be quick to challenge me) that art is at most only about 33% technical, and 66% creativity. If your character can communicate to us something about himself then it's less important that he is well drawn. But with this character that you have, even if a master like DaVinci drew him he still would be pretty plain-looking.

A little creativity goes a long way. I would advise defining this character's identity a little better and then trying again, even if you're not the best artist it will make a huge difference!

[Beoran]

Point taken! When I was drawing this sprite, I was just thinking: "I want to make a generic placeholder guy with red hair that I can reuse later in the game as the main character with some modifications".  The result of such intentions is that, he looks like a placeholder. That makes a lot of sense, now.

To be honest, I'm not at the stage of the design and development of the game yet where I can say exactly what personality my main character will have. So, perhaps I should focus on drawing some NPC's first, and use them as a placeholder for the player character.

But I'm the kind of guy who obsesses over certain details, especially on palettes. I've been spending weeks on deciding what palette to use, so, I really want to get myself a fixed palette to draw from as soon as possible (so I can stop obsessing over it). So I'm still looking on advice or even better,  a good example of a 64 color palette. Arne's 16 color palette is awesome, but I'm going for the SNES style, so a bit more colors will be needed.

[Lackey]

My suggestions, especially if you're just doing colours right now, is that you shouldn't go full saturation massive contrast like this.

Here, I had to restrain myself so as not to get off-point.  Because you are using blue in your palette, does not mean you should go FULL BLUE 0,0,255! Blue Jean blue is suitable for your needs.  Same with the hair, RED RED hair is unlikely, and it's not a colour that appears enough to justify using it in your palette.



Other advices: 1: check what your lines suggest.  This guy had odd, popping-out elbows, and his hairline was touching his eyebrows. 2: use shadow to suggest form.  We don't see in outlines!

[Beoran]

Thanks for the advice, Lackey-sensei! I'm impressed by your correction, just a few tweaks make that sprite look a lot better already.

You're very right on about the colors. From now on, I'll avoids fully saturated colors, except maybe for special effects such as "magic".

Also, I noticed that in your correction, the shape of the head is much better, less round, the ears are smaller, and the chin is shadowed, not outlined. I was struggling with that chin and the position and size of the mouth, as it was touching the outline, or at least seemed to do so. But with a shadowed chin, the mouth also comes out much better.

The reason the elbows were sticking out was because I had trouble in defining the arms and shoulders. I used thin wrists because I thought they looked better. But then I found that the arms would stick to the torso too much, so I had the elbows stick out a bit to suggest "wideness".  But your solution is much better, making the shoulders more square and turning the lines of his shirt towards the torso, and also widening the wrists a bit, makes the arms a lot better defined.

Oh yeah, and , of course, the waist shouldn't be a straight line. Heh, how come I didn't d see all those details before?  Anyway, I'd hate to steal your correction as it is so much better than my attempt, so I'll scrap this sprite and redo it, keeping your advice in mind.

[Lackey]

It can be hard to see these things in your own art a lot of the time, it helps to have someone just poke it!  Also this isn't stuff I think about a lot, you described what I did better than I can, so I will work on elucidating these details in the future.

Oh yeah, and , of course, the waist shouldn't be a straight line.

  I missed that too.