I don't get tired of putting my Indiana Jones Artwork here ;). I revised my Indy walkcycle completely. Here's the old one again:
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/indywalk2.gif)(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/indywalk2.gif)
and here's V 2.0:
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/indyV2.gif)(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/indyV2.gif)
I redid almost everything. Added shading to the pants, for example...
I would welcome every kind of critique or comments!
Heya! (http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/actionpose.gif)
The walk-cycle is very good!
Very fluid!
The only problem I see is that the neck is VERY thick!
Darn that's beautiful. Maybe a little too shaky around the collar and the belt could probably be a bit less jumpy(so it goes along with the zipper), but god damn. Very nice!
Edit by Andail: censored profane language
He's limping a little bit, isn't he?
Quote from: Snarky on Sat 07/03/2009 18:10:43
He's limping a little bit, isn't he?
Well, if so it's not intended :P. Thanks for the comments!
I love how the pants look now. Very nice shading. Very good, very very good. His arms look less stiff now but they still do look a bit stiff to me. But I don't think it's a big issue.
OMFG! This is the best walckcycle i have ever seen! Congratulations! :D
Legs look nice. I'd change the shading on the arms and hands a bit so that when they are back they are more in a shadow. It's hard to tell how far forward and backward his arms are moving.
Quote from: Evil on Sat 07/03/2009 21:01:32
Legs look nice. I'd change the shading on the arms and hands a bit so that when they are back they are more in a shadow. It's hard to tell how far forward and backward his arms are moving.
True, true. Maybe I'll add that on version 3 xD. And thanks to everyone, especially to Jakerpot ;D.
;D I wish i could animate like that!
The new colors look good, but the larger a sprite gets the more obvious anatomical flaws become. Here's what I mean:
(http://i485.photobucket.com/albums/rr218/ProgZmax/indyv2cl.gif)
In your original, Indy is 5 1/2 heads tall and his hands barely brush past his waist.
Now here is a rough edit I made that extends his length by 1/2 a head and compares it to a scaled photo of some random guy:
(http://i485.photobucket.com/albums/rr218/ProgZmax/indyv2cl2.gif)
Notice that the guy is nearly 7 heads tall. I scaled him so his head would be roughly the size of the sprite you made to give you an idea of relative sizes. I adjusted Indy slightly by making his legs half a head longer, lowered the waist slightly, and extended the arm lengths. This makes his legs and arms look less stumpy without making him as large as the reference at the same scale.
Hey ProgZmax, thanks for the efford, I appreciate. I'll think about changing the size.
I think the size and colors look perfect so far, nice job :)
Only glitch I see is that the top part of his jacket on my left seems to cut itself a bit inwards. Otherwise, great work!
Phemar, your right! Thanks for the note, I'll fix it :). When animating I loose the sight of the whole thing and get stuck on little details. But I never realised that glitch before. :P
Theres something about the hands that make the general movement on your first attempt feel more fluid. I'd study your first version closley and attempt to implement the same sense of realism into version 2. He appears notacibly stiffer than the free flowing swaying Indy you showed us first. The new colors are great btw.
Edit: Personally I would resist changing the proportions of your sprite. What made the characters of the LucasArts and Sierra classics back in the 90s so interesting to look at was their arcade-like and stocky appearance. It gave them personality. A style of art that can never surrender to hyper-realism. If we measured everything for the sake of staying true to reality then every game would lose its artistic value. Induviduality is key in presenting a new product to your audience.
Cheers,
Sparky.
Thanks Sparky!
I didn't expect any more comments on this :). Anyway, in my 1st version, the left arm and the right one were animated different and have they're individual movement, which adds more life to it, I guess. In version 2, I just copied the same movement to both arms, to make it more symmetric...maybe that's why it looks more artificial.
And I also like the proportions of my sprite and didn't change it so far. First of all, it would be a lot of work. And second, I also like the way it looks now. Thank you for your comment, again :).
No, I really don't get tired to continue the work on this character-sprite. Here's the new approach:
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/indyzoom.png)
And a little evolution of the sprite over the ...years ;). Oh yeah, it's almost one year since I made the first version. And I almost got my character done. Makes me fell encouraged for the whole game.
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/indy1-1.png)
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/indy1zoom.png)
I tried to improve on the proportions and the posture this time. Oh, and the face of course. Stay tuned for another year of fixing this sprite ... or give some c&c... :P.
Greets, Kaio
The latest version looks amazing, long development processes always yield good results! Duke Nukem Forever scenarios notwithstanding.
I'd also go for the latest version... looks exactly like Indy!
... in the fourth film :P
I think it could be a personal choice though. The latest one does look amazing as it's more realistic in terms of both proportion and shading, etc., but it would be hard to show his expressions (if you need to) with that. The earlier versions had bigger face and more defined facial elements (but less realistic shading) which made (exaggerated) expressions more noticeable.
Thanks Mr Flibble, NsMn and Gilbet for the comments!
@Gilbet V7000a:
That's right, facial expressions might suffer under the new grade of realism. But I remember the great "Fate of Atlantis" where they had also a more realistic face for Indy. I also remember, that there were some great facial animations, too...so it's possible, I guess. :)
And if not, I still can switch between the various versions of the face I did over the years :P.
btw: ...NsMn, in the fourth film? Wtf did I do wrong? ::)
Yeah. But remember, in FOA the characters were drawn in even smaller resolution and they're not as detailed as your sprites. Also, while the heads did not look that much comical in FOA (note that even though your earlier versions looked a bit comical the faces were indeed much more detailed than the FOA ones, which set a good base for visible expressions) they indeed were intentionally drawn a bit bigger in proportion.
In fact, I don't think the characters in FOA were drawn to look very realistic either (under that low resolution and with facial structures defined by only a small number of pixels it's not easy to draw faces recognised as either realistic or comical). Furthermore, IMO the facial expressions/movements in the faces were actually very exaggerated (take Indy's talking head for example), as under that resolution it would be a very noticeable move already when say, the head was raised by 1 pixel.
However, it is up to you to choose, as the latest one does look very good. It may also depend on the tone of the game. If the game is supposed to be quite comical the earlier ones might be better but the latest one is perfectly fine otherwise (note that IMO all Indy games are supposed to be comical but it's just to what extend you want for how funny it could be).
Since there won't be a complete game featuring these sprites in the near future, I just see them as practise for me :P. It was my goal to make it look as realistic as possible this time and not to make it functional for a game in general. Anyway, I continued the work a bit on the shirt-version... basically it's been completely redrawn:
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/vergleich-1.png)
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/kaio89/vergleichzoom.png)
The progression through the stages is very good, especially realistically. The only thing I see is his collar on the left of the neck (his right). The colour of his neck and the colour of the collar seem too similar, which could easily be fixed by putting a darker pixel to separate it?
Also, I agree that the walkcycle in the first post is the best one I've ever seen. Excellent artwork. :)
Also, his neck is still too heavy. I'd take away one row of pixels on each side.
I like the progression to the third version because it shows a marked improvement in color usage and shading as well as posture. The only issues I see is that his legs are still rather short for the size of his head, his neck seems a bit large still, and his nose is shaded darker and looks like he's drunk. The shift of skin tone towards red and the shading on the hat are great improvements!
Edit: I thought I'd make a quick edit to show you how Indy would look with the standard 7 head proportions. His legs look far less stumpy but then you're dealing with a larger character. It might be worth it to extend his lower legs 4-5 pixels regardless, though, just to make the upper and lower leg lengths match (not including the feet). I also widened his shoulders slightly and reduced the bulk of his neck somewhat.
(http://i485.photobucket.com/albums/rr218/ProgZmax/jonesescl.gif)
(http://i485.photobucket.com/albums/rr218/ProgZmax/jonesescl.gif)
Wow Progz, nice edits, thanks :). Especially the nose-job :P. But doesn't he look a bit too stretched? He looks like a basketball player now, lol.
I made him a bit larger than 7 heads because the original version wasn't exactly 6 (it was 6 and a little bit off the top of the head as you can see) so his legs are slightly longer than they should be, though not enough to really cause a problem. Reducing two pixels above and below the knee in my edit would probably bring it back to the 7 heads rule, but again, this was just an example to show you how the proportions work out based on the size of the character's head :).
In fact, your edit is great, ProgZ.
The reason for thinking that he's an oversized basketball star is only caused by the relation to the original version which was very unproportioned.. (but much better than the older versions I may add).
Kaioshin, i think you may want to have his upper body acting as a counterweight to his lower body, ie left shoulder down, a pixel or 2, right shoulder up a pixel or 2. Lengthen those arms, they look about 3 or 4 pixels too short!. The thumb connector thingy (KNUCKLE!) should be in line with the crotch. Give him a sliiiight curve if you think you can. It'll look far more natural. He looks unbalanced and too symmetrical at the moment. Lower body is great, but the upper body needs work. (I would draw an example but it's 3am and I'm tired) :p
Thanks for the hint, Layabout. I was also wondering how I could give him a more natural appeal. I'll try out what you just said :).
Hey there Kaioshin ;D Great work, this Indy will kick Pandoras a**. ;)
Quote from: kaioshin on Thu 03/09/2009 18:19:18
He looks like a basketball player now, lol.
I think he looks like Chris Jones the Adventurer!
I think the last one is the best...your walk cycle animation is really really good...
Congrats! :)
Can I be honest?
...I don't like the proportional version.
For what it's worth I think Indy deserves a stylised look. Theres no use in pulling out rulers and graphs when all you need is a good artistic eye. In my experience, for both games and film, going with whatever looks right doesn't necessarily mean going for what's physically accurate.
Here's my interpretation of what feels right as an artist:
(http://www.shuugouteki.net/paul/Images/Indy_Fresh.gif)
Cheers,
Sparky.
I love these Indy Sprites! :-*