Adventure Game Studio

Creative Production => Critics' Lounge => Topic started by: Nacho on Tue 12/10/2004 22:55:27

Title: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Nacho on Tue 12/10/2004 22:55:27
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/mania2.gif)

(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/mm4.gif)

A nice project mixing a time travel stuff I had in mind and Maniac Mansion came to my mind and I start making some remakes of the old DOTT images.

I need a bg with this odd upper perspective... I am going in the correct way? the plain below the house and the river are unfinished, as some of the parts in the house, etc... but I'd like most a crit of the perspective... Of course, if some old lucas' games fans are interested in being involved in such a take-it-easy-project make me know.

One day work.

Thanks.

UPDATE: A new image for the intro I have in mind.... It's Weird Ed, on his knees because his Hamster is dead. I know he has no arms, but they will be there, holding the dead body of the little poor animal... Am I going in the right direction?

(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/Mm5.gif)

And yeah! The cat of Shrek 2 inspired me...Ã,  :D
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: Krazy on Tue 12/10/2004 23:24:36
Looks great, almost like a real DOTT background!!
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: YOke on Wed 13/10/2004 00:25:44
Looks, like Krazy said, as original DOTT artwork. The semi top-down perspective should, however, result in showing almost only ground, with the horizon close to the upper edge of the image and the dark green hill in the foreground should not be visible I think. Unless both time and space are warped, of course. ;)
But you have emulated the style perfectly!
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: Darth Mandarb on Wed 13/10/2004 04:15:37
Yeah it looks great!

I dig the warped perspective.  It's hard to achieve (I have tried before and failed miserably) but you've managed it quite effectively!

Please post the progress on this one as you go!
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: Mr_Frisby on Wed 13/10/2004 07:35:28
Theres something wrong with the bottom left - the tree looks squashed flat in the wrong direction. With that much of a skewed perspective the tree should be pointing out instead of up.
Your probably right its just bugging me a bit.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: jasonjkay on Wed 13/10/2004 13:40:58
The house looks too angled to me. It looks like it should just fall of the hill. Still the rest of it is amaziing and the style is spot on.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: Nacho on Wed 13/10/2004 13:58:02
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/MM3.gif)

Tiny changes that try to fix the crits you staled... better?  :-\
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: jasonjkay on Wed 13/10/2004 14:18:12
Loads better. Still nnot sure of the house.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: Igor on Wed 13/10/2004 16:08:14
Looking very good :) The only thing is... the original is so perfect that it will be hard to reach its quality.

Thing that bothers me: while the original background is warped, it still preserves the main perspective rules, in that, that it never confuses viewer where virtual "camera" is set... Your image is much less clear. When i look at it, i'm not sure from which point i'm looking at the house and its surroundings: you drew every element in different (!) perspective... So, in short, perspective is not warped but changed completely in different parts of picture. This reminds me a little bit of Escher's spatial illusions (though the point of his graphics and illustrations was completely different), but i don't think that was the result you were after.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction?
Post by: Nacho on Wed 13/10/2004 16:14:23
Yeah, you're all right, and it's tricky, because that are problems to be solved in the very early squetch and not it appears to be close to the finish...Ã,  :-\

The original squetch had a lot of landscape in the left bank of the river, removing some of the "warp effect"... but I wanted it in that way because my intention was to focus the atention on the house (Do you remember that the original scene was used for an horizontal scroll?). The idea is to use this bg in a 1 or 2 seconds unzoom were you hear a shout . (A shout of pain and sorrow... Ed's son has lost his pet, the hamster)

I hope this clarifies a little bit more why it's so warped. :)

Thanks for all the comments!

EDIT: FINAL VERSION?

(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/mm4.gif)
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Nacho on Fri 15/10/2004 12:16:48
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/Mm5.gif)

Here it is... Weird Ed Edison...
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Babar on Fri 15/10/2004 13:28:43
hehe... weird ed looks like a bulldog :D. Seriously, maybe you could make the "pouches" on both sides of his chin a little less prominent. About the background, the only thing I noticed is that the polluted water looks like it is going a bit uphill
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Nacho on Tue 19/10/2004 09:17:54
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/Mm6.gif)

Here is the last image of Weird Ed Edison holding his dead pet... Will it be more critized than the previous? who knows...
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: YOke on Tue 19/10/2004 10:06:29
Looks great as I would expect from you! ;)

But:
- His shoulder seems very low.
- His nose has more depth than the rest of the face. if the side of the nose is shaded, surely the side of the head should be equally shaded. The same goes for the upper body.
- I would like to see him with a more protruding, squared jaw.

But the only thing that REALLY bugs me is the shoulder.

Keep it up!
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: aussie on Tue 19/10/2004 10:28:22
It looks excellent. A couple of quick crits:

- He appears to have only one cheekbone.
- I think you could remove that grey bit of scalp on his head. It doesn't add much and it doesn't look all that great.

BTW, I wish you posted your art more often. It's usually fantastic. 
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Nacho on Tue 19/10/2004 11:49:00
Some of the points you staled are now so... evident! I really like when CL works, thanks for the crits.

(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/Mm7.gif)

To the final version: Fixing the shoulder made the position of the neck moving to the right, so I had to paint the t-shirt, adding more detail to make the neck sprout from the now fixed position of the chest.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Nacho on Tue 19/10/2004 12:28:17
Sorry for the double posting... my fault. Explanation of the mini-tutorial above.

1. Rough pencil sketch... I realise of the main poses, leaving spaces for the gaps where I know I can go on with computer (I am lazy for doing all the pencil sketch, yeah)

2. Start working over the layer of the sketch, and I look for some references.

3. Post on CL... I remove some bugs. Look for references for the pose of the pet (G'Lord, I made the hamster with the sixe of a Chiuaua! Well... this style is goofy, who cares?)

4. Discuss with DG in gen gen... Make a "very-close-to-definitive" version.

5. Final version.. I hope!
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: InCreator on Tue 19/10/2004 12:40:54
I like the whole thing.
I hate the way tears fall from eyes, it's gross!
Usually, tears came from UNDER the glasses, not through them.
Right now, tear is spoiling whole cutesy look.

also, add Ed's thumb to rightmost side of pet. About where his forearm is visible.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: James Kay on Tue 19/10/2004 12:45:47
Spumco-licious!!!!Ã,  ;D

I agree the tear is a bit over the top (even for an over the top image like this one). Why not go the whole Spumco way and remove the tears, make the glints in his eyes animate moistness and have his bottom lip quiver. You won't need tears then.
Mind you, the tear is not really bad, though.....
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: mornin (away for quite a while) on Tue 19/10/2004 16:49:44
This is just great!!!
I'm not bothered by the tears at all, but by the fact that his legs kind of look like they were chopped off underneath his knees.
Other than that, I simply love it  ;D

mornin
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Nacho on Tue 19/10/2004 18:35:20
Yeah... As for the feet, I lied to myself saying nobody would going to notice it, because the vision of them should be blocked by the body, but, mmmmm... I should do something with it, yeah.

About the tears, I'll probably make something, but I don't think they're a big bug. Glasses have a very special behave in cartoons, they sometimes can be moved, acting like eyebrows, and yeah, IMO a tear can sprout of them over the glasses, not below.

But, of course, thanks for the help, and wait for the updates!
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Evil on Tue 19/10/2004 20:37:54
That a pretty big hampster. Make have him cupping his hands with a little, bitty hampster lying in them? I think that would give it a sadder effect. The picture itself is great.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? Choose one!
Post by: Nacho on Fri 22/10/2004 18:59:08
IMPROVEMENTS! Which one do you preffer? I preffer the Bgrounded one, is the level of detail correct?

Thanks!

(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/mm8.gif)
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Pet Terry on Sat 23/10/2004 07:47:42
Ooh, lovely! It reminds me of the days before AGS when I tried to create a DOTT-style adventure game... I have to play DOTT again someday soon. :)

As for those two pictures, I prefer the one with background. I love the floor/carpet, it looks really "DOTTy".

Keep it up, it looks awesome.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Damien on Sat 23/10/2004 10:24:01
The only comment I have is to change the wide open eyes with x-es, since the hamster is supposed to be dead. I mean like: x_x

Keep it up.
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Nacho on Sat 23/10/2004 10:54:34
Can I crit myself? I think the body of Weird looks tiny, and, while I agree with you and preffer the backgrounded image, I think it must be altered a little to make it seem more little in comparision with Weird's body. One thing is to make it cartoony and the other to alter it completely...  :-\ I'll made the background again. Advise: Make your art, and don't look to it in some time, 1/2 or so... You'll see it different and the errors more clearly. :)
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: n3tgraph on Sat 23/10/2004 14:05:10
If I remember correctly, this guy has a huge torso and small feet....

I tried print screening the bitch, but it didn't work :S
I think this artwork rox
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: intermalte on Sat 23/10/2004 22:24:49
The hamster could look more dead. Maybe crosses in its eyes?
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: Scummbuddy on Sun 24/10/2004 00:06:06
and thats exactly what damien said....  ;)

I would love to see more of your shots that you make concerning this style and liscense(dott).
Title: Re: Am I going in the right direction? NEW IMAGE!
Post by: intermalte on Sun 24/10/2004 12:27:18
Oh - I just read side one of this thread - and wondered why I couldn't see my post... ::)