shiremct's art thread

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shiremct
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shiremct's art thread

Post by shiremct »

It's been quite some time since I posted here, and hopefully, my spriting skills have improved, at least by a bit :P.

I've been doing some work for orbivm (aka Imperial Era, expanded) and will probably post some WIP stuff for that in here at some point, but to get started, I have a unit spawned as the [censored] child of a failed attempt at a unit for orbivm that I've biggerized up to wesnoth-size and reworked. I think this unit gives a pretty good example of my abilities right now and I would love some feedback.

Any feedback is great, but there are also a few things in particular I'm looking for feedback on. One such specific regards Anti-Aliasing. I hate gimp. I really really hate it. The multiple window thing makes it really hard for me to use it comfortably, so I try to minimize my need to use it to just sticking on a shadow and making the shadow transparent. This means I've taken to another method for anti-aliasing that doesn't rely on transparency, just on color variations; I'd like some feedback on how it works out. The spear and, to a lesser extent, the edge of the shield are good places to look to see the effect. It's very simple color variation along the edges that, to me, seems to work out okay, but it's easy to miss the obvious when you've stared at something for long enough. I'm kinda worried it will make the sprite fuzzy looking (in a bad way), or worse, just like I've placed random color blocks :lol2:. Please let me know your opinion on it.

Another specific bit of information I'm looking for is the TC-ing. I seem to have trouble judging the way the shade variation will work out once it's been converted to the other colors... It is quite often very different, usually with the contrast being less pronounced with the colors that it converts to or the whole unit being too dark with a dark TC color like blue. Is there perhaps a image I can download that has the TC colors paired up with the colors it converts to for one of them, like the shade-line of magenta and right below it the shade-line of red, or blue, or whatever, as it appears in the game? Failing that (or in addition to 8)), is there any advice someone with some experience drawing the TC portions of units can give me on things to keep in mind when doing it to avoid those problems? Anything problems you could point out on how I've used the TC shading on this unit that will give me problems?

Any other feedback is also nice. Pose, shading, contrast, anatomy, etc. The more the merrier :D.

I hope to have a few variations/upgrades of this guy ready to post soon as well, and if I can get myself back in the swing of spriting, some WIP stuff for a orbivm faction for critique in the near future.
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Spearman.png
Spearman.png (1.79 KiB) Viewed 8508 times
Last edited by shiremct on December 3rd, 2011, 1:57 am, edited 1 time in total.
megane
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by megane »

Overall, a very good sprite xD

Also, oh man, a TC question, this is totally mine. :D

:eng: You're right, TC's contrast does tend to be lower in-game than it is in magenta. Thus, what you want to do is use a slightly wider range of TC colors than might appear best. This spearman only uses the darker half or so of the magenta palette; remember that what looks "medium pink" in the sprite will be the base team color in-game.

As for shading, you need to develop a stronger directional light. Most of the areas on this guy are lightest in the exact middle and equally dark at each edge, which makes him look flat and/or oddly twisted; his helmet, for example. The light should be coming over the viewer's right shoulder. Also, remember that shading isn't necessarily a perfectly smooth gradient.

Oh, and metal (one of the... scarier, I guess... things to sprite) has a ton of contrast. Shadows on metal are really, really dark, and highlights are really, really bright. You're going to want to use something like %10-%20 grey on the darkest parts and %80-%90 where the light hits it. Not to toot my own horn, but: Image
that little girl's parents were attacked by ninjas - generic npc
hee hee! - little girl
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shiremct
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by shiremct »

megane wrote: :eng: You're right, TC's contrast does tend to be lower in-game than it is in magenta. Thus, what you want to do is use a slightly wider range of TC colors than might appear best. This spearman only uses the darker half or so of the magenta palette; remember that what looks "medium pink" in the sprite will be the base team color in-game.
This is exactly why I wanted some kind of comparison scale of an actual in-game color compared to the TC magenta scale. As it happens, I went ahead and made one myself, attached below, which should help me better use the TC scale. Hopefully it will helpful to some other people as well 8). I didn't do all the TC colors, but the most common are there.
megane wrote: Oh, and metal (one of the... scarier, I guess... things to sprite) has a ton of contrast. Shadows on metal are really, really dark, and highlights are really, really bright. You're going to want to use something like %10-%20 grey on the darkest parts and %80-%90 where the light hits it.
Hmm. I mean no offense, but I actually don't really care for the metal shading in your image. The contrast is too high; it looks like a sharp, well defined edge down the middle of the armor which doesn't seem to be intended from the first version of it and the detail of the chest from the first version is completely lost. Either way, there are no such sharp lines in my armor and I'm quite happy with my bronze equipment. I think it is recognizable as bronze and looks a little "dirty" and not completely uniform as most ancient alloys were, including early steel. It's also important to point out that the units I may post here will be armed/armored in bronze and iron, which have a much lower luster than the steel that most other wesnoth sprites are equipped with. For now, I have tried to add a little brightness to the highlights, but I won't be changing much else with the metal. I know I'm no expert and if others also comment that the metal needs more contrast, I'll consider it, but for now, I'm happy with what I have.


I have posted a new sprite. It's an upgrade of the first spearman, built (lazily :P) on the same pose. The scale part was quite difficult to work out at this scale, but I think I finally got something going that looks good for it. However, the large number of colors in the scale mail shading make it really difficult to make the leather belt and studded straps work below it. I've tried to eyedropper up every color scheme I have and even made a few tries with new colors, but I can't find any that look right and stick out as a different material/color scheme. I'm not sure what to do to make that belt distinguished more from the bronze scales. Any suggestions?
Attachments
TC Scale.PNG
TC Scale.PNG (4.01 KiB) Viewed 7895 times
Spearman2.PNG
Spearman2.PNG (1.8 KiB) Viewed 7914 times
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shiremct
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by shiremct »

Not much in the way of feedback :(

Guess I should be used to it by now :? Portraits get all the love these days :P

I have a new sprite to share for feedback: a war elephant. Especially need tips on how to shade its body, no real experience shading critters, so it's at the moment just kinda pillow-shaded but not sure how else to approach it. The TC blanket and carriage are just placeholders for now as I have no idea how I want to approach that just yet. I plan to add the toe-nails to the feet if I can fit them in, but I'm not sure how much success I will have at that scale, I'll have to see how it goes.
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elephant.PNG
elephant.PNG (1.62 KiB) Viewed 7372 times
Blarumyrran
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by Blarumyrran »

spearman2 is really grand. but as of the elephant,

one thing, its legs are really weird - thinner in the middle than they should be, but go a lot wider near the toes than they should. also the elephant's butt is round on the sprite; if it were almost vertical, it would work way better.

as of elephants skin, it looks almost gradient, like tense and young skin; but elephants skin is _very_ wrinkled. i see some wrinkle-like things on the sprite, but imo they should be stronger/darker.

and the contour of the interior of the ear should maybe be stronger too.

Image

and in case you didnt know, all wesnoth units need a shadow under them too. (60% opacity; pure 0,0,0 black; Blur 0,5 in photoshop or 1,5 in gimp)

other than that, looks promising!
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shiremct
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by shiremct »

Thanks for the feedback! Could you perhaps point me to a good example of wrinkly skin on a wesnoth sprite? I know their skin is quite rough and wrinkly, but I don't really know how to represent that without some good references.

The elephants in that image are Asian/Indian elephants. I honestly don't understand how such large creatures can even move about on such a seemingly unstable rear-end/hind-legs :lol2: . It's true that in reality Asian/Indian elephants were used in battle much much more often than African elephants, but African elephants look so much more powerful so I used them as my reference. African elephants don't really have the flat, dropping off rear end that their Asian counterparts do, but I'll see if I can rework those legs a bit. Once I get a better grip on critter body shading, the whole body will probably be reworked as I shade.
Image
Image
Image
Sangel
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by Sangel »

Hey - that second spearman is very good. Nice work!

Unfortunately, I can't think of any unit in Wesnoth that has wrinkly skin; or at least, one that has large quantities of wrinkly skin like an elephant would. You're attempting something pretty new here, I'm afraid.
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Urs
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by Urs »

:shock: How did I miss this?

:) Glad to see ya back, shiremct. Still working for the Dardanoi specifically? (BTW, the new forums are in my sig)

'Bout this guy:
Image
Yeah, I think the belt/crotch guard thing could be better - I'll try an edit later, if you don't mind.

I can't say much for the elephant, though - I never really attempted a sprite like that. Better than I would have done, had I.
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shiremct
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by shiremct »

Yes, please feel free to edit him, I tried and tried to make that thing stand out to my satisfaction and just couldn't get anything to work :cry:
I'd be very grateful if you could upload the edit if you think you have an improvement so that I may learn :eng: :wink:

These units aren't actually specifically for the Dardanoi, they are far to big for IE stuff, but I'm probably gonna use them as a base to add to the other stuff i have as well.
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Urs
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by Urs »

Well, it's pretty late around here and I need sleep, so I can't tell if my edit actually helped.

Basically I made the border green and the belt more red, as the the armor leans toward yellow.
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Spearman2.PNG
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shiremct
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by shiremct »

:shock: Major thread necro'ing! :shock:

New stuff for the wide wide world to see.

Javelin armed skirmishing unit drawn with the intent of being a level 2.5 or level 3 unit. This unit is "done" for the most part (Yes, i know there is no shadow yet).

An unfinished level 3 leader unit. Good thing this guy has his sword at the angle he does because he's got nothing drawn between his waist and his knees; otherwise I might have to censor black-box him! :lol2: Also prominently missing his left arm and whatever it may end up being equipped with (most likely a shield). I haven't yet figured out how I want to draw his waist or pose his shield yet, feel free to brainstorm with me.
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Lvl 2.5 or Lvl 3 skirmishing unit
Lvl 2.5 or Lvl 3 skirmishing unit
unit.PNG (2 KiB) Viewed 5927 times
Unfinished Lvl 3 leader unit
Unfinished Lvl 3 leader unit
unit2.PNG (1.76 KiB) Viewed 5927 times
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Zerovirus
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by Zerovirus »

I very much like the second one's helmet. I think I'll be saving it and deconstructing it for research on my own time.
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shiremct
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by shiremct »

Allow me to help with that:
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Helmet.PNG
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Issyl
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by Issyl »

Your initial spearman sprite's armor faces directly towards the viewer. The center of the armor, including the shoulderpads and center leather strap, should face at the same angle as the head; i.e. towards the bottom right.

You seem to have corrected this for the most part in your skirmisher unit.
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Issyl
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Re: Ancient Mediterranean-Themed Units

Post by Issyl »

Maybe this might be useful to someone.
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Here's a bit of an edit.
Here's a bit of an edit.
corinthian helmet.png (1.91 KiB) Viewed 5885 times
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