My First Sprite - Feedback More than Welcome

[denimtrousers]

Hello everyone. Please excuse the newbie, but I'm in the process of making my first-ever game; I'm attempting it solo for now, but I doubt that'll keep up for long. (I'm terrible with scripting.)

Anyway, I've been taking a whack at making a sprite of the main character. It's been really tough without a graphical tablet, but I persevered nonetheless, and came up with this:



Then I took a crack at some talking animation, and ended up with this:



(NOTE: There's one extra frame at the end when his mouth closes. But oh well.)

Now, I'm planning on making the game at 640x480, so my main concerns are:

- Is the sprite big enough? Or, too big?
- Are my lines too thin?
- How will it look when it's actually in the game?

If it makes any difference, I've been using GraphicsGale to make the sprites, and Ulead GIF Animator to animate the them.

Any of you guys got any tips or ideas on improvement? Thanks a heap!

[Anian]

Well if it comforts you, I found it easier to work with a mouse on smaller sprites (and even bigger ones) it's just more precise right away and doesn't require so much cleaning up (stuff like lines 2px thick instead of 1 etc.).
But I do do a sketch in PS and then open it in GG as a background guide (for size and all around relations between elements).

What do you mean by "big enough"? Just make a background (like in GG or in Photoshop or wherever, just as trial) 640x480 and stick the head on there. Just make sure that the sprite size matches the sizes on the backgrounds (like doors, cars etc.), that's all the limit you really have.
Later you might try how it looks on full screen (either in AGS or for quick quick test stretch it on full screen by zooming etc.).

Your style looks clean and retro, which is just fine and will make it easier to do at such a (well people here would say big, but it's perfectly ok) resolution. Animation looks nice as well
I'd maybe remove that yellow line in the center of his hair, or make wider. That's about it.


P.S. don't forget if your gonna have GUI (inventory, dialog options, commands etc.), it might take up some height of the whole screen (it depends on what you design). So your backgrounds will be like 640x420px and not 480.

[Ghost]

It's a nice sprite, really, and it should look pretty good in 640x480. The talking animation is *very good*, considering you're calling yourself a newbie. Lots of small details that make up a believable and expressive face!

To see if it's going to look "good" in your game, there's a simple way: Just make a mockup of a game screen, with a room and your character in there, and then start refining until it looks okay (to you, it's your game and your style, after all).

From personal experience I can tell you that in a 640x480 game, outlines of 1 pixel (like yours) look good but should have a clearly darker/lighter shade than the neighbouring colour- you did that, so it should work well. The size I am not too sure about- are you going to add a body to that head? Then the sprite might be very big compared to the screen estate*. For a "talkie view" as used in Sierra games it looks about the right size though.

Again, a nice sprite (that for some reason reminds me of 2D of Gorillaz fame), don't be shy and post some more!

* For comparison, here's one of my own attempts of a 640x480 game, where the character's head is considerably smaller than yours...

[Victor6]

Now, I'm planning on making the game at 640x480, so my main concerns are:

- Is the sprite big enough? Or, too big?

Depends. If you're using a lot of scaling, then sprites are rarely too big since it allows you to do close-ups without a horribly pixelated \ blurry mess. However it does mean that your sprite is virtually always out of focus.

As a rough guide I use 4-5 times the background height as a default scale. If he had a body
we'd be looking at a sprite larger than 480 pixels, which is a little excessive.

If it's a talking head though it's about right.

- Are my lines too thin?

Again, it depends on if you're using scaling, and if you're happy with out of focus shots. Thin lines are fine if you're not scaling too often. If you are using scaling you might want to consider using double thickness to reduce the breakup at halfscale.

best way to test this is to just resize the sprite in paint, without any blurring (assuming your paint program allows this.)

- How will it look when it's actually in the game?

Now this is the big fish. Ideally you should design your sprites around your game, not visa-versa. Since it's your first project ; Create a new ags game. Put in a box room background, import your sprite as the main character and then test it. It's the only way to be sure.

[denimtrousers]

Hey, thanks for the quick replies! I was anticipating an hour-long wait, tops.

Okay, now to reply to individual comments.

///

Well if it comforts you, I found it easier to work with a mouse on smaller sprites (and even bigger ones) it's just more precise right away and doesn't require so much cleaning up (stuff like lines 2px thick instead of 1 etc.).
But I do do a sketch in PS and then open it in GG as a background guide (for size and all around relations between elements).

That, in fact, is a great comfort. I was also thinking of scanning a sketch of my characters, and using low-opacity layers to make the sprites on top of that. Is that do-able?

Your style looks clean and retro

Thanks! My main inspirations are Day of the Tentacle and Sam & Max Hit the Road.

I'd maybe remove that yellow line in the center of his hair, or make wider. That's about it.

Yeah, I wasn't too pleased about that, either. I'll fix it.

P.S. don't forget if your gonna have GUI (inventory, dialog options, commands etc.), it might take up some height of the whole screen (it depends on what you design). So your backgrounds will be like 640x420px and not 480.

Good to know. Thanks.

///

It's a nice sprite, really, and it should look pretty good in 640x480. The talking animation is *very good*, considering you're calling yourself a newbie. Lots of small details that make up a believable and expressive face!

Thanks! This is quite seriously the first time I have ever animated anything, aside from that one time I messed around with my Star Wars toys with the GameBoy Camera and made hilarious 'videos'.

...are you going to add a body to that head? Then the sprite might be very big compared to the screen estate*. For a "talkie view" as used in Sierra games it looks about the right size though.

I've been toying with the idea of using 'talk screens' like in King's Quest VI, so we'll see. However, I figure it'd be easier to scale down than scale up, so I'm adding a body to this. Well, I'm trying to, but finding it exceedingly difficult.

reminds me of 2D

Ah, I love Gorillaz. And hmm, y'know what? It does! Cool. 

* For comparison, here's one of my own attempts of a 640x480 game, where the character's head is considerably smaller than yours...

Awesome, thanks for the reference.

///

Depends. If you're using a lot of scaling, then sprites are rarely too big since it allows you to do close-ups without a horribly pixelated  blurry mess. However it does mean that your sprite is virtually always out of focus.

As a rough guide I use 4-5 times the background height as a default scale. If he had a body
we'd be looking at a sprite larger than 480 pixels, which is a little excessive.

I'm a bit lost here. Isn't it possible to scale down and avoid out-of-focus sprites? If so, why not make all my sprites larger than the background and just scale down? Please excuse me if there is an obvious answer, but again, I'm totally new to this.

Now this is the big fish. Ideally you should design your sprites around your game, not visa-versa. Since it's your first project ; Create a new ags game. Put in a box room background, import your sprite as the main character and then test it. It's the only way to be sure.

Okay, thanks. That's a good idea. I'll do a mockup of the first room and see what I get.

[denimtrousers]

Oh, and here's a hair fix in lieu of anian's recommendation:

[Anian]

That, in fact, is a great comfort. I was also thinking of scanning a sketch of my characters, and using low-opacity layers to make the sprites on top of that. Is that do-able?

Somebody more exeprienced in GG might have to answer this one correctly. As far as I found, no, might be some way though I doubt it's practical.

If you use transparency or alpha of layers (you can set that for example when making a new layer) you can set transparency/alpha, but it's not like the layer will become transparent like in PS but it'll start to dither surface (deleting pixels). Basically it's the effect you might want when actually drawing something and not for paintovers.
You can set transparencies of individual colors, but that's more trouble than it's worth.
Also you can set which color will be transparent so in a layer might wanna set that...although that doesn't really help you with paintovers.

[Victor6]

I'm a bit lost here. Isn't it possible to scale down and avoid out-of-focus sprites? If so, why not make all my sprites larger than the background and just scale down? Please excuse me if there is an obvious answer, but again, I'm totally new to this.

Quick example. filtered sprites to the left, unfiltered to the right.



For lack of a better name, lets call this little guy Bob. By default he's 40 pixels tall. If he gets larger or smaller he either becomes blocky or blurred, depending on the graphics filter. If he gets smaller, the details blurs together (or in the case of the unfiltered sprite, becomes a bit of a mess.)

Ideally you'd want to keep Bob at 100% scale as much as possible in the game, to avoid the ugly scaling effects.

[denimtrousers]

That, in fact, is a great comfort. I was also thinking of scanning a sketch of my characters, and using low-opacity layers to make the sprites on top of that. Is that do-able?

Somebody more exeprienced in GG might have to answer this one correctly. As far as I found, no, might be some way though I doubt it's practical.

If you use transparency or alpha of layers (you can set that for example when making a new layer) you can set transparency/alpha, but it's not like the layer will become transparent like in PS but it'll start to dither surface (deleting pixels). Basically it's the effect you might want when actually drawing something and not for paintovers.
You can set transparencies of individual colors, but that's more trouble than it's worth.
Also you can set which color will be transparent so in a layer might wanna set that...although that doesn't really help you with paintovers.

Hmm, okay then. I'll play around and see what I get.

///

I'm a bit lost here. Isn't it possible to scale down and avoid out-of-focus sprites? If so, why not make all my sprites larger than the background and just scale down? Please excuse me if there is an obvious answer, but again, I'm totally new to this.

Quick example. filtered sprites to the left, unfiltered to the right.



For lack of a better name, lets call this little guy Bob. By default he's 40 pixels tall. If he gets larger or smaller he either becomes blocky or blurred, depending on the graphics filter. If he gets smaller, the details blurs together (or in the case of the unfiltered sprite, becomes a bit of a mess.)

Ideally you'd want to keep Bob at 100% scale as much as possible in the game, to avoid the ugly scaling effects.

Ah, I see. That makes sense. In that case, I'll definitely have to start with some backgrounds. Thanks.

///

Okay, here's a new talk animation that I did. I cut down the number of frames, and utilized the hair fix.

[Igor Hardy]

Nice sprite and talking animation (well, the animation in your last post is a bit worse than the original).

As for potential improvements - if anything, I'd work on making the nose less based on geometrical shapes.

[denimtrousers]

Nice sprite and talking animation (well, the animation in your last post is a bit worse than the original).

As for potential improvements - if anything, I'd work on making the nose less based on geometrical shapes.

Thanks. I'm still not sure which animation I like more; I'm still leaning towards the last one. I dunno, we'll see.

As for the nose, that's just my style. That isn't really going to change, I'm afraid.

[Igor Hardy]

The problem with the second animation is that it's very apparent the guy is stuck in a loop, in the original the talking looks much more natural, unpredictable.

[denimtrousers]

The problem with the second animation is that it's very apparent the guy is stuck in a loop, in the original the talking looks much more natural, unpredictable.

Ah yes, very good point. Okay then, I'll play around with it and see what happens. I'm sure I can find a happy balance between the two that I like. Thanks!

[Ghost]

That, in fact, is a great comfort. I was also thinking of scanning a sketch of my characters, and using low-opacity layers to make the sprites on top of that. Is that do-able?

Not only do-able but a common practise. I'd recommend to use the sketch as a reference only, though, and stick to clean pixel-pushing with sharp outlines. Makes both animation and shading a lot easier than soft AA edges (though AGS supports PNG transparency).

As for the whole scaling issue, I disagree a bit with what has been said here and instead advise to AVOID scaling. AGS can scale, yes, and even do smooth scaling, but for the best results (in my opinion) you should create your rooms in such a way that the character can move around the main parts without scaling. It's a personal opinion, though. Scaling just takes away detail, and you don't want to craft a nice animation of your character doing something wickedly cool and have it play in an area where said character is reduced to a tiny heap of pixels...

[Anian]

Yeah, you see I shouldn't ve answered the GG thing. Just add a new layer and in the alpha blend set it to whatever you want (don't forget in which one you're working.
http://broken-skills.blogspot.com/2005/03/graphicsgale-part-3-layers.html

Again, I apologize, jumped the gun a bit.

[denimtrousers]

Thanks guys, I really appreciate the feedback and suggestions. I'm working on my first background now, so we'll see how everything stacks up once that's finished. My biggest problem with GG right now is that there aren't any brush options, at least not in the free version. I'm stuck with single-pixel lines. If I want the lines any thicker, I have to go back and double my pixels manually (as far as I'm aware, anyhow). And yet, so far I've found it far simpler to use than Photoshop (which I've always used for everything up until now), mostly for GG's line tool, which PS has but is just terrible at utilizing. I've still got PS 7 though, so I'm not sure how the newer versions compare.

Nevermind, I'm an idiot. I just found the pixel size options.

Well, thanks again. I'm sure I'll post the background when I've finished it for some more feedback.

[denimtrousers]

Ugh, maybe I should ask for a bit of help with these backgrounds. That, or lower the resolution. This shit's hard.

[Anian]

Ugh, maybe I should ask for a bit of help with these backgrounds. That, or lower the resolution. This shit's hard.

What backgrounds? Are you talking in general?

This is not an AGS game, but it is pretty cool and as far as I can tell of your style, you could probably adapt similar background style - it's very clean and not too precise on perspective etc. but still interesting in that retro look
http://www.dreamagination.org/wordpress/en/dirtysplit/downloads/
Taht, or as mentioned that it looks sort of like Gorillaz, you can use for example Sketchup to make 3d elements quickly and the touch it up in Photoshop or something.

Or you can "recruit a team" http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=36479.0 somebody else to help out with the backgrounds.

[denimtrousers]

Yeah, I mean in general. Here's what I've got so far:



I've downloaded Dirty Split to see how they do their backgrounds. I'll also check out Sketchup, though I'm not sure I'll use it.

But yeah, I'll most likely try to get a team going. It'll get things done faster, and hopefully better.

[TerranRich]

Hehe, it looks like the guy is saying "I like booobs" over and over.