Hey all you wonderful folks!
It has been over two years since my last post, but the recent Monkey Island news got me interested again.
Anyway for a small game I am working on I drew the following Nazi. It have been a long time so I am way out of practice. So I post this in hopes that someone here will be able to give me some suggestions on how to improve the little guy.
Thanks in advance for any ideas.
It's cool to see so many old names still here! :=
Edit: New Version
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/naziguar.png)
3x
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/naziguar.png)
Hello Cpage... I sorta like it, but I have a "basic concern"... he seems adorable. Are you sure that the personality of the character matches with its image? Art is not just about painting, but about thinking a bit before painting...
And another issue... Why using 105 colours when you could do the same, with same appeal, with 15?
Since he refered to him as "the little guy," I imagine he has thought it through, and he's some kind of Seargent Schultz type bumbling, comical Nazi.
I like him a lot, too, and I agree that that color count could be dropped considerably.
Good job so far, though!
I don't understand if he's meant, like... to be resting his back on a wall: otherwise I couldn't understand the position of his feet.
Apart from that, I think it's light years from what I'll ever be able to draw. Excellent job.
Wow thanks for the swift replies!
Nacho- Thanks! Yes I have thought it through, He is supposed to look like very little like an actual Nazi guard. But I don't want to give too much away just in case this game actually gets finished.
Captain Lex- Thank you. Yeah the color count was what you get when you don't really think about budgeting. Hey it was 6 AM and I hadn't slept. :) I have reduced to 15.
Abisso- It is true at first he was supposed to be leaning against a wall, but then I realized my flaw in putting the light source behind him. I have moved his right foot further to his right. Does that help any?
New images in first post.
Now that's what I call a lovable Nazi. Boffo color reduction, there's hardly any difference!
It actually helps a lot... it could be better even if you'd straighten the part under his belt: did a quick paintover, just moved his left feet to the left, adjusted his belt and the uniform below the belt. You probably can do a lot better than this... sorry but I suck at drawing. I'm just trying to help.
(http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/5071/naziguardmod.png) (http://img441.imageshack.us/i/naziguardmod.png/)
HI there cpage!
I did here a quick edit with the following modifications:
1. Moved the feet (both of them) further back.
2. changed the shading of the left foot (for the character) to match the light source ...i hope so :P
3. changed the hand a little bit.
4. Moved the nose 1 pixel to the right
Any way, Great looking sprite there!!!
(http://img93.imageshack.us/img93/6523/naziguard15edit.png)
(http://img93.imageshack.us/img93/6523/naziguard15edit.png)
Captain Lexington- I'm glad you like it. :)
Abisso- Excellent paintover! I see what you mean about the coat and belt. I used that in the update.
Gazzo- Thanks a lot for the paintover! I have used it to correct his posture a bit and excellent work figuring out what I was going for with the hand.
Thanks Guys. A new version is up in the first post
The magnified images are blurry for me, it never happened before... any kind of script line has been changed in the forums, so I have this problems in CL? ProgZmax? CJ?
It works without problem double (errr... triple) pixelled for me under Opera. Are you using FireFox?
Yeah that is a major downfall of firefox.
I'm using Firefox 3.0.10 and everything seems fine...
By the way, cpage, your Nazi guard is ready to strike now (or, more likely, cry for his mommy). Hope to see him in a game.
Ah! Okay guys... IT'S NOT firefox, but now I remeber I am suing the new Explorer from a few days ago... Sorry to highjack this thread with this (And for being hypocrital and put it back to the top of the page with the reply...) Eeeeer... Thanks.
That's not a bad idea, suing Microsoft. ;)
Hey Folks,
I just did a background to go with this game and I wanted to know if you guys had any ideas.
Also I have two versions I can't decide between.
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/shed3.png)
2x(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/shed3.png)
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/shedwline.png)
2x(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/shedwline.png)
Thanks for any feedback you have.
Also if you are interested in the process of making this here is an animation of the steps I made for my own reference.
(http://www.topherboywonder.com/photos/shedanim.gif)
Well the second one does have a little more painting like feeling, but it also seems that you just overlayd the sketch on it (on a toolbox the outlines don't match). :)
Personally I would go with less noisy color reduction.
Hello cpage,
i definitly prefere the first one. The second looks great as a painting but in a game the first beats the pants of it. The outlines dont fit in to the rest at some points (toolbox, cable across the room, right end of the flag) also the jointings (ouf is it the right word?) on the floor dont appeal to me in the second picture.
In addition the first one doesnt look that handdrawn, so your (awesome!) character fits more in it.
besides that, both, your character- and background-style are really close to what i wish i could design.
which program do you use?
the flag doesnt seem to be affected by lights and shadows in both versions.
I think the second one is the best, and I like it very much (I love that sketchy feeling, produced by the more evident outlines). But I also agree that your character fits better in the first one. So I suppose you should go with the first one.
And, since you drawn so much things in the background, I hope you considered which of those will be animated. It's usually better to insert modifiable things as objects for animation purposes, but you probably know that already.
Anyway, I once more have to congratulate for your art.
Definitely the first one. Also, as it's been said already - less noise!
But it's a really nice BG by the way...
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/shedWFIXES.png)
(http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/shedWFIXES.png)
Thanks for the comments!
Mr Matti- Thank you! And I have adjusted the Dithering style, I hope it helps.
Abisso- Yes I am aware of the difficulty in animating based on the background, but I find the little extra work produces better results. :/ I will be using objects in the end but I do this way to make sure it fits perfectly. And thank you for the nice comments :)
Bensch- Thank you for the comment. I have added shadows to the flag. I'm hoping it looks better? And I use a combination of Paint shop pro for the pixel work, Painter for the painted effects, and Photoshop for the color reduction. It seems kind of pointless since photoshop does all of these things... but it is the way I seem to have always done these things.
Zabnat- Haha that is exactly what I did. See I was close to using it because I like the feel of having sketch lines that didn't exactly fit. But as has been said the character fits the first better.
Again I hope the color reduction looks better this time around.
I love it. Reminds me of the Beavis and Butthead adventure game. Good work :D
Is the nazi the main character of your game?
I don't want to be a killjoy and maybe thats the wrong section for the discussion, but I can't relate anything positive to a nazi and I wouldn't want to play him as a good guy.
Quote from: Helme on Tue 28/07/2009 12:19:42I don't want to be a killjoy and maybe thats the wrong section for the discussion, but I can't relate anything positive to a Nazi and I wouldn't want to play him as a good guy.
I also thought Tom Cruse was the most realistic thing in that movie Valkyre...I mean: an assassination attempt on Hitler by a Nazi soldier? - How dumb does Hollywood think we are? - As if something that unrealistic would ever happen...All Nazis were pure evil...actually all German people are.
<sarcasm off>
Ps. Sorry...couldn't resist.
Pps. Yes, I did read in your profile that you are German ;)
Phemar- Thanks for the kind comments. :)
Helme and Misj- "but I can't relate anything positive to a nazi" But what about the amazing dental care? Anyway it is true originally this was the player character, that was changed later on. And while I agree your argument is a generalization the concern is not baseless. Knowing full well that i have replaced the player character I still am going to say that when put in context you will not hate this particular "Nazi".