Character designs and sprites

[MrColossal]

how about this:



compare the blurry one on the left [from a screenshot from your game] to the blurry one i made in photoshop to the crisp one

almost the same and all i did was take the crisp one, copy it to a new layer so there were 2 stacked on each other, add a gaussian blur to the top layer with a threshold of .2 and then select the crisp image behind the blurred, invert the selection and delete all the blurry pixels that went out of the outline of the crisp layer

that make any sense? that way you can animate them normally with your pixellated technique and then just do this for a whole sprite sheet and every one is done

eh eh?

ps, not that i'm a fan of the gaussian blur, just trying to help you get what you want, i prefer the crisp pixels

eric

[Chicky]

MrCollossal has a good point there, and reasonably easy to do. but if you really want to split the bucket of truth and reccilliation then why not steal your sprites from a commercial adverture of a gaming sort, they're of equal calliber and the sediments in the rock are just rite.

LONG LIVE THE MULLET

*goes to bed*

[big brother]

Yet another reason why MSPaint sucks jaggon...

[Bernie]

Thanks for the example, MrColossal. I know how to do this, but I prefer the AGS alias over Mr. Gaussian Blur and that other Photoshop blur.
And it would be annoying for every frame to do. At least, too annoying for lazy me.
I could spend ages on spriting, but then my game would never get done. I've done 4 characters with walking animations in all 4 directions and don't really want to blur em all in photoshop.
That's why I was considering using AGS' alias in the first place. Coz' it's fast and does the job well.

oversizedchicken - I don't understand what you're trying to say. Could you find some other words for me, please? I'm not so good with english because it's not my mother tongue and you used some of them more complicated words there and you used one too many phrases. Sounds like there is some irony in there tho, but i might be wrong, too.

[MrColossal]

what i mean is gaussian blur looks exactly the same, if by prefering you mean cause you don't want to blur each image that's fine but if you have sprite sheets made up already it wouldn't be bad at all

and if you don't have sprite sheets made up maybe you should get into doing them just for situations like this, especially when you want to change colours of animations like you wanted to do before, sprite sheets make it easy

[Bernie]

Sprite Sheets - I hate to do those, but I've made a sprite sheet of my green guy, because I wanted to give him a lighter skin tone.

Anyway, I've decided not to use any alias at all because many people suggested not to use it. Thanks for all the info though, I really appreciate it!

[Chicky]

sorry Bernhard, i was in a weird mood . I was just saying that Eric's idea was a good one, but if you dont want to do it the you dont have to.

anyway, great work but you still havnt told me how you make those amazing backgronds look soo watercolour/painted but still manage to keep the colours down... anyhelp :p

cheers

-a chicken

[Bernie]

Hehe, no problem!

As for the backgrounds - I must have missed you asking me about that, sorry.

Anyway, here's how I do it (assuming you know photoshop basics):

I make them at the same size as they'll appear in the game (some people draw em at double size and shrink em down to 320x240 for better details).

Next thing I do is filling the image with blue, if there's lots of sky around. Then I just use the brush tool with single, solid colors to define basic areas, like meadows and rocks and whatnot.

By the way, I'm use a tablet - not really neccessary, but it helps a lot.

Then I usually give the grass some definition. I use a slightly darker color and smear it about until it seems right. After that I use a smaller smear brush to define grass on those darker colors I've splurted about, and pull up some green where the rocks come out of the ground.
Now you could use a lighter green to make some highlights and define some grassy shapes with those, too.

Then I  give the rocks some shades using the brush tool. I smear those colors around until they have rocky shapes. To do highlights, just draw em with the brush tool and smear em about until they look right. It might take some tinkering with the smear strength if you're using a mouse.

Then i use a really small brush to define outlines of some objects. You can use the smear tool to fix em up if it doesn't look good with just the brush tool.

Trees are done sort of like stones,  just pull lighter and darker shades up and down with the smear tool.

Leaves on trees are a bit tough sometimes. I usually just draw a basic shape with the brush, and draw some highlight and shade dots on those. Then I give the whole thing some leaf-bushy form with the smear tool.

Clouds are easy too - just splurt some white about and smear it around. You could make yellowy highlights which you then smear around if you want, gives it a warmer look than just white.

So, when it comes down to it, it's just choosing nice colors, defining shapes and their shades and highlights which you then smear into form.

I'm sure there are different techniques to do backgrounds, but this works best for me. If you have any questions, ask away!

EDIT - I forgot to mention the last step. When I'm all done, I adjust the contrast, brightness and the color balance, helps a lot with to give it some atmosphere. Then I sharpen the whole picture and fade the sharpen filter 20-40%. After that I switch it to indexed color mode with 160-256 colors, whatever looks best.

[Argentinian]

Amazing job, Bernhard!!
Do you have a Wacom tablet?

[Chicky]

cheers Berhard!

wow thats more than my last english essay(and i thought english wasnt your mother language), thanks a lot.

now im putting a hella lot of that information into practive

cheers again

-a chicken

[Bernie]

Thanks xD
I still don't know quite a few words (such as 'reccilliation'), but I guess I got the basics of the english language down.

Are you gonna post your pic when it's done? I'd love to see it and maybe I could give you some suggestions and pointers, if you want.