AuthorTopic: Gothic Cathedral  (Read 3245 times)

Offline VampireCake

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Gothic Cathedral

on: November 22, 2009, 09:02:04 pm
First Pixelart post, hope pics work correctly and all that:

I made a Gothic Cathedral, which at first was going to be used in a game but decided not to. Not a real reason why, by the way. Anything I need to improve? Critique always welcome :)




And also a dying ghost :)



See ya later, gotta go sleep now...
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Offline huZba

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Re: Gothic Cathedral

Reply #1 on: November 23, 2009, 09:41:18 am
Your building is in desperate need of lighting. Skylight, candles, torches etc. A few lightsources at the entrance would make this so much more dramatic!
If it feels too hard on such a big piece, try doing it with your ghost for example. Put a pointlight in front of it and an area light behind it and try to compute how they hit the ghost.

Offline Dusty

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Re: Gothic Cathedral

Reply #2 on: November 23, 2009, 07:05:05 pm
I think the double-thick black pixels are really hurting this, and the colors could use some reworking.

Offline VampireCake

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Re: Gothic Cathedral

Reply #3 on: November 23, 2009, 08:54:24 pm
Hmm... I certainly agree on the need of light, but I kinda like the thick black lines. IMO it makes a bigger space between the bricks, and thereby giving it more depth. However, I realise that I would need to make some bricks a darker color then all bricks about the same light intensity.

After trying some stuff out on the cathedral, I decided that I might as well safe the time (of which I have few) for other, new drawings, and implement the knowledge on those new drawings.

This is the experimenting I did -- I dithered on the left part, and added torches. I should have made the torch and everything else dither, because now it appears the dithering is out of place. Also, the shadow still is a bit dull, even on the left side.



Any tips on what I did so far with the experimenting?

Oh and by the way, I use MS Paint, because I like the simplicity of it, and I wonder if learning (as in getting to know) another program (GraphicsGale, or Paint.Net or something) would eventually be time-saving. Are there any other programs that are simple yet more effective? For instance I would very much appreciate layers, and undo's with more then 3 steps.
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Offline MARS

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Re: Gothic Cathedral

Reply #4 on: November 23, 2009, 09:19:50 pm
Dithering will do you no good as long as you're lacking on skills as fundamental as colour theory, lighting and surface rendering.
Also, start small. Why not pixel some tiles or sprites or basically ANYTHING less megalomaniac than a full-blown million-pixel cathedral?

Cheers, mate.

*Edited for objectivity.
« Last Edit: November 23, 2009, 10:55:17 pm by MARS »