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Just to elaborate on the image format issue, you shouldn't use JPG for images that have less than 256 colors. They get messy because of the JPG artifacts.

For pixely images (less than 256 colors), you should use GIF. It maintains the exact pixels without any artifacts. They retain the look they were originally given.

Personally, I would use a bit less saturated colors to convey the horror game atmosphere. I mean, the second character has the most vibrant red and blue, for example, which are kind of opposite of scary.

The overall look for the characters is really good though. The shapes are really nice.

Your first animation?!  :o

I just had to butt in to say that it's amazing - especially for a first try! Did you use any reference? It's something I still would have problems making. I'm no animator, you know. The simple yet distinct fingers are absolutely fantastic.

Yeah, I agree with Farlander on the fact that the head's motion is perhaps a bit extreme. On the one frame where it kind of nods, perhaps you could move it one pixel on the left making it a bit more subtle. Though I like the effect a lot, so I wouldn't like seeing the nodding go away.

One thing that I'm not sure whether it's just a special feature for this character or the way you would do it for all characters, but her arms' motion looks kind of like she's swimming in the air. Again, I'm not sure what you were going for - it works great on this character - but if it's just your way of doing the arm animation, I would suggest taking a look at it for the other characters.

Again, amazing!!! :o

I have the exact same problem. Right now I've got that problem only with an acrylic painting. I bought a canvas about three weeks ago and I want to paint, but for some reason I haven't started it yet. Even though I've had the time.

I think Timosity got it right, at least for my case - I just don't feel like it. I want to paint, but I want to do it when I'm in the right mood and the result is optimal. I wouldn't want to ruin it by forcing it.

I suppose it's the same thing with Grim Fandango, my brother and my best friend keep telling me it's one the best games ever, yet I haven't starter playing it - even though I'd like to play some adventure game! I suppose I don't want to spoil that either without the correct atmosphere. Well, that and the fact that I've seen half of the game here and there by watching my brother play it.

Fatman adventures on eBay!!! Rock on, Ionias.

Sorry to bump this thread up once more but I thought Chis needs to learn from the best:



Not that anyone wants this to go on anymore.

--Pessi from FINLAND

I totally agree with Duzz. Even the fact that the image looks cool!

I think you could achieve an even better look for the image without making any dramatic changes to the way you work, by rendering them with a Global Illumination renderer. I think it would have a real nice effect on it. It would look almost photorealistic, but still you could create a distinct world for the game that might not be equally well possible with photographs.

Which program are you using? I know 3D Studio Max has the renderer in the versions 5 and 6. I really recommend checking the Global Illumination out. It's available for other softwares as plug-ins as well, if it's not already there.

Wouldn't it be easier to use separate objects for the wall instead of a texture map? I think it would be faster and you'd get more accurate edges for the blocks. From the little I've worked with 3D, I learned that texture maps can become a serious drag!

Looking really good, Migs! Is it really all by hand?

I think it's perfect for practical purposes, like for a game. But perhaps I would try and make it a bit less 3D'ish just for giggles. I don't really know what gives me the impression that it's 3D. Perhaps it's because it's very neat and the textures are a bit too clean and symmetrical. Sorry, I'm talking about it like it's a 3D image.

Anyway, to make it look more alive and kicking, you could perhaps make some hue and saturation (the same kind of effect as with human's skin) variation and slime dripping from the teeth or something.

Anyway, it's really stunning. Keep up the good work!

Nice to meet you, Reaxan.

Really good points, Keiko! I'm definitely with you on the fact that fancy tools don't mean fancy image. I personally think all you basically need is brushes, like with real painting. They can be any kind, depending on preference. MSPaint
vs. Photoshop.

I think the key to the style your after is correct tools. Basically the images aren't very complex in any way. With very few strokes you can make good looking image. At first it seems harder than it actually is, which hopefully is  encouraging. Anyway, I just tried out the method I've always used when trying to mimic a style - painting over. Here it is step by step.First, naturally, observe the style. Find images of the game and perhaps save them on your harddrive. Look at them fullscreen with an image-viewing application. I actually have tens of screenshots on my HD of Monkey Island 1, 2 and 3, DOTT, Sam And Max and probably of some others as well. It's really educative.

Try to figure out how the images are made. For example the specific Sierra's style you're after probably is originally achieved by scanning oil-paintings and reducing the color amount to 256. Basically, if you want to work on the computer, just use similar kind of brushes. I think regular round, sharp and soft brushes will do the trick. However, if you'd like to add the grainy hue variation, you could use custom brushes in Painter or Photoshop, if you want. But that's not really essential, it merely makes the image a bit more full and alive.

Anyway, to start off the mimicing, get an image you like and open it in your favourite painting program. As we're merely trying to mimic the style, no trying to educate ourselves in composition or anything else, just take a portion of the image and paint over it, trying to copy it. I selected this image I found from Mobygames.com, I took it because there's the kind of an empty wall that will demonstrate the simpliness of the process well.



I'm going to focus on the wall on the left. Select the wall with a selection tool (make sure it has anti-aliased edges) and fill it with the shadow color. You can pick the color with an eye-dropper tool. The reason why you pick the shadow color is that, in my opinion it's good to work from dark shades to lighter ones gradually. Even better, from mid values (brightness) to extreme values. Kind of adding contrast all the time until you're satisfied with it. Also, as you get more comfortable with it, you'll notice that as a color gets lighter, the color subtly changes. When you work your way up gradually, you'll be able to change the color respectively. However, that's not important right now. It's just good to try and learn the easiest techniques from the beginning.



After you've got the base color down, you can block in the main colors. Basically first the one for the lit area and then a dark one to make the upper part of the shadow a bit darker. The latter one might seem unreasoned and confusing at this point, but it's just something light does. You can leave it out, don't be put off by it. As for the color-picking, often it is recommended to pick the colors by yourself from your painting program's palette (because when you work on an image from the top of your head, you won't have direct reference), but I know from my own experience that finding the right colors in the beginning is VERY challenging. That's why you can take a shortcut and use the eye-dropper tool to pick the color and see where the color is found in the palette and try to see a relation between the colors in shadow, and the ones in light.

As for the actual drawing part, try to find a brush that lets you get off as easily as possible, still getting the desired effect. For the border of the shadow and the lit part, you want a smooth edge. It would take lots of blending if you were to use a sharp-edged brush, but you won't have to deal with that because you'll be using a soft brush. You will optimally only need one stroke for the edge. Then just fill the rest of the lit area. Also, for the dark shade in the shadow, you would just use a bigger brush and a single stroke. It's easy to get too complicated with this.



Next, we'll add the subtle lighter part of the lit area. This is because the closer the surface is to the light, the brighter it is. In this image, in my opinion, the way the light goes is not quite natural (not that I knew that well anyway) but it looks really good so it doesn't matter. You can either use once again the eye-dropper for the color (you have the same wall on the right which you can use for color-picking) and see how the Sierra's artist chose it according to original bright blue color. Or, you can just pick the blue color and make it a bit lighter with the palette options in your painting program. In Photoshop, you just double-click the foreground color that shows on the toolbar and the palette window pops up.

In the next image, there's an example of how you could move the brush around to minimize the amount of strokes. I tried to demonstrate it with the red lines. The topmost line is with the light blue, and the bottom one is using the
original blue color to cover any misstrokes. This way you don't have to be perfect first, you can just 'erase' the excessive color with the original one. If you're wondering, less strokes doesn't really mean a better result, but it
means faster workflow, which is always good for images that have lots of detail.



Next, I added the reflection-kind bright blue edge. I just removed the selection that was earlier keeping me from accidentally painting on the background. Then I picked the bright blue color and used the generic line tool
to make the lines. Simple and very accurate.

I also added the ceiling there. I just picked the dark shadow color and painted the ceiling with it. Well, actually I used the path tools to get as smooth edge as possible, but at this point, you can equally well use a sharp-edged brush for
it.



Now, we're going to work on the detail a bit - the light. Here you get to see in action what I meant by the gradual coloring. This is due to the lens effect (I think) that you seen in pictures. The center of the highlight is white, and near the edges of the highlight you see the actual color of the light, a bit exaggeratedly. You will start with coloring the actual color of the light with bright blue (see the actual colors I used in the boxes on the image). Just block in the hape of the light. Next with a bit brighter color (it's actually also a bit more cyan - details, details), paint on the shape of the light, but so that the very edges are of the previous color. See the middle of the image for this phase. Finally, you'll add the white, or nearly white, center for the light.

You'll see that in the end, the middle phase doesn't change much. However, with gradients of larger size, the effect is very noticeable. It takes time, however, to learn what kind of colors you should use for the gradations. I'm still trying to learn. Color theory is your friend on this one. As well as photo reference.

[img width=250
height=100]http://runestone.adventuredevelopers.com/staff/Pessi/TrashCan/SierraColoringHelp/06.gif[/img]

And here it is on its rightful place. I also added the edge that is between the wall and the ceiling. Again, I used the line tool but this time it was two pixels wide. I also used a Photoshop trick on coloring the red and the blue parts. This is something that is irrelevant at this point, but I drew the line on a separate layer and used the 'lock pixels' feature. It locks the pixels' transparency so that you can color it any way you want - you won't be able to cross the edges of the shape (line). But that's just something I've learned to use to speed up the process. You can use a regular small brush to paint with the red color manually on the line.



Here are the rest of the images I have. It so happened that when I was finished with my post, the board said my post was too long and that I should go back and edit it. When I hit the back button and refresh, this is the last version I get. Luckily, I saved this version on the notepad (screwed up the formatting, by the way). So, instead of typing the rest, I'll just post the images and edit later to add the comments. I hope this is of some use as it is right now. Good luck!

I think it could very well be that you should just take a break for a while. Often doing too much creative stuff really drains out the creativity. You just need to do something else for a while. Something that doesn't take much creativity but still is exciting.

I've noticed that working for me. Creativity is one of those things that just can not be forced.

Talking about professional! :o

That rocks, Loominous! But I agree, the colors itself are hardly inspiring, nonetheless the style and the textures definitely are! And they wouldn't be the same without those unsaturated colors.

Again:  :o

That is really sweet, Eric!

About the colors. I think you definitely have attained a certain atmosphere and as always with any art that isn't trying to be realistic, it works as it is! I don't think there's much to change in that respect, in my opinion.

However, if I was to make it more appealing to myself (which is kind of stupid), I would perhaps tone down the difference between the yellow and blue on the skin just a bit. So that the shadow wouldn't be quite as blue, but perhaps closer to red or purple, so that the ambient light wouldn't be as distinct.

Also, as Taryuu (great observations!) pointed out, the background is very vivid, perhaps in a bit distractive way. It's not an error of course. To me, if I was to go deeper into the image, it would symbolize the fast world distracting from seeing the relevant. Anyway, if it was to be drawn more unambiguously, I would tone it down as well. The highest values in this image are on the background, the eyes and the skirt. Perhaps the attention could be drawn towards the eyes more? Or the skirt perhaps... Or not.

All in all, I really like how you used so many colors for stuff that is supposed to be drawn only in one color. It really adds to the image a lot. Here's my more generic approach on the image, http://pelu.jns.fi/~teropa/Misc/Colossal_LineDrawing.jpg . Don't worry, it won't make you cry.

Rock on, Jayel!!!!!!11111 That is sweet! I'm sooo jealous (yet inspired)! Have you thought about drawing anything similar with oils or acrylics? The result would be kick-ass.

Thanks for the link, Rodekill!

Impressive!!!

I first thought like, "What?!? Igor playing with Poser? Can I trust anyone anymore?" But when I saw the image I realized why you were playing with the program. The image rocks! It definitely isn't the generic Poser character I was expecting to see. Even the renderer seems to have changed substantially. Or did you make that great lighting manually?

I probably wouldn't use Poser for game characters just because it's Poser, but playing around should be pretty fun. I actually tried the fourth version probably about two years ago and I really liked it. Didn't have to spend lots of time on the models. The only thing I didn't like about it was the fact that they all looked the same. Well, the nudity made up for it.

Just kidding.

Well, as you said you have already tried clothing and facial expressions, one thing that really makes a difference in a character is their posture and gait. You probably remember recognizing a friend by their gait when you haven't been able to see their face.

When you think of Hoagie's posture, it is obvious that he's an easy-going character and it seems that whereever he is, he's just hanging out. Whereas Indiana Jones is looking very alert and ready to go.

A good way to go around the posture issue, is to merely make a silhouette of the character. This way you don't have to worry about the facial expression or the clothes. If you're wondering whether it's a good method or not, make silhouette of Hoagie, Guybrush and Indiana, and you'll see you can very easily recognize them merely by their shape. You will also notice how Hoagie looks interesting because he's fat and short, whereas Guybrush (in CMI) is thin and tall - I mean, look at his ankles!

Welcome back, Interference!

For the webspace, I think "good" and "free" are really hard to find together. I don't really know any specific hosts... I think you could either try to find one with Google or check out where other AGSers are hosting their homepages and avatars. Mine are on an account I got from my previous school, so no help there, I suppose.

I just ran a quick search on free hosting and this is an example of probably the better hosting services you can have for free. http://www.doteasy.com/ . I hope someone with experience about this shows up but meanwhile, perhaps you could check the free services out.

Thanks for the comments, Subspark! I'm always up for getting better at this. Though I'd like to say that I'm actually just trying my best at telling how I like the image and how I personally might change it. I used to make it more clear about a year ago or so that I was not educated or anything and that I just observed the images and told what I found. Not only to criticize, but equally importantly to learn myself.

However, I'm intrigued, how did I contradict myself? I just can't find it. Perhaps it could be just the fact that I'm expressing myself wrong, English not being my mothertonque and all. Do you mean the way I first say the contrast is great but then say something is wrong with it? Or the way consistency seems to be the issue in all the aspects of the image?

Anyway, your criticism rocks! You REALLY seem to know your stuff and it's great that you share your knowledge. It is greatly appreciated. I hope to see it in the future as well!

I also recommend the same things. Basically, all you need to do is: practice and observe your surroundings and the styles you are going for.

Any style bases on reality and this is especially true for Curse Of Monkey Island and the way light works in it. It works in the very same way as in reality and it is really important to understand that. Those styles are just variations of reality and you need to learn the rules (photorealistic) before you can break them (make something in CMI style, for example). To learn those styles the only media isn't screenshots from those games but everything else that has something to do with art; perspective, composition, light and color theory. There are lots of resources listed in the Critic's Lounge sticky thread about tutorials. I also recommend going to http://www.sumaleth.com/links/ . It has lots of links to tutorials from professional artists. It's hard to go wrong with that.

In any case, good luck! You've selected really great styles to go after.

Man, that is rockin! Great atmosphere!

To start off with the good things, I think you've got the sky spot on. I think it basically creates the whole calm and warm atmosphere with the wonderfully harmonious colors and well-placed sun. The trees are also really well placed. My first thought about trees against that sky would be pretty negative but you have placed them somehow non-intrusively that they really work well. Probably some kind of a see-through-leaves thing.

Anyway, on to criticism. I think the most important things for me are the consistency of the style as well as the actual painterly look you were after. The consistency issue actually arises from the fact that for the rocks you use outlines and for the rest of the image you don't. I don't know if it actually is something that is distinct for your style but then that leads me to my second point: the painterly look. Paintings often do not use outlines and if they do, they are more stylistic paintings that are kind of suggestive instead of definitive. In either case, in this image, to me, it reads as inconsistent.

One thing that I want to mention is the contrast which is both good and... could-be-worked-on. In general, it's great, you've got really dark colors and really bright ones as well, in addition to low-saturated and saturated colors. However, at some places the contrast isn't quite there. I think the edges of the trees are one of those places. I'm not even sure why they seem to lack contrast to me but I think it might be because there's no dark spots among the lit parts. It might be also be that the center parts of the trees aren't quite as dark as they could be, or on the other hand, that the edges of the trees aren't as bright as they could be. Either way, they seem to lack contrast to me which kind of stands out in the same way as the inconsistency issue, as in a way, it is inconsistent.

Finally, I think the path on the foreground seems a bit off perspective, unless it's uphill. Although it doesn't seem like it because it kind of lacks the features of a hill. Nonetheless, this is irrelevant in achieving a more painting-like look.

The best advice I can give in achieving even more of a painted feel would be using big brushes, loose strokes and textures. And textures in sense of custom brushes. However, you didn't say at any point that you wanted to make a virtual painting so I'll just leave it here.

Anyway, the image is fantastic and I think it would rock in an adventure game as it currently is! Hopefully we'll see more of these!

Yeah, I know them. For obvious reasons.

To be honest, 'huumorihumppa' is not really my thing but I still think they are pretty good. Perhaps I'm just a bit too serious when it comes to music.

Thanks again, Dude and Custard!

I actually enjoyed the article despite the fact that it's targeted at beginners. I never thought of it as a retarded how-to-play adventuregames guide. I think it's a great introduction to both AGS and adventuregames (yes, for those who don't know of them). I don't think they can take anything for granted when they are introducing something. Perhaps they could make a follow-up article and present something more advanced but then again there's no better place for further guidance than AGSForums. Not that it would matter to them, but anyway.

The article presents AGS as it has always been presented, easy-to-use yet advanced. Job well-done, in my opinion.

I used trueSpace for quite a long time about a couple of years ago. I really got used to the interface and when I first tried 3DSMax I thought its interface was really clumsy after using trueSpace. So yeah, I think it's just about what you get used to.

However, I must say trueSpace really isn't something you should get used to if you're serious about 3D. But if you would just like to have one game project with 3D pre-rendered backgrounds, then I think it's perfect. It just kind of teaches an unorthodox way of working in 3D but still I have never regretted the fact that it was my first 3D experience.