Hello there! I just could help posting my first attemps to make a room for my first game. I'm just too excited. :) I'd like to know what you think about it and even more I'd like to now how to improve it: make the room look a little more "real", how the shadows should go and is there anything I can make to improve the character (which is low-res as you can see).
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/CurtainsDown.png)
Curtains down. Character facing the screen.
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/CurtainsUp.png)
Curtains up. Character facing away from the screen.
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/TVon.png)
Sideview of the character. TV's on. :D
Hi, Ookki, welcome to the forums (I know technically you've already made a few posts, but hey, you can never be too welcome).
The first thing that really pops out in my mind here is that when the curtain is open, your shadows seem a bit off. Like they're lit from above, although the window seems to be the only light source? The composition of the room is pretty decent, though sparse in places - but by no means does it look bad.
One thing you may want to consider is working out your vanishing point to fix up the perspective a bit. At the moment, every z-axis line you have is a perfect diagonal. While that keeps lines clean, it does make the room feel a bit skewed. I like the 3/4 top-down angle - it reads well, but the objects would feel a little more proportional with a more well-defined perspective. If you'd like some examples of this, just let me know and I'll be happy to show you what I mean.
Also, your bottom screenshot seems to be the same as the top one. Maybe you linked the wrong picture?
yeah, the screens are the same :P but the room is good for your first attempt, i`m not a expert or something, it`s just my opinion, and no one should be good to opine. Well, you could add more details on the walls, think in what kind of appartment is this considering social classes; Very Poor one, Poor one, Mid Poor one, Mid one, Good one or Very Good one. From Very Poor one to Poor one, you could add more dirty borders, some painting falling from the wall, cracks and destroyed watter pipes. Mid ones, it should have a bigger tv i think, a 24 inches one or more (remember, just a opinion). What is that in front of the TV? Add a computer or something, a sofa and a toilet! Where does he make his necessities??? (hehehe) Think if you have 100-200, 300-400, 500-600 or more U$$ in your wallet, what would you change in your apartment?IT`s his home, make it based on his personality!
And just a OBS, the blanket it`s too tiny! make it bigger, touching the floor and covering the bed (adding a retail sewn on it would be good to add detail :D )
Thanks for reading it all! (or not)
J-
Oh my! :D It really seems that I messed up with the picture, but now it's fixed.
SpacePirateCaine:
Firstly thank you for welcoming and replying. :) Now, the shadows certanly need some work but I don't exactly now how (yes, the window is the only light source). If you kindly could give me a little example of shadowing, perhaps the shadow of the table? If it's not too much work of course. Does the 3/4 top-down view mean that the vanishing point divides the y-axis in portions of 3 and 4? I suppose the remake of the room doesn't take too long because the 'sketch' is kinda ready.
jakerpot:
Thanks for your reply too. I was thinking the character is a young adult (something like 30 years old?) who aimed high with his career but didn't quite get there. So I suppose he's living in an apartment what you describe as mid poor. Do you think I should make the room a bit bigger as though there's quite a bit of spare room there now, I doubt I can manage to fit a sofa and a WC there. :D The thing in front of the TV is a mouse trap, or a band poster depending which direction is the 'front' of the TV. :) I noticed the blanket to but didn't know if anyone else will notice it, however now that you noticed, I'm certainly going to change it!
Okay I redraw everything and this is what I got now:
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/kotiscreen.png)
Any improvement suggestions for the charachter/room? I know that the room atleast seems too clean at the moment, but I'm not quite sure how to make it more alive without making it a carbage pit.
EDIT: I also seem to have a bad habit of making the rooms too deep. Which gives me problems with character-size. :-[
While this is much better, the colors hurt my eyes. I can't focus on much but the screaming green while everything blends into yellow around it. Looking at this for more than ten minutes fullscreen would probably cause a headache. It's way too saturated.
Here's a very quick edit of how it could look:
(http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/8281/57607836qy0.png)
It's a little duller than I'd like it, but it gets my point across.
As for the composition of the room, I find it odd. Why would he place a television right infront of a doorway? I'm assuming that's a kitchen to the right, so what's his fridge(?) doing in the living room? And his bed? I suggest you look at a few real-life photographs of apartments and see how they fill them up. They usually have a bunch of paintings, windows, lamps and cupboards all over the place. Check it out:
http://www.daughtersofsarah.org/massry/apartment1.jpg
http://www.californiavacationrentals.net/images/living%20room_front.jpg
http://www.maryhardestyrealty.com/714-Larkspur/apt-living-room.jpg
http://cache.marriott.com/propertyimages/j/jkter/phototour/jkter_phototour04.jpg
http://www.belmoreinternational.com/Image/small.234living%20room.JPG
You could also do it the easy way and simply make the room smaller. Good luck. :)
I think some shadows are still missing. When he opens the curtain, it seems like the whole room lights up. That is impossible. The edges (wall-roof) have to be darker for example. Also the sofa's arm-rest has to throw shadow on the sofa itself (look at it and then look at the light that goes through the opened door on the left). Even the cable from the TV has to throw small shadow on the floor (since all other shadows are long). The area above the curtain has to be darker.
Here's an example. Bad indeed but enough to reincarnate my thoughts in something visual :) :
(http://static.photo.net/attachments/bboard/00O/00Oaih-41980684.jpg)
Yes, the window is deep in the wall, but we have here a situation like that. Even if the whole room was completely white and reflects the light, there would be some shadows on the wall where the window is place on.
Hope I'm right :)
Thank you for your replies! I'm sure they'll help me to improve my work. I'll try to rework the shadows. I agree that the room's furniture placement is quite funny and needs a revamp however I'd like to keep it as a one room + somekind of a cooking closet and a bathroom apartment and not a family sized house.
I'd like to know what's the best location of the lightsource for the character for overall use.
EDIT:
I tried to be more carefull with the shadow's and here's what I've got at the moment:
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/OIKEAKOTI.png)
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/OIKEAKOTI2.png)
Everything is too bright. Hurts the eye. Try using some softer colors like HillBilly did. Can't see any shadow except under the sink, in the vent on the very right below and under the bed. Outside the room through the opened door I can see something, but...I doesn't look like shadowing thingy. The same is for the small dark blue triangle on upper left side of the wall with blue Dutch tiles...
Even something as simple as this will make your room more interesting and much less empty looking.
(http://www.bryvis.com/images/other/agsf/ookki_livingroom.png)
Using HillBilly's colors.
Also I never notice it until now, but your hallway is very very narrow. Half the size of a normal hallway (or less).
I never touched any of your shadows or anything. I was only showing you what you could do to make the house look more cramped like you said you wanted it to be. This way the character won't enter the kitchen since you can clearly see it's very small. It also explains why the fridge would be in the living room.
I forgot to put in a sink, but you get the idea.
change the tv direction to the front (not back) and place the sofa on the bottom. It will be more logical. Also if the bed where drawn horizontaly (not verticaly as it was drawn), it could have some space to put a WC door. ;)
You have improved greatly since the first post, now you just need to get the colors right. Desaturate the whole pic. Also keep in mind that shadows are always less saturated. An easy way of adding shadows: add a second layer, draw the shadows using black, then turn the layer's opacity to 40-70 percent.
Quote from: KhrisMUC on Wed 18/02/2009 06:38:33
You have improved greatly since the first post, now you just need to get the colors right. Desaturate the whole pic. Also keep in mind that shadows are always less saturated. An easy way of adding shadows: add a second layer, draw the shadows using black, then turn the layer's opacity to 40-70 percent.
Thank you! Didn't know that getting positive feedback is this powerful motivator, it really made my day. :) Now I finally undestood how to lessen the saturation. And thanks for the shadow tip it seems really helpful.
Here's a new pic. Only the saturation has been changed (from value 100 to 50). :D
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/OIKEAKOTI2b.png)
Quote from: Ryan Timothy on Wed 18/02/2009 01:32:56
(http://www.bryvis.com/images/other/agsf/ookki_livingroom.png)
Shadow in the edges of the room are missing and not only there. I draw crap on the PC, so here's very ugly sketch of what I mean (gray region should have some shadow, red one is lighted up):
(http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/6339/windowhf8.png)
There refrigerator for example throws shadow as if the light come from somewhere of the foreground and on the left. But the light comes from the window right? ???
Yes, rbaleksandar, you are correct that my shadow doesn't work with the window.
If you look at his image, I kept the shadow the way he had it, and just ended it off as if the light source is coming from a ceiling lamp or something (which since the ceiling is obviously invisible, so would the ceiling lamp).
BUT
I wasn't showing him how to do the shadow (as I stated in my post), I just quickly showed him what he could do to make his kitchen a part of the living room.
Sorry, misunderstood you, because I saw the refrigerator (which wasn't like this in your first post :P) and the shadow, and thought you have fixed some aspects.
Yea, I'm finally getting a grip of the room shadowing and I'll post my development tomorrow. In the meanwhile, here's my walking animation that I made a couple of days ago:
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/Animation1.gif)
First I was proud that I even managed to do a walkcycle however the more I look at it the funnier it looks. I guess that characterwise I have made the classic "light source between the viewer and character" -mistake. Any pointer for that?
Now then. Here's the room at the moment:
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/OIKEAKOTI2b-1.png)
I think I'll add something hanging on the wall(s) and maybe some kind of small table in front of the sofa. And of course doors to bathroom and to the hallway. In case you wonder what the purple ball in the middle of the screen is, it's my "light source" to the living room, hanging from the ceiling, that way you should see that the shadows are quite in the right places. Or are they? I hope I've done it right this time.
I have a question to ask :P Obviously there's some light in the room (don't know where exactly, maybe hanging from the roof).
What still bothers me is that some shadows point out that the light is in position X1,Y1 and others - in position X2,Y2.
Take the sofa for example. There's shadow on both sides of the piece of furniture. How can this be? It can happen only if the light is somewhere in front and a little above the sofa, so that the elbow-rests throw shadow. Well, can't see something like that. Then comes the bed. It's show the complete opposite direction of the light source. ??? And the thing that confuses me most is the TV-set and the table where it's placed on...Here's a sketch from above the TV-set (sorry that I'm not drawing a ready-to-use object, but I'm a total newbie in drawing pixel art :P):
(http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/8744/tvsettableshadowif7.png)
The rooms are getting better and better..
@matti
Thanks! I really appriciate it. :)
@rbaleksandar
Yah, you made me realize I really messed up the TV shadow. :D However, I'm quite sure I didn't mess up the other shadows you mentioned. Correct me if I'm wrong. Here's a simplified picture of how I thought the light source:
(http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a397/KoneMies/intructions.jpg)
Ah, that's something else :P Ok, so you did mess the table's shadow. From you picture I can see that you TV-set throws a correct shadow. About the bed...I thought this light spots are some kind of wrinkles or a color pattern on the blanket ;D
btw I would recommend to draw the light source (hanging from the ceiling), but since this won't look very nice, it'll be wise to combine somehow a couple of light sources, to achieve the same shadowing. It's what I've seen in most adv.games I've played and I think it's the right thing to see where the light comes from and not shoot in the dark ;D
And really - the room is getting cooler and cooler ;) (especially compared to your first attempt :))