artisticdude's Art

Make art for user-made content.

Moderator: Forum Moderators

Forum rules
Before posting critique in this forum, you must read the following thread:
Post Reply
User avatar
shiremct
Art Contributor
Posts: 116
Joined: August 1st, 2007, 9:23 pm

Re: artisticdude Might Be Back to Spriting...

Post by shiremct »

What you've done with the palette there is a good start, but isn't having the impact it could potentially have because your pink, green and light blue are all very close in... something... I'm not sure what the correct term(s) is, but they are all light, low saturation colors so they can't contribute as much a sense of depth as they maybe could, but you are on the right track. The ones you are using now are creating some very smooth and clean shading in the highlights, though, which I quite like. Either way you look at it, this guy needs some more interesting color interactions, either through different color elements or more color interaction within the elements if they are all going to be the same.

The legs and feet are a little short and stretched for the size of the upper body, as you noted. Either extending them or tightening in their angle would help. Pay particular attention to the angle and position of the knees.

Good job on this, I'll keep my eye out for any updates.
User avatar
artisticdude
Moderator Emeritus
Posts: 2424
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:37 pm
Location: Somewhere in the middle of everything

Re: artisticdude Might Be Back to Spriting...

Post by artisticdude »

*shrug* I was bored. :mrgreen:

Tempted to completely change the position of his right arm, as currently the position of the hand is somewhat ambiguous, and the hand didn't turn out quite right anyway.
Attachments
rogue.gif
rogue.gif (2.1 KiB) Viewed 4222 times
"I'm never wrong. One time I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
User avatar
artisticdude
Moderator Emeritus
Posts: 2424
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:37 pm
Location: Somewhere in the middle of everything

Re: artisticdude's Art: Unsolicited Baseframe Tweaks

Post by artisticdude »

Experimenting with hair. Might be useful to UMC authors as a special character that you'd want the player to be able to tell apart from other rogues.

EDIT: Also the tweaked male baseframe, if anyone would like to use it.
Attachments
rogue.png
rogue.png (5.13 KiB) Viewed 4185 times
rogue+female.png
rogue+female.png (5.05 KiB) Viewed 4185 times
"I'm never wrong. One time I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
User avatar
Mefisto
Art Contributor
Posts: 422
Joined: January 8th, 2009, 3:53 pm

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by Mefisto »

So you created bishonen. Bravo.
(Jetrel's females have much thinner waists and visible breasts so they are distinguishable from males).
And seriously - nice work with hair.
User avatar
artisticdude
Moderator Emeritus
Posts: 2424
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:37 pm
Location: Somewhere in the middle of everything

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by artisticdude »

Mefisto wrote:So you created bishonen. Bravo.
I admit it: I had to Google that one. :P
Mefisto wrote:(Jetrel's females have much thinner waists and visible breasts so they are distinguishable from males).
That's a good point. I did try to narrow the waist a bit by only changing the shape of the shadows and highlights, but yes, I think I can definitely afford to exaggerate a bit more.

I'm a bit conflicted with the breasts; I want to make the chest area a bit more prominent, but at the same time I don't want to lose the front of the cape or make it hard to read. :hmm: Guess I'll have to play around with it a bit.
Mefisto wrote:And seriously - nice work with hair.
Thanks. :)
"I'm never wrong. One time I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
User avatar
Mefisto
Art Contributor
Posts: 422
Joined: January 8th, 2009, 3:53 pm

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by Mefisto »

I tried to make few quick and dirty changes. Something like this maybe?
Attachments
rogue+female02.png
rogue+female02.png (5.05 KiB) Viewed 4143 times
User avatar
artisticdude
Moderator Emeritus
Posts: 2424
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:37 pm
Location: Somewhere in the middle of everything

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by artisticdude »

That looks much better than any of my attempts so far!

I did a few minor edits on top of it and this is the result. Still not entirely happy with having to do away with the front of the cape like that, but it's either that or sacrifice some of its readability as female, so I think it's a good middle-ground.
Attachments
rogue%2Bfemale02 copy.png
rogue%2Bfemale02 copy.png (5.05 KiB) Viewed 4140 times
"I'm never wrong. One time I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
User avatar
Mefisto
Art Contributor
Posts: 422
Joined: January 8th, 2009, 3:53 pm

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by Mefisto »

Now she look cleaner but for me her bust is directed to the south while her head and hips to south east. This is why I made strange things with intermediate shades, trying to make her breasts appear sloppier. Well, maybe I was overzealous. If I have more time I would also work on her legs, especially her right one.
User avatar
Boldek
Posts: 576
Joined: April 14th, 2011, 6:37 pm

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by Boldek »

Isn't there a female rogue you can base this off?
Guys I never thought I'd come back to this forum after 8 years this is wild
User avatar
artisticdude
Moderator Emeritus
Posts: 2424
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:37 pm
Location: Somewhere in the middle of everything

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by artisticdude »

Boldek wrote:Isn't there a female rogue you can base this off?
Yup, there is. Actually, I have based it on that, at least to some extent. :mrgreen: The problem is that the current mainline baseframe isn't exactly a good reference. It has a vast number of technical problems (unnecessary colors, banding, wonky shading & outlines, etc.), and the style is a bit outdated. No offense to the original artist intended.

The problem lies with having the front of the cape overlapping her chest. The old baseframe just hid most of the front of the cape under her 'chin' so that you could barely see it was there. I want the cape to be slightly more obvious, but at the same time I want to make sure that she's readable as being female. At this scale, that can be a difficult task. :hmm:

Here' another shot at it. Tried to correct the south-facing bust, although it's still a bit more muddled than I'd like. I just can't think of another way to make it more readable at this scale.

EDIT: Hm, I think I may have gotten it! ^^
Attachments
rogue+female.png
rogue+female.png (5.01 KiB) Viewed 4035 times
"I'm never wrong. One time I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
User avatar
Mefisto
Art Contributor
Posts: 422
Joined: January 8th, 2009, 3:53 pm

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by Mefisto »

I REALLY should be working right now, not playing with pixel art. OK, this femme fatale probably wont have better torso. So I tried to address some issues I had with her right leg. Does it look now better for you or not?
EDIT: Looking at the original sprite I really miss two shades on her torso: one intermediate between the current bightest and the next brightest, another which should be as bright as the brightest on original. I like the original bust better and our belt looks slightly lopsided. But I agree that some original colors are unnecessary, especially on hands. I could still work on her boots but not in this moment. It looks like we are desinging some custom character of rogue profession.
Attachments
rogue+female04.png
rogue+female04.png (4.99 KiB) Viewed 4030 times
User avatar
artisticdude
Moderator Emeritus
Posts: 2424
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:37 pm
Location: Somewhere in the middle of everything

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by artisticdude »

quote="Mefisto"]I like the original bust better and our belt looks slightly lopsided.[/quote]The original bust was okay, it was too high up for me. The original belt was directly facing the viewer, which put the waist/lower torso area out of sync with the upper torso area, since the bust was facing to the south-east. I tried moving the belt so that it too faced south-east, but I agree that there's something off about it.

I think you're definitely on to something with the position of her right leg in your edit. I find legs to be the trickiest part of drawing a sprite, because if you are off on them even by a little bit the entire sprite will look off-balance.

I'm going to try playing around with this a bit more this afternoon and see if I can't fix some of the issues mentioned.

EDIT 1: Ended up with this. The stance is a bit more dynamic than the original, although I'm not necessarily sure it's entirely an improvement. :hmm: The shading of the legs/boots is still a work in progress, but should be enough to show where I'm going with it.

EDIT 2: So I think I'll call this pretty much finished. I ended up losing the TC on the boots; not sure if I should try and put it back or not though.
Attachments
ladyrogue.png
ladyrogue.png (4.97 KiB) Viewed 3933 times
"I'm never wrong. One time I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
User avatar
Alarantalara
Art Contributor
Posts: 786
Joined: April 23rd, 2010, 8:17 pm
Location: Canada

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by Alarantalara »

artisticdude wrote:I ended up losing the TC on the boots; not sure if I should try and put it back or not though.
I find myself hoping you do: it would be really neat to be able to use the less dynamic pose from earlier most of the time and switch when an enemy unit is nearby.
User avatar
Mefisto
Art Contributor
Posts: 422
Joined: January 8th, 2009, 3:53 pm

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by Mefisto »

Oh, I started to make my modification on your previous, unfinished version od f-rogue in meanwhile and wanted to present my proposition. Slightly changed the belt, added one more shade on bust, redid lower parts of her skirt and removed banding on trousers. And slightly modified boots. And remade her right fist, though I think that your fist is better. But looking on your boots I think that you shortened her right foot too much.

I forgot to mention that I liked your new stance more than previous. If this stance would be regarded as "ready to attack" and the previous as "neutral", I think that the neutral stance could have lowered hands.
artisticdude wrote: EDIT 2: So I think I'll call this pretty much finished. I ended up losing the TC on the boots; not sure if I should try and put it back or not though.
I think you should, she has very low amount of TC on her right now.
Attachments
rogue-female06.png
rogue-female06.png (5.01 KiB) Viewed 3920 times
User avatar
artisticdude
Moderator Emeritus
Posts: 2424
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:37 pm
Location: Somewhere in the middle of everything

Re: artisticdude's Art: Rogues with Long Hair & Other Odditi

Post by artisticdude »

Alarantalara wrote:
artisticdude wrote:I ended up losing the TC on the boots; not sure if I should try and put it back or not though.
I find myself hoping you do: it would be really neat to be able to use the less dynamic pose from earlier most of the time and switch when an enemy unit is nearby.
Actually, that sounds like a great idea. I'd probably want to redo the neutral pose too though, the legs aren't as good as they could be, and like Mefisto pointed out the hands could be lower to help signify the passive posture.

But either way, the TC will definitely make a comeback. ^_^
Mefisto wrote:...added one more shade on bust...
I'm not terribly fond of the idea of adding another palette shade unless I absolutely have to, but you definitely have something there... it might also be possible to alter the shades of the existing palette to transition more smoothly into each other.
Mefisto wrote:But looking on your boots I think that you shortened her right foot too much.
I think you're right about that; now that I look at it, the foreshortening of the foot does seem a bit excessive for the angle at which it is supposed to be viewed. I'll fix that.



I just noticed when reading this thread that the rogue is up for a redesign anyway (which AFAIK no one has started yet), so it might be worth continuing this discussion in either the Art Contributions forum or the Art Development forum.


EDIT:

I decided to make the leggings entirely TC'ed, that way there should be plenty of TC visible and it saves me from having to struggle to put those TC bands around the rims of the boots while attempting to keep readability intact. I also began playing with the palettes (specifically trying to making them brighter to match Jetrel's revised footpads & the thug line). I also resized the right foot to correct the foreshortening issue and got rid of the unnecessary highlight on the cape.
Attachments
female_rogue.png
female_rogue.png (4.95 KiB) Viewed 3850 times
"I'm never wrong. One time I thought I was wrong, but I was mistaken."
Post Reply