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Good point on the door Sephiroth, my eye didn't notice that.

Some more tweaks left to do, but I'm happy the way it turned out. Thanks for everyone's help, I learnt quite a bit.

Thanks Sephiroth, I fixed that in the above version.

A new version with more interesting lighting (thanks MAD). Also, better brick texture, a bigger main door, and higher door handles (thanks ProgzMax).

Thanks Khris! Great technique. Here's the steps I took:





I'll try the archway next, and thanks for the detailed explanation.

Btw, you don't need to upscale pictures yourself, just use e.g. [img width=640].

Has anyone noticed that using the img width tag makes the picture blurry in certain browsers?

Other than the already mentioned problems with perspective, you should maybe also look into the lighting.

I'll certainly give that a go, thanks!

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Thanks for all the advice. I'll keep practicing. How's this for an improvement?

If you want the curve to be perfect on either side, that's a little bit more work and easier to explain in a tutorial.  I'll make one if you really think you'll use it.

Thanks for the offer! Maybe I've improved the arc slightly in the above? I did throw down some lines while I was working at it.

Well, here's a background from a few years back I've given a paint over. I've only recently started to really pay attention to perspective and vanishing lines. While the floor isn't so bad, the walls on the side are.

So I guess my question is: How bad is it really? I realize I'll eventually have to fix these issues as I've done quite a bit screens without any regard to proper perspective.

Criticism on anything would be appreciated as I should really learn my lesson about now.

Old version:


New version:

Hmmm! Some animations have a lot of QFG in them like the warhammer swing. Maybe a bit of Kyrandia too for the nature stuff.

Thought I'd make a quick update. The first post has some new stuff!

I just got around to playing The Winter Rose. It was great, and so should this game. Best of luck!

Just finished playing recently. Wow, what an experience!

Some thoughts:

-Background art: John Paul Selwood is my favorite background artist, and you can tell he's at his best. Just amazing. I also enjoyed his behind the scene stuff.

-Animations: I especially enjoyed the environmental effects (Fire, water, etc...) Well done with those.

-Voiceovers: Really great. The barmaid was quite memorable. The brigand ordering ale sounds exactly like this guy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsmGXvpKmFk

-You REALLY have to earn your freedom. Whenever I thought I had the means to escape, there was something missing. Made victory all that more enjoyable.

-Extras: All the little extras, and it felt like a considerable amount, really added to the game.

-Scripting: I didn't seem to encounter a single bug. Remarkable!

-Music: Excellent; especially the falling to your doom tune.

Great work!

Looks nice!

An extra frame after frames 3 and 6 would probably do the trick. After a leg stretches out, it seems to come back too quickly. Same with the arms at those exact frames.

Though even one more frame would reduce the choppiness.

Seven years ago, I made a tutorial on some beginner techniques for drawing 90s type backgrounds. Since people occasionally come across it still, I thought I'd update it as the previous techniques were somewhat out-dated.

I'm not the best artist out there, so there may be some lighting/perspective issues... not sure, but the tutorial is mainly for beginners who want to try some painting techniques.

Enjoy!

http://www.corbydesigns.com/meadow/

Here's my quick way:


You can grab a selection or just grab an entire layer. Copy it, and drop it into a new file.

Go to Image - Mode - Indexed Color. Then just choose your settings.
Then drop it back into the original image.

I think Sierra used quite a bit of dithering back in the day, but it depends on your style! I'd recommend a low or no dither as well.

BTW, your Graham is looking quite nice!

Maybe needs a little more detail and some more "stuff"? Quick example. Black hair is kinda cool.

Thanks Loominus, I'll try adjusting those eyes a bit.

First off, I think you're off to a great start with your backgrounds. They are imaginative, and quite vivid!

Well, thought I'd try a quick paint-over. This is mainly to show how a lower resolution (I prefer 320x200 now-a-days) might look. I've found things become a lot easier at a lower resolution. One problem, of course, is that you can lose quite a bit of grass detail.

I think one problem with the style you were using (from my really old tutorial ), is that when using the maple brush, the foliage tends to come out too sharp in contrast to the rest of the background. In the paintover here, I used a softer brush that matches a bit better with the background. Also, trimming the dark edges of the foliage makes things look a bit more natural.

Other than that, I used less brighter blues/purples on the darker sides of the trees and added a bit of dithering here and there.

Again, just a quick paint-over! I didn't trying fixing any perspective issues, which I'm not good at myself.

EDIT: I also lowered the contrast on the front bushes so they appear alot more dark.

Thanks for all the help!

I'll save the higher brows for animated expressions.

Cheers!

Thanks!

Fixed some anti-aliasing here.

Also, I wonder if just more of a smile would help with her look less angry. I tried the raising of the eyebrows as well for comparison below. I could also use the raising eyebrows for her speech animation later.


Slight color loss from the animated gif.

As Matti says, work on the aliasing a bit and you should have a great portrait.  It reminds me of some of the TSR roleplaying portraits from the 90's, so you're definitely on to something!

Thanks! I was actually studying Eye of the Beholder and Lands of Lore for this.

Thanks! Well, I'll stick to this style then.

I agree, there is some smugness/anger in her face. She's actually the protangonist, so she should shouldn't look liike a villian. She's supposed to be serious though, so I'll give her a 15% reduction in anger with the help of Anian's advice.