The Resource WIP thread 2

[Sharm]

The ramp you need to use for brown is pretty awkward, you should probably adjust it before moving on since it's going to be such a highly used color. Maybe replace one of the orange ramps, you won't need that many. A little unification of the ramps would be really good, but it's a more advanced color choice technique. Be careful about where you use the black, it's a very bold color and draws a lot of attention. Right now your cliff walls are upstaging the house and trees. Pine tree roots don't spread out like that, they go deep before going wide, so you wouldn't see quite so much of the roots as you're showing. I think Pokemon meets Dragon Quest is a good way to describe the style, you're hitting your goal there. You could simplify the look of the grass further, make it more stylized and it will match the inspiration better and help differentiate from the ground more.

Getting this to work in one of the Makers without planning it out that way will make things difficult for you. I suggest learning the resource standards soon or plan on using the TileD plugin for mapping. So far you could fit everything on A5 and B sheets, but A5's space is pretty limited.

 

[shadefoundry]

@Sharm Thanks for the tips! I'll look into cleaning up my palette a bit, and see what can be done about making my rocks more brown. I'm not entirely comfortable with palette construction yet, but I'm sure I can figure out a good balance given a few hours of messing around. I think you're right about too much orange, although I'm not really seeing a case where I'd use that row of pink so that might be able to go instead.
I wasn't aware that pine trees worked that way, since there's not many in my area and I've never taken the chance to examine one.

I'm actually not too worried about formatting the set for VXAce just yet, as the scope of my project is pretty small and I honestly don't see myself using up more than one set of sheets, especially since the majority of the tiles I've got and many of which I have in mind (should) fit fine onto the auto tile pages. I've worked enough with formatting tiles for the program that everything will (hopefully) transfer smoothly.

Thanks again for the pointers, I'm going to work on these tomorrow and hopefully come up with something that's a bit nicer.

-Shady

 

[Sharm]

The autotile sheets? Wow, that would make mapping a pain. Possible though.

I can think of some good uses for pinks, especially once you start doing interiors or if you want to make more than tiles. It isn't a color that's easy to imply either, unlike orange. The current palette I'm using has exactly one orange and I haven't really felt like the palette could really use much more. Tans and yellows or even sometimes pinks work well for the highlights and there isn't really any need for a dark orange and a dark brown, they're almost the same thing. I'm always wishing it had more browns though (also more purple, though that's probably not relevant).

It might be useful for you to take a look at some existing color palettes that have been created with pixel art in mind, maybe read some of the forum posts discussing their creation if you can find it. Check out Dawnbringer 16, Dawnbringer 32, Arne's palettes (he's got loads), and Softmilk 32. There are more that are good but I can't remember them right now.

 

[Nutty171]

I'm trying to get into pixel art, so I made this lovely little map to show off my "skills."

 

[Sharm]

@Nutty171 That's a really good start. What sort of advice would you like? Do you have an example of style that is similar to what you want to go for? Be careful not to go too crazy with adding texture to everything, not everything is going to need it and it can be a nice break for the eyes sometimes to let things be plain. Sometimes texture is just noise.

 

[Nutty171]

@Sharm Lol I think you meant to reply to my exact same post on the map & screenshot thread. (At first I posted in the map & screenshot thread and then realized I should have posted in this one, but I didn't what to delete my post in the map & screenshots thread.) Mr. Detective hasn't posted recently in this one.

What sort of advice would you like?

Basically I wanted to make sure I wasn't doing anything wrong.

Be careful not to go too crazy with adding texture to everything, not everything is going to need it and it can be a nice break for the eyes sometimes to let things be plain. Sometimes texture is just noise.

And that's why I didn't shade the flowers. I'll admit this isn't my first time trying to do pixel art. Far from it really.

 

[Sharm]

Oops. I'll edit that out and paste it in the right thread then. . . .

Well, you're not breaking any of the "rules" of good pixel art. I don't think the texture on the trees is working for you, personally.

 

[Nutty171]

Well, you're not breaking any of the "rules" of good pixel art.

Wait there are rules?

I don't think the texture on the trees is working for you, personally.

Not working as in, not fitting the style...? Or are you saying that it's unnecessary texturing, aka noise?

Meanwhile, we have the battle of the bridges. Which one is better?

I personally much prefer the second one.

 

[Sharm]

Nothing hard and fast, just like any creative field, but yeah, there are some rules. Don't pillow shade, avoid fat pixels, selective outlining has extremely limited uses and is often just bad, ect. The Pixel Joint tutorial is really good for learning those.

Not working as is leaning towards noisy. The dots aren't doing anything to imply a leaf texture and aren't helping the stylized banded look either.

I like the larger logs better too.

 

[Nutty171]

Well, I kinda like the dots... But you're a professional so I should probably listen to you.
Here's the new lovely map:

Spoiler: Without tree dots

Spoiler: With tree dots

Oops, I have the tile highlight on a flower in this one.

Spoiler: With half-or-so tree dots

Now that I look at all three of these, I'm leaning more toward removing the tree dots entirely.

 

[Robert-Character Creator]

Hey Sharm, you might remember me from page 90. I've been working on a set of sprites for my main character, and just completed a face, for when she speaks. I really appreciated your help, it was very valuable in setting all this up.

For reference, the sprite-sheet is colored for my own reference; I've actually only completed the standard walking animation. The top row is for Idle, Walk, Run, and an Extra space; the bottom row is just for the diagonal variants.

Please, let me know what you think, and how it can be improved!

 

[Sharm]

I see some improvement, I'm glad that I could help. The character face looks familiar for some reason, but I can't place it.

 

[Robert-Character Creator]

I based the hair off a Japanese girl, the nose off an Irish girl, the lips off a Pakistani girl, the clothes on a Victorian nightie, and the eyes off my own. However, I did use two faces from the "People 1" RTP in VX ACE as a framework for her so you might be recognizing that somehow.

 

[Sharm]

That's actually it. ^_^

 

[RocketKnight]

At end i just get lazy.

 

[Sharm]

This definitely needs some sort of texture. You could either use shading to do it or overlay a picture of a RL one. I'm not a fan of mixing hard pixel lines with soft shading, but I may have mentioned that to you before. Sorry if I have and you've decided to keep it on purpose.

 

[RocketKnight]

@Sharm idk how to texture that.

 

[Sharm]

It mostly just needs to be more rough. Look up pictures of statues, especially older ones, to get an idea. Something that big wouldn't be an expensive, smooth stone, so looking up marble or bronze statues won't help. It'd probably be granite or something more porous that would pit and crack over time.

 

[Rukiri]

@RocketKnight When you're getting into large objects standard shading isn't going to work but what I would do is basically use your lightest color and fill the object us that as a source then work your way up. Use dithering around the hands and as for the stars standard shading works fine. Then as for a texture I would use noise and a Gaussian blur on a separate layer than find the right opacity "20-45 is a good range" and then add a small sharpen. Basic filters but will work fine, as it's just a blurry mess atm...

Basic adjustments is all it needs.

 

[Marquise*]

@RocketKnight MoLoCh!!!
Sorry couldn't say it like Freder