The VG Resource

E-Man:
My animations are almost always an even number ranging 2 to 8 frames. 4 is my standard for idle stances.

Alaby:
I think you're right about the knees. I was trying to make the legs look like Ryu and Ken but with a wider stance for balance. But maybe he is over extending. I'll move his feet closer together and see how that effects the knees.

OK, so first, here's the design progression for Shacklebolt:

Far left is the prototypical shadewing. No claws, undersized wings, pillow shaded eyes, a real mess. The middle has bigger wings and more glassy-looking eyes, as well as claws and shackles on the forelegs. On the right, new style eyes and the underside of the wings are lighter so he doesn't look like a big black blob when flapping.

Because of their dark palette, shadewings have a selout of 0x101010, while other KL sprites use 0x202020.

Now, for your viewing pleasure, an older version of Midi.

Hi Midi:

For Shacklebolt: Are these itirations of the final model? If they are, I like the one the further to the right better. I think it reads alot more than the other. About the shackles, I didnt know they were shackles until you mentioned it, but that makes sense because his name is "Shacklebolt" haha .

If you are planning on making more animations with him, I suggest that you make the shackles more apparent so they add to the personality of the character, and so they stand out more . I thought about adding a chain element... but then I thought it would pose a really big challenge animating it.. not sure how that would work.

Cheers!

Yes, the one no the right is the most recent, although I may not keep that, either. I've realized my current design makes shadewings too bulky for flight. I'm going to try a more slender build but keep them arouns the same height.

As for the shackles, how would you suggest I make them stand out better?

I thought that a little piece of chain could come out of the shackle in the front, I cant show you an example right now but, it would be like a little ring or two jutting out of the shackle. Im new at this so I dont know if there will be problems animating

Hm, yeah, maybe. But storywise, I doubt the characters would leave jingly chains on him. There's a reason the shackles themselves can't come off.

Sometimes, Midi, it's okay to make certain details on sprites simplistic. I know you want to make the shackles flashy, but that's a little hard to do in sprite format. Since editing space on sprits that size is rather tight, a single pixel would really change the look of a sprite (but not always for the better).

As much as I would say that spikes would make the shackles look good, I think you are better off leaving them alone. The only other option I would think of is to make them have more contrast against the main body of your character, but that's up to you.

Went digging around in my sprites, and I found an older sheet that I hadn't finished finished. It's Jack from Harvest Moon.

I think what E-man said was sort of what I was fearing... Its true that theres not a lot of space to add a lot of detail, and it can get a little tight if you add such small details, so I think you can discard that idea.

Those Harvest moon sprites look nice. I have some CC.. it might just be me, but for the first walking sprite, the upper most on the left, does it seem like his legs a too far apart? Maybe bring them in a little? I dont know what other people think about this.

That's how far apart they are in Pokemon, and I was doing those in Pokemon style.

As for Shacklebolt, I tried using a lighter metal and came out with these:

Left is old, right is new.

A common thing that I see happening when people make sprites is that they tend to use a whole bunch of colors that don't really read. (I make this mistake all the time, too, I'm still working on it)

There are a bunch of colors in the Shacklebolt sprite that can totally be cut out to optimize the color palette.

Here I cut down the palette from 22 colors to 14 (13+transparency) and brightened up one of the colors. I also moved a small bit of pixels around, but not very many.

There are still a lot of things that I would tweak/add, one of which is a neck, or at least move the head forward a little bit. It'd also be more visually interesting if it were standing in a more dynamic pose, but that's entirely up to you.

Yeah, I've been meaning to trim down the color palette, but lazy squirrel is lazy. Been thinking of cutting it to three shades per color.

As for Shack, I agree he needs more visible neck. I've decided to use the physique of an Umbreon, with the head remaining the same shape. That should give him a more readable body, as well as mke it more believable that shadewings are bred for stealth and flight.

I personally wouldn't even use a "three shades per color" guideline, if it's a key color, like the dark bits then yes, three or more shades are necessary. but on small details, maybe two shades are all you need. with sprites, less is more.

One of the beautiful things of having smaller palettes is that you don't need to worry about shading everything in the same way as the initial sprite. (and you can play around with palette swaps more easily, too.)

I managed to cut the palette down further from the 13+transparency to 10+transparency.

a good way of cutting out unnecessary colors is to compare your shades, if they're close enough that it's hard to tell that they're different, use one or the other. it's pretty fun.

Ah, sorry, I meant to say three shades maximum. But I really do like the way my sprites look now. Although, and I don't remember if I posted this here or not, but only female shadewings have white manes. THe males have gray. The way you did it makes him look like a girl. XD

I dunno, maybe it's cuz I'm OCD about it that I treat colors the way I do. Honestly, and I know this sounds lazy, but I don't wanna have to go through and modify every single sprite I've done in this style. I finally made my own style, and I guess I just don't want to change it. *sigh* Yeah, I know, that sounds bad, but it's the truth.

Here's a test of other color styles: