Pixel Art Critique

Started by TGames, Sat 26/05/2018 03:39:24

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TGames

So I was practicing with pixel art and made this

[imgzoom]http://tgamespics.webs.com/Pixel%20Art%20Practice.png[/imgzoom]

This isn't for any game I'm making, I was just trying to practice with this style.

What do you guys think? Any comments will be appreciated.

VampireWombat

It's pretty good. I have no clue what's in the bottom center, though. Rocks? Spikes? Obelisks?
I'd recommend doing something to make the trees look a little less like bushes. Maybe add a few tree trunks or something. I'd also recommend rounding the tops of some of the mountains a little.

Creamy

#2
That's a good start. Some elements could be improved:

-   perspective. The bushes should be big and detailed at the bottom left, decreasing progressively in size and contrast near the vanishing point at the top right. You did that to some extent with the mountains.

-   layout. The bushes and mountains seem lined up. You can scatter the elements around to make the scenery look more natural.

-   colors. Right now, we can clearly identify color blobs â€" grey, light green, dark green, brown, dark blue, light blue. You could try mixing colors to unify you composition.

Good luck!
 

TGames

Thanks for the advice! I added those things at the bottom because it looked pretty bare. They're supposed to be large magic crystals that are decaying the ground around it.

TGames


Snarky

Mmm. The ocean is nicer now, and the smoothing of the mountains, sure, but what is that brown line along the edge of the forest? Is that meant to be tree trunks? It doesn't read at all, and the color doesn't seem right. It's also problematic because it doesn't follow perspective: it's about the same width (or height, rather) up close as in the distance, and shows up even when it out to be hidden behind closer boughs.

I think where this could really use some improvement is in the shapes of the different parts of the landscape.

Now it looks like you have a flat plain of grass, then suddenly mountains rise up with no transition whatsoever, like a model placed on a table. And only a single row of mountains, placed almost perfectly in line, running all the way to the coast, and then suddenly stopping (rather than continuing out into the sea to create islands). It's not a convincing landscape.

All the mountains are basically the same shape: a simple cone tilted somewhat to the left (with the colors, they look almost like a line of pyramids). Break up the shapes and silhouettes a bit (the little crag you have between the two closest peaks is a nice start), and above all, add depth to the range by showing that there are parts behind that we only glimpse parts of.

And the forest grows only on the mountainside? Or is that intended to be a forested hill in front of the mountain? In the first case, it looks weird how it ends halfway up the mountainside in almost a straight line. The tree limit isn't usually as sharp as that, and varies depending on sun and wind. Plus the tree line doesn't seem to follow the contours of the mountains properly. In the second case, the problem is that it follow the contours approximately, and there's no edge or "backside" between the forest and the mountains to distinguish them as separate shapes.

In either case, the shading of the forest definitely makes it look like it rises steeply from the plain, and to make it more convincing I would try to create a more gradual transition from flat to hillside/mountainside.

Finally, a very minor thing, but worth catching early: the sky usually goes from darker higher up to lighter by the horizon, while you have it flipped here (though it's almost imperceptible because your gradient is so faint).

I think you have a nice cartoony use of colors, which works fine both in sharp contrasts (as in the first picture) and blends well (as in your second). I wouldn't spend too much time blending the shading until you've worked on the shapes of the landscape, though.

ManicMatt

I don't have anything to add, but I'm curious. Were you going for an rpg world area style like in ps1 final fantasy games? That's what I'm reminded of here. :)

Snarky

It made me think of Kyrandia, specifically these map/landscape intros:

Spoiler


[close]

The main point I think these illustrate is how the landscape rises up gradually towards the mountains, they're not just plonked down on a flat plain. (In other ways, the Kyrandia landscape is clearly not realistic, using gigantically oversized trees almost as icons to convey forests in a cartoony fashion.)

TGames

It's funny because I actually was thinking of that screen when making this. Thanks for all the tips snarky :)

ManicMatt

It's better to look up the images as a reference to see how they did it, rather than think it up in your head. Well, that's what I have found. For instance, I needed to draw a ray gun, I had a good idea of what one looked like. Drew it and.. it looked terrible. So I looked up ray guns and came up with something much better, without actually ripping it off completely. (Like you wouldn't want to draw over these Kyrindia images, just look at how the mountains form like Snarky said.)

Keep it up, you draw better than my first pixel attempts!

Snarky - Oh nice, I think that game I only played the once, and possibly not through the whole game.


thedaemon

I can suggest cleaning up some of the stray pixels. You may not be aware of the pixel cluster technique. Basically don't have any stray pixels. You can find some tutorials https://lospec.com/pixel-art-tutorials/tags/clusters.  I hope this helps. Good improvements btw!

ManicMatt

Better, but the way you drew that makes it look like it should be a grey colour like rocks, or brown dirt, not grass. Perhaps someone can explain this better.

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