new pixel-art technique

Monsieur OUXX · Tue 17/02/2015 16:28:09

Two threads around here have dealt with bottom-up pixel-art shading in the past. By "bottom-up", I mean a pipeline starting from a sprite, and generating a pseudo-3D shading after computing some normal mapping. I can't find the forum threads right now, but there're somewhere around, each of them dealing with a specific tool.

Now, there is this top-down approach: it starts from the 3D mesh in a real-time 3D game, and applies a pixel shader that makes it look like pixel-art.

http://initialsgames.com/main/?p=1360

That's interesting.

Snarky · Tue 17/02/2015 16:33:53

Cool!

The tools you're talking about are SpriteLamp and Sprite DLight.

selmiak · Tue 17/02/2015 18:26:55

wohah. The final result at the end of the page looks pretty cool. Even the fingers look like you wouldn't have to tweak a lot.

Calin Leafshade · Thu 19/02/2015 00:19:27

I cloned Sprite DLight a few days ago because it's not free.

Beautiful right?

I managed to get pretty cool results.

ON:

OFF:

Dropped Monocle Games · Thu 19/02/2015 12:28:50

I'm interested to see how this could be used with AGS, dynamic lighting would be great but my brain couldn't think of a way to use it other then regions with different views!

that looks really good Calin, I envy your skills :/

Calin Leafshade · Thu 19/02/2015 12:53:19

You could maybe use normal mapping in a low res ags game with fairly small characters.

Otherwise, without shaders, it's just too computationally expensive.

Monsieur OUXX · Thu 19/02/2015 15:06:07

Quote from: Calin Leafshade on Thu 19/02/2015 00:19:27
I cloned Sprite DLight a few days ago because it's not free.

I demand to have this.

Cassiebsg · Thu 19/02/2015 15:37:50

AwesomeBump is free: you can find it at awesomebump.besaba.com

Haven't tried it for sprites, only textures for Blender... but should work?

Calin Leafshade · Thu 19/02/2015 15:46:22

The new thing that these generators introduce is that they use the distance from the background to roughly determine the height of the sprite.

selmiak · Thu 19/02/2015 16:56:14

Now I'm even more blown away by this thread!

Chicky · Thu 19/02/2015 18:48:49

My work colleague was telling me about this shader today, I didn't believe him and kinda dismissed it like 'Oh, this guy probably doesn't know what real pixel art is', I figured the end result would be anti-aliased like mad, here I am looking at a turnaround sprite with my jaw on the floor. That wouldn't take much fixing up to look really nice! Finally my basic 3D skills will come in handle for something

nads · Fri 20/02/2015 04:11:01

That 3D plugins automatically reminds me of an article I read ages ago in regards to King of Fighters XII (and XIII) how they kinda cheated on the "sprite art" side of things and alot of the animation work was done via 3D programs and used a similar technique to get that sprite feel.

I'm a lazy, lazy man. Looks like I found a winner.