WIP BG; Snowy forest [Requiem] - alternatively: TREES

[Gizmonicgamer]

Still very WIP; might have to alter the palette as is its a little too colorful in certain parts to fit in with the rest of the graphics in the game this is going into. (Requiem - desaturated metroidvania type game).

But anyway; my plans are to have this seperated into several different parralax scrolling layers. So far I only have the front two (the main plane the character will walk on, which is everything up until the closest tree roots, and a small one behind that featuring more snow and thus far two trees). I've got that all set-up, but I am having some issues with the trees. The front one, I think, came out fine, but I'm having a lot of trouble trying to do the ones in the back - which I want to be taller and more looming then the one in the front - and I quite simply can't seem to properly define them. Notably the top of the middle tree.

Can anyone offer some crtique or help on that, or even just anything in this thus far?

C+C so far?

NEWEST VERSION:

[Scribblette]

It doesn't look yellow to anyone else, I believe. Regular colour here. That aside, I think folk are able to set up the forums to have various colours as the background, so you can't really control what happens there.

Regarding the trees, the fore-ground one has lots of character partly for its wilted/knotted grasping at the sky - the middle tree may be too straight for your design. I probably wouldn't have so thick a top, either, as it looks like a much taller (and very straight) tree that has had the top broken off. Instead perhaps thicken the branches and give it the same twisted character as the tree in front, giving the tree more opportunity to loom?

[st0ven]

I say keep going!, there isnt anything that really stands out as saying 'this needs fixed immediately' knowing that its still so early in progress.

The feel of the atmosphere is really nice so far. colors are pretty, i can imagine a really dead, cold, silent bg to accompany it with a crow or two sitting on the branches waiting to swoop down to peck at your eyeballs.

Id reserve detailed constructive criticism until there is more of a completed composition. but for now, i say technically speaking its looking rather pretty.

ps. dont desaturate/alter palette yet. also, what does it look like with characters on it?

[Jad]

The yellow colour appears whenever a certain post is highlighted for whatever reason, like when you edit your own post (LOOK EDITED!) or when you click the 'newest posts' icon (NEW STUFF FROM HERE ON!) etc. So don't worry, if you just open a topic freshly the colour will be gone.

[Mathias]

EDIT: Also, is there any way to do something about that obnoxious yellow backcolor when you edit a post? Because that is messing with the atmosphere of this post and ruining the flow of the image and post color. 

Nobody sees the yellow html bg but you when you edit, etc; no worries.



Can't wait for that solid bg to be filled in, this is looking nice. My first thought was that the snow was non-pixel art (NPA) because it's so smooth and has so many colors. It's a little odd how only the beaten path is lit and the rest in front and back is so dark. not clear whether the non-walkable snow is dirty or in shadow.

Too much color? Nonsense, I like the palette alot so far. It's nearly greyscale already. But like what st0ven said, it's how it looks once all composited that matters.

So you're having tree trouble? You need to establish a better sense of scale and distance with some tricks - you want the viewer to believe those trees are larger and farther away. Are you afraid to crop the tops? Get rid of all 1px thick twigs on the front-most tree so you can use them for ones farther away, this'll automatically give a scale clue. Do the contrast thing, as needed; fade things father like there's a fog/mist.

And you want a more looming look? Hmm, I dunno, you'll just have to play with shapes and forms and shapes, and forms. And shapes.

[Gizmonicgamer]

Thanks for the comments, everyone.


This is what I have thus far; I need to sleep now, so I'll tackle most everything I haven't responded too tomorrow when I resume working on this. Like providing an example of how it looks with the character on it. I made the middle tree and left tree taller and shaded them and have begun work on another middle ground tree. After this I imagine most of the trees will exist more in the background then the foreground.

Do note, the gradient that starts to build up will mostly be obscured by trees. I'll also probably even out the brightness of the snow a little bit from the main path and the back layers. The idea is its in shadow (I also want the area the main character walks on to stand out more) but I think the execution is a little extreme for the idea right now.

As for dealing with the pixel-wide scraggly branches in the trees up front, I'd like to keep them - at least for now - because I feel like a majority of the trees character results from those. But, if it begins to interfere with some of the BG layers further back I'll have to deal with them. EDIT: Unless you actually meant remove the scraggly branches from future trees that would exist in the BG? in which case I plan on doing that.

In fact I imagine I'll probably end up rearranging and altering a lot of the different background features I have by the time I'm done, to help compensate for the backlayer. This is after all the first time I've actually attempted a background quite like this.