Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Contribute art for mainline Wesnoth.

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Jetrel
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Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Jetrel »

We have a new commission up for pixel art. Much like our previous saurian commission, we're looking to hire someone to expand the animations of some current units "up to spec".

Based on experience with the previous one, we've raised the price on these to $250/unit (and don't worry, sleepwalker got a substantial bonus to even his out; I would hate to underpay him for his excellent work). Price is flexible for more difficult stuff.

You are free to take on a number of units of your choosing. Be aware that each one of these is a lot of work. You're mostly free to pick whichever unit(s) you'd like; nearly all of our sprites are in final, animate-able status. Please don't start anything without my go-ahead, since I need to prevent duplication of efforts. Please also be aware that I can refuse anyone at my discretion, if I don't think they're good enough, and that I insist on some proof via existing work that you'll be able to do the job; I'm willing to entertain people who are unknowns in one skill if they happen to be excellent in another (as sleepwalker proved by being an excellent animator in addition to a great spriter), but I will need to see a portfolio or such if you're not an accepted member of the community that I have some estimation of.



To repeat what has been stated before, we don't need people to replace current animations that live up to the spec, only replace/augment them if they're markedly shorter than what we're looking for. We also want this spec done for 2 directions; our current SE, and a new NE facing. Spears, alone, may merit a rare addition of unique N and S animations for just the attack, but everything else, including movement, needs just NE and SE.
Unit Animation Spec:
1] a standing "breathe/bob-and-weave" animation between 3-6 frames long. Should be similar to the fare seen in games like Nippon Ichi's Disgaea series:
http://www.crimson-penguin.com/ especially: http://www.crimson-penguin.com/forum/disgaea2.htm

2] a running animation between 6-10 frames long. Our characters move relatively fast across the game field, we want a run, rather than a walk.

3] a defense animation consisting of precisely two frames; this animation is a full defensive pose, and then an inbetween frame used to cycle between it and the standing pose. This scheme has already been employed on most wesnoth units.

4] for melee attacks, an attack animation consisting of roughly 6-10 frames. Swords/maces/etc should be swung in a wide arc; these animations will get used for attacks to the direct south, as well as south-east, in wesnoth, and a wide arc makes them look tolerable for that. In the case of the saurians, the staff-swing of the spellcasters is up to par, but the spear-thrust of the "skirmisher" line needs additional frames.

5] for ranged, such as spear-toss attacks, an attack animation consisting of roughly 6+ frames showing an exaggerated, easily-readable toss of a spear. We mean looney-tunes style "readability and exaggeration" Big windup, big toss. Bows are easy, and should be handled like our current human bowman animations.

6] for spellcasting, the character should raise their arms into an erect "moses parting the sea" pose, over a reversible set of 2-4 frames. The existing animations already fit this for SE.
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Stern
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Stern »

I want to express my interest in animating a mainline unit. I am particularly interested in animating an undead or Northerner unit.

Are any of the following units eligible for animating or bringing up to spec?

Goblin Rouser
Goblin Impaler
Orcish Grunt (I am especially interested in animating the Grunt)

Ghoul
Necrophage
Spector
Nightgaunt

Sincerely,

Stern
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thespaceinvader
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by thespaceinvader »

Yes. To all. The Grunt being a minor exception, in that it does have a solid south attack and defence animation, but if you came up with something better, no-one would complain =)

Note: I don't have final say as to commissioning - I'm just here to say what remains to be done ;)
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Jetrel
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Jetrel »

He PM'ed me about it and I asked him to post it here.

Mostly because we have enough cash in the coffers, at the moment, to potentially have another person or two onboard, and it would help for this to be an active, attention-grabbing topic.
Stern wrote:
Jetrel wrote:Sweet. Could you post your message here (more or less verbatim) in the actual thread? A show of public interest might help kindle other people's attention.

I think you are good enough to do this; what I would suggest out of your options would be doing the grunt. Depending on how you feel after doing, and/or how well you execute the level-1, I might welcome you finishing the whole grunt line. Girgistan (supposedly) is doing the assassin line, so that would deal with 2/3 of the entire (mainline MP) race. Grunts are also easy because they have only a single attack.

Goblins would be easy, but if you're interested in doing anything else, I'd kinda like to save them as a "low hanging fruit" in case we have someone rather worse-off than you, skillwise.
Hi Jetrel!

I posted my message to the forum in which case I hope it will draw some more attention to your commissions. I would be very happy to do a commission for the Orcish Grunt. I believe that the challenge of working on the Grunt would be an excellent opportunity to further develop my artistic skills. As for subsequent commissions, I would be delighted to work on more units in the future.

Sincerely,

Stern
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StDrake
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by StDrake »

paid commitments to open-source..*shrugs* you scare me
..if i had any more spriting talent I'd have a go with some for free..maybe I'll even try anyway xD let's see what I can break in that spectre sprite

oh wait that's a good idea - if you don't know what to choose, the lev3 ghosts have no animations at all, so if you're thinking what to work on - think on them (before i start showing off my epicly failed attempts xD)
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shiremct
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by shiremct »

I'm interested in working on a unit's animations as well. At present, I'd prefer to work on the elven fighter or archer, if available, though I'm open to filling other needs.

As a relative unknown, I will provide some links to previous work. I believe I am pretty good at spriting, but animating is largely a new learning experience for me, and while I may need a little more guidance and feedback to get to a finished product than more established animators, I think I'm capable.

I have made one attempt at a real animation (beyond the arm-chop style animations we all started out at) in the past. I wasn't receiving much feedback on it so I assumed I had taken it in a wrong direction and gave up on it, but it's located here (sorry, I don't know how to link to specific posts in a topic, so I'm linking to the image instead:) http://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=46359.

In addition to that WIP animation, a large number of my new and older sprites can be found here http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewtopic.php ... 3&start=30.
Another recent sprite of completely different style can be found here http://pocketgames4.me/index.php/forum/ ... ss-sprites.
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Jetrel
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Jetrel »

shiremct wrote:I'm interested in working on a unit's animations as well. At present, I'd prefer to work on the elven fighter or archer, if available, though I'm open to filling other needs.
The fighter and archer are both kinda half-done, by me right now, so that's a bad target. I'd encourage you, if possible, to work on the orcish archer - if your work pans out, then we'll have someone attacking all 3 respective lines of the orcish race. Which would kick ass. 8)
shiremct wrote:I have made one attempt at a real animation (beyond the arm-chop style animations we all started out at) in the past.
Yeah, you look like a decent spriter, but it's the animation question that looms. I'm afraid I'll need to ask for "spec work", since you don't have a portfolio/examples of anything other than that one animation which didn't involve significant limb movement. Try doing one attack animation, and one run animation, to the SE. Heck, if you do it for the orcish archer, and you're able to do these without being hand-held, I'd be happy to roll it into the commission. "Hand-holding" is the key thing; if I have to do as much work as you, tweaking and reworking your animations, there's no point in paying you, since I may as well just do them myself, and if anything I'm doing a public service by teaching.

For these spec-work attempts, we're agreeing that you're doing them with no claim to being paid, just like everyone else who posts free submissions on the forum. I'm saying there's a chance, but I'm not promising anything.

shiremct wrote:I wasn't receiving much feedback on it so I assumed I had taken it in a wrong direction and gave up on it, but it's located here
Oofda; let's do that "later" rather than never. What's goofy about that is that the belt moves away from the pecs; it should move "in sync with" rather than in an opposing direction. There are also a couple instances of body-parts moving around (again, the pecs, and also his off-hand) where in moving to another frame, such as the extreme with the offhand closest to the torso, that they change in size. Some of the details in the animation, like the tail-twitch, are very nicely done.

I'd suggest you outright move the spear, like the saurians move their weapons.
shiremct wrote:(sorry, I don't know how to link to specific posts in a topic, so I'm linking to the image instead:) http://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=46359.
Right click on the little "page" icon, and there's a "copy link" or "copy address" command. Specifically, that'd be this icon, if it lets me link to it: Image
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Reepurr
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Reepurr »

Thinking about halfheartedly doing the Royal Warrior, which doesn't even have a mainline-quality defence, reasons unknown. Is defence/leadership for the Royal Warrior (Warrior King in TroW) all clear?
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thespaceinvader
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by thespaceinvader »

Yes, that's available, and could use updating. But you'll need to prove your skill level in the same way as shiremct, and there are no guarantees of getting a commission.
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Zerovirus
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Zerovirus »

Oh man. I really want to do this, but I don't think I'd be able to keep up with the speed Sleepwalker was churning them out. That, and I've had a pretty bad track record with animations.

How long will you expect completion? I figure over a long enough time I can make something noteworthy.
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thespaceinvader
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by thespaceinvader »

I don't know about Jet, but I'd guess that time is less important than quality, given that we'd be paying per unit, not per hour ;)
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Jetrel
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Jetrel »

Zerovirus wrote:Oh man. I really want to do this, but I don't think I'd be able to keep up with the speed Sleepwalker was churning them out. That, and I've had a pretty bad track record with animations.

How long will you expect completion? I figure over a long enough time I can make something noteworthy.
thespaceinvader wrote:I don't know about Jet, but I'd guess that time is less important than quality, given that we'd be paying per unit, not per hour ;)
Quality is everything. Time can't be completely disregarded, but yes, it's incredibly flexible here, compared to almost anyone else who would be commissioning pixel-art work for a game project. I'll have to insist on the same thing as shiremct - I need you to prove you can do it. So pick a unit, and get cracking. At the worst, you'll bring yourself up to skill. (Mind you - this isn't easy. Sleepwalker was able to suddenly do what he did because, in his free time, he's been working on a game prototype of his own, and had gotten the necessary practice there.)

Far and away the most important thing is to not just jump into detailing, but to - like sleepwalker did, block out the motion with just two colors or so.
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Reepurr
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Reepurr »

RISE FROM THE NEWLY DEAD!


I just realised you forgot to mention the odd animation specification.

1. Recruit - much needed for skeletons.
2. Death - er. much needed for skeletons.
3. Leadership - one of the most common abilities I believe

EDIT: Sorry if it wasn't clear - I meant frames, what the character should be doing, etc., like in the main post.
Last edited by Reepurr on January 12th, 2011, 5:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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thespaceinvader
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by thespaceinvader »

Recruitment and Death are low-priority, but good if there's an anim that makes sense for them (particularly easy for skeletons). Any additional abilities like Leadership would also need doing if applicable.
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Jetrel
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Re: Open Sprite Animation Commission:

Post by Jetrel »

thespaceinvader wrote:Recruitment and Death are low-priority, but good if there's an anim that makes sense for them (particularly easy for skeletons). Any additional abilities like Leadership would also need doing if applicable.
Recruitment is an animation, like "idle animations" that we don't officially require. It's sweet to have, but less important than moving on to the next unit and getting its core animations done, which is what this whole commission process is about.

Death is the same way.
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