Hey folks I was wondering if the background itself and the character art feel like they go together or if they outlandishly clash?
(http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o227/Dayne007/NewImage.png)
Thanks for any input!
Is this scanned in art, watercolors? You might want to make the lines on the background a bit stronger. Try adding outlines on a layer above the background picture.
p.s. I know you probably know it but it also helps "they go together" feeling - the painting on the left is way too high on the wall (it should be at eye height...because that's the easiest way to look at a painting) and the desk, the door and the painting are too big for the character - just look at your desk, and door knob and try to match the height/ratios. If you make the character bigger, then make the bed higher as well.
Thanks Anian. This was indeed scanned and then edited via photoshop. The paints that were used were Acrylic paints.
Maybe you should consider making it a 32 bits game? It's a pity that you paint nice backgrounds and then the gradients get "posterized" by the low colors definition.
Ouxx is right, please show us the scan without color reduction and with a slightly higher resolution (800x600 or 1024x768)
Someone I know did the painting of the background but I did the character art seen in the picture. Messing with art as a whole let alone on photo shop is kinda new thing for me.
This is probably a nublet kind of a question but is the purpose of having 32 bit images basically mean upscale my game resolution as a whole and in the end make the game art look better?
EDIT: Alright i have a few links to the pictures:
This one is the original painting but only scanned into the computer
http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o227/Dayne007/scan0012.jpg
This one is just resizing it into a 320x200ish, format;no photoshop or smudge tool effects
http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o227/Dayne007/Conceptgameart.jpg
This image link is the right after using the smudge tool and adding a few different things(portriat mans beard) before I put the image into indexed mode(which is probably the reason why it looks like that clunky gradient style)
http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o227/Dayne007/Conceptgameart-2.jpg
I hope this is what you were looking for!
There are two different things: resolution and color depth. Resolution is the size of your picture (e.g. 800x600 pixel), color depth (8bit, 16bit, 32bit) is how many different colors are used to display the picture.
Quote from: cat on Thu 17/02/2011 10:38:25
There are two different things: resolution and color depth. Resolution is the size of your picture (e.g. 800x600 pixel), color depth (8bit, 16bit, 32bit) is how many different colors are used to display the picture.
Yes, so in mypost I meant to tell you that it seems like you chose 8-bit colors (that is: 256 colors) insteads of 32-bit colors (millions of colors) when you created your AGS game.
As a consequence, when you imported the background, millions of colors (and fine gradients) have been reduced to 256 colors (that is, clunky gradients).
So, if you have the original picture (outside of AGS), even if it's in resolution 320x200, then still post it so that we can see how good the original colors look, and give an opinion on your choice of using only 256 colors.
Alright I edited the previous post with links.
Well, it's all amatter of artistic choice.
- I like the original scan, because one can see the texture of the paper. That would be a good differentiator for your game. It wouldn't look like any other game
- the smudged version also looks good, scaled or not, provided you follow the tips you were given (enhance some contrasts here and there, especially the outlines, to match your sprite style)
- I still think indexing the colors is not a very good idea. the gradients get screwed up. It doesn't leave much of the original art.
One thing you have to consider are the objects: Making an open door, objects that are used in the game... If you can make them in a way that they fit the style of the painted, unmodified background you should try that.