Overwarm - Run Clyde, Run! Meet Gribbs! [new] PortaProblem?

[Sokota]

Ah, but that is doing it backwards, I mean, it's very easy for you to change the background color when working on it, and when saving it for posting here. When you need to export it for gamemaker you can change it to green, not until then.

I promise, you will need to do that if you want to get a clear image of how your colors really look! Pure green or pink are often used as transparency colors in many games and game making programs, but that doesn't mean that everyone who has made games for these worked on a green background. Neither should you. Contrast works in mysterious ways, something that's on a very saturated background seem less saturated and vice versa, so make sure you work on a neutral background color. Changing it every once in a while never hurts either.

If you like your style, then try to improve on that, but never forget to be open to critique. If enough people (at least on this board, where people know what they're talking about) say it's wonky, you'll have to assume that changing it at least could improve it.



Draco9898: UGHH, I'm not liking your unpleasant tone or anything at all. Apparently you have good critique to give so why not try to give it in a more pleasant way? Or do you enjoy when people put "*Sigh* " when replying to your critique?

Do not crit just to vent your personal feelings about the piece, crit with the intention of the subject of critique actually being able to take it to heart.

At least that was encouraging. So I'll change the background color. Though Draco's gif. made good work of that. I'll mess around with backgrounds and whatnot. I know my colors stand out/are bright, but isn't that what comics are all about? Unless I'm delusional. I'm not trying to be defensive, but I honestly think that so far, what I've come up with, is the best for that style. I've been asking other people off this forum, (And yes, they would be less professional, in terms of pixel art) and they seem to like them. And they are my target audience. So I'm a bit stumped on what to do. Also, I have a deadline for these sprites, so keeping them simpler will allow me to get more done, instead of having a few realistic WIPs. Does anything think it has improved since version 1? And, if enough people agree about something, I'll probably change it, but so far, I've gotten a few different replies about different things. I've even tried working without outlines *1st and 2nd attempts*, but the outlines helped me get my perspective, which I still have to work on it, for other sprites. I do have a completely unrelated question though: Would this perspective be fine with a dead on sideview platformer backgrounds/tiles?

Thanks for the good words, Jad.

Sokota

And once again, I'm not trying to be defensive. That only closes your mind. However, I am stating my reasons for doing things.

[32]

i don't think any comic i've seen has used super saturated colours, try dropping the saturation to about 130-200 and in your pallet and increase the saturation as you increase the luminosity, this keeps a bright feel but doesn't leave your eyes burning. In case you didn't know thats what people mean by contrast (that and making the luminosity further apart).

And if the other forum your talking about happens to be the game maker community, don't listen to them, they rarely know what there talking about (as far as pixel art goes), and praise anything that wasn't made with the circle tool in paint.

as far as perspective goes, only use this perspective on idle sprites and a more side on view for animations

and yes, as far as technique goes it does look better, but i still prefer the first one.

[Raytheon]

You're definitely taking a step in the right direction, it's moving towards a far better outcome.

Anyway, the first issue that needs to be adressed is contrast and saturation. I know you want your colours extremely bright to look like comic book characters, but that doesnt mean they can't be saturated. Contrast. Alot of your colors have a good amount of contrast, but such tones like your skin tones need more contrast. Otherwise you're fine with this issue.

Heres a quick edit adressing a few issues


The pose. The pose you're trying to go for is good and will work right, but the way youve brought it out can be improved. I'm liking what you're going for, i just changed it up a bit.

Anatomical issues. The headshape is more octagonal than anything else, so i changed it a bit into what it should like more.

face issues. a few of these, made a edit as to what they could like.

I'm not awesome at pixel art but i tried my best to give you an example of a step in the right direction. I like the direction you're going in though

[Sherman Gill]

Raytheon: Wrong topic? Nevamind.
->
Edit on tha' girl. Hands are hidden 'cuz I couldn't get 'em looking good . I uh, couldn't tell how old the girl is supposed to be so I made it so she's in her mid-to-late teens or so.
First off: Forms forms forms they usually take precedence above just about everything else. Make sure you're not thinking in symbols and the surfaces in your picture make sense. Most prevalent example of this would be in yo' gal's chest Looks like you're thinking of a woman's chest as just a W (imagine that's a smooth handwritten W and not a angular typeface W  ) tacked onto their torso, which ain't what it is! Breasts have form! They occupy space ! Not only that, but shirts obscure the form.
See: http://shop.layup.ch/images/shai_girl_shirt_grey_01.jpg
Black outlines are also frowned upon because they serve as a crutch, replacing the need for you to use form. This is especially true of internal lines where they can really clutter up the picture. That's not to say black outlines are bad, but just make sure you're not using outlines and symbols to mask a lack of form in your picture.

Next: Pose! Avoid having perfectly straight arms and legs. It's pretty much guaranteed that if you' have straight arms or legs you won't have a dynamic pose, not too mention I don't think it's possible for human arms to be perfectly straight. Effectively, arms in a neutral stance are closer to a ( than a |. Legs are little more complicated, but same basic thing. If you want to read more on dynamic poses, Niklass Janson has some things to say on his art tutorial: http://itchstudios.com/psg/art_tut.htm#line_art

Lastly, hair: The pig tails look kinda weird. The far one wouldn't be so far forward. It looks like you moved it forward to make sure all of the girl is visible in a 2 dimensional view. They also seem to droop kinda weird. I think the curve would be much sharper down. Hair, after all, is pretty bendy .
Also, you've got a lot going on here! There are pigtails, a headband, and hair draping over said headband! The thing to keep in mind is: Usually with pig tails almost all of a person's hair ends up IN the pig tails. I think this kinda conflicts with the hair outside the headband (Actually a headband probably wouldn't do anything with pig tails anyway!), so in my edit I switched it out so there's less hair draping over the headband, and only a ponytail.



Whoo, my critiquing brainpart has gotten rusty Hope this was still useful for you.

[Draco9898]

Jad, Ok, im sorry, I was a grumpy toucan that day. My apoligies if I came off like sand-paper

Liking gills edit on the girl.

Don't use MSPaint, Sokota...at least I wouldn't  You need fast access to all 16 million colors so you can make the right decisions about your pallete

Just change it back to the green transparencey color when we are done.

Also hear me out about the legs, we don't have enough pixels to make the legs have shape. It looks like he has toothpick legs.


You argument for the super-sat colors is: it looks like comic-book style. Go look at any comic books you own or google comics. Any good comic will try to make their art look as good as possible, and thus won't have saturated-burn-your-eyes colors.

[TrevoriuS]

Don't use MSPaint, Sokota...at least I wouldn't  You need fast access to all 16 million colors so you can make the right decisions about your pallete

Don't fire up that discussion, MSPaint has just as easy access as any other program. It's good to work with, so don't change to something foreign to you until you find it necessary yourself. Now Sherman's critique is a valuable one in here

[Sokota]

Thank you all for the great critique, especially Sherman Gill. Thank you, Raytheon for your being the only one  to like anything about it so far. Ok, well, I have bad news and slightly better news. Due to time constraints, I'm not changing the style, as suggest by Sherman Gill's really good edit. I'm keeping the simple, almost-noob outlines and shading, but I may tone the colors down a bit. *I still like them, anyways * And although the style is set, I still need lots of help! I'm starting on a run cycle for Clyde, which needs more frames but I'll post it anyways to get early feedback. Nevermind. Needs a wee bit more work, but I will post it, all four frames, wee. But, I still have a lot of other sprites to make as well. And one more thing:

You should do the animations in sideview

Oh. Crap?

Thanks so much again, and I may rework these after the competition, but I don't know. Also, I know about the program wars, don't really care, to be honest. I've seen awesome stuff done with Paint. And Draco, about the legs, I like them like that. Adds more character, I think. Also keep in mind that for this whole game, kinda going for a Calvin and Hobbes-esqueness. So yeah. Anyways, here is the run cycle and a toned down Clyde:


Only two key frames done, I'm afraid.


Saturation Comparison. I dropped the Sat by 40 on every color, since someone mentioned that the contrast was pretty good. Better?

Sokota

More Direct Comments:
@Sherman Gill: About the breasts, well I "loled" when I read that. It's because the girl is much younger than you thought her to be. I was trying to fix them, but didn't look right for her only being 11 or 12. So yeah, It was either do a very light breast or none at all. With none, that area looked kinda empty. Again, not being defensive, just stating what I did and why. Well, you can see what I did, but anyways. Your edit on her was amaz-zing-zing. But yeah, not the style we decided to go with.

@Raytheon: Anatomy isn't a huge issue, since they are more comicbookish *Not graphic novel*, but I can see where your coming from. I did end up changing the sat, closer to what your edit looks like, I think.

@32: I wish I would have read that animation tip sooner, but I don't think I've strayed too far. Also, yes I'm more prominent on the GMC, but I know their habits when it comes to pixelart. Why do you think I'm posting this here? Pixelation is much better in terms of maturity and professionality with discussions. So yeah. I've tried toning down the sat, hope you guys approve!

Once more, thanks for the help again!

[Opacus]

I made topic on the GMC about animation recently:
http://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=406787

I hope it all makes sense.
I coppied alot of it pretty much directly from the Animators Survival Kit, but just very brief and in my own words.
It might help though? :\

[Sokota]

I made topic on the GMC about animation recently:
http://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=406787

I hope it all makes sense.
I coppied alot of it pretty much directly from the Animators Survival Kit, but just very brief and in my own words.
It might help though? :\

Crap just edited than bam, another post. Well, thanks Opacus. I'm trying to do all those extremes, inbetweens, and the passing, instead of just doing random frames. So far, I only have the extremes, but it looks like I might have to redo them.  *Will eventually, I'm sure* Thanks for the great tutorial! I'll review it as I work on Clyde.

Sokota

[Jad]

When doing the extremes, make sure you make 4: extreme, passing and then mirror versions of both. A tip is to ignore the legs at the moment and animate by only blotting out the feet and knees. (if done in a program with instant animation preview, like graphics gale) You can edit it on the fly much more easily that way, and get the motion right before you go ahead with more difficult stuff.

Make sure his head stays in place during the animation, right now he's moving forward with the motion, that might be hard to animate right, I suggest you keep him still in horizontal space while animating him.