The VG Resource

I would like some help learning how to make these sprites a little better and more stylistic. I mostly based these sprites off of Paul Robertsons work (he is one of my favorite pixel artists.) I would like to know how to make these better; anatomically, color, style.

first of all this thread was made in the wrong subforum it should be in spriting & pixelart


when you say "based off of" do you mean you copy pasted some stuff and edited it afterwards ?

if you like paul robertson that's nice and all but at least try and make it all from scratch for a more unified feel
atm its obvious the faces and bodies weren't made by the same person

Thread moved.

Also try to make your own style. I know it's great you have an artist you like but trying to emulate a style that is not your own unless it is a paid gig, it's just not worth it.

...actually, to side with OP that is OP's own style.


Paul Robertson's work looks like this.

None of OP's work really looks copied and pasted. It looks more like he stared at it for like a few days, marveled at it and then made his own original work. Which, admittedly, is okay but I still feel like I'm staring into the backgrounds of Scott Pilgrim: The Game.

Like, I can definitely see the influence, in both but I'd say it resembles something more like Bryan Lee O'Malley's work...and even then, it really doesn't resemble O'Malley's work either (pretty much just the clothing resembles Bryan Lee O'Malley

and that's fine other than his characters intentionally made to stand out, they're quire generic)


I get the vibe in this topic though, basically: "It's obvious these characters resemble Scott Pilgrim designs. Spruce up the character design some to shake off the Bryan Lee O'Malley feel, but also don't go off totally wacky designs in an attempt to emulate Paul Robertson either"

i meant paul robertson as in what he did in the scott pilgrim game
cause as the thread titles says, "beat em up sprites"
its easily recognisable

here's an example

(04-25-2014, 12:59 PM)Lexou Duck Wrote: [ -> ]i meant paul robertson as in what he did in the scott pilgrim game
cause as the thread titles says, "beat em up sprites"
its easily recognisable

here's an example

aww man, when you post that

now i see it

it's the same thing just with tinier eyes, augh


also to OP, little extra:
Besides working on the clothing choices, I'd also suggest drawing out more fluid animations for the characters as well. Like, the character in the middle (the guy who's probably gonna beat some people up) is in like Generic Punch Guys Pose #1234. Try drawing up a more vivid, exotic skeleton frame on paper; translate that into your pixeling program of choice; go nuts recreating the pose. For what I mean, look at the different characters in Street Fighter. They all don't stand and pose like Ryu. KOF might be an even better example. Not a single character, apart from the 4 copies of Kyo, look even remotely the same.

"b-but Kosheh it's because they have different fighting styl---"
BUT THEIR BODY LANGUAGE IS
BIG

I know the advice is really generalized ): but halfway while you're doodling you'll figure out what i mean.

After reading all of your thoughts and critiques I want to say a few things.

In regards to the comment made by Lexou Duck When I said based off of I meant that I wanted the characters to be in that style, however I did not copy and paste. I referenced heights and proportions and all that and yes I copied a few things but I tried to make it my own...guess that wasn't "me" though.

Moving on, Kosheh thanks for your critiques and advice on what I should try to fix and also for defending me when I was clearly wrong.
Now that all that is said and done I think I am gonna have another go at trying to find my own pixel style.

That being said I have been slowly working on a portrait of that main character ( The one with spikey red hair?) since getting your replies. Any chance you could help me out a bit with it?

he looks sad in a 'man, it sucks to live' way. (which is okay if you intended him to look like that, notice that this is also important for characterization of your sprites)

As for the sprite itself... it doesn't look like you understand the techniques behind everything you did. Honestly it looks like you placed those pixels this way because 'the other pixelartist do it this way'. Which isn't inherently bad, but it can be without any basis.

For example, you completely forgot to outline the hair near his left eye. It would be okay if you were aiming for sel-out (a technique where you shade the outlines in order to make it more 'tridimensional'), but the effect is not achieved due to lack of understanding.

The hais is weird also. I know that anime usually has over-the-top hairdos and spikes everywhere. But the spikes are laid out in an understandable fashion, and I'll show you:


(shamelessly grabbed from google images)

As you can see, the third guy from first row has hair in spikes, however the spikes are laid out over his head in an even fashion, as not to make it lopsided, or unbalanced. This goes for all other famous anime characters. The spike is meant to be a group of hair: instead of drawing hair one string by string, you just draw groups of it, which is less tedious.

Sure, the character is yours and you can invent other hairdos that aren't like any other existing character, but I don't think that a single spike is all that appealing as a character.

---

PS: While hair has importance when creating a character, you shouldn't rely much on it, or over-the-top clothing. A good character is made with good personality, body/face shape and stuff like that. Don't be a cookie-cutter designer, just changing the hairdo and its color, to create new characters.

When drawing/spriting, it's important to consider everything else before "style" because that's honestly the last aspect of artwork that should ever be considered. Style is something that arises after learning how to use all of the other principles and elements of design and becoming familiar with them. I always think of an "art style" as more of the artist's handwriting, so to speak, so learning all of the proper "sentence structure" for designing logical characters and drawings is more important than mimicking another artist's handwriting.

of course, there's nothing wrong with having influences, but cheapening yourself to one single influence will only limit you in the end. For example: I used to know a bunch of people who limited themselves to drawing based on their favorite animes, which I think has greatly stunted their artistic growth because they won't venture outside of it.

In regards to main character design, I think the color red is an overused trope. You can have a main character with a strong design without using the color red (though this is still up to you in the end) but consider the attitude of the character instead of his/her looks, what about their personality makes them the main character and what makes them the character that the spotlight focuses on?

(05-02-2014, 10:58 AM)Gors Wrote: [ -> ]he looks sad in a 'man, it sucks to live' way. (which is okay if you intended him to look like that, notice that this is also important for characterization of your sprites)

As for the sprite itself... it doesn't look like you understand the techniques behind everything you did. Honestly it looks like you placed those pixels this way because 'the other pixelartist do it this way'. Which isn't inherently bad, but it can be without any basis.

For example, you completely forgot to outline the hair near his left eye. It would be okay if you were aiming for sel-out (a technique where you shade the outlines in order to make it more 'tridimensional'), but the effect is not achieved due to lack of understanding.

The hais is weird also. I know that anime usually has over-the-top hairdos and spikes everywhere. But the spikes are laid out in an understandable fashion, and I'll show you:


(shamelessly grabbed from google images)

As you can see, the third guy from first row has hair in spikes, however the spikes are laid out over his head in an even fashion, as not to make it lopsided, or unbalanced. This goes for all other famous anime characters. The spike is meant to be a group of hair: instead of drawing hair one string by string, you just draw groups of it, which is less tedious.

Sure, the character is yours and you can invent other hairdos that aren't like any other existing character, but I don't think that a single spike is all that appealing as a character.

---

PS: While hair has importance when creating a character, you shouldn't rely much on it, or over-the-top clothing. A good character is made with good personality, body/face shape and stuff like that. Don't be a cookie-cutter designer, just changing the hairdo and its color, to create new characters.

I did intend for him to look sad or depressed or whatever as the story I want to make I want to be very melancholy in its tone but still lighthearted in the way it is presented. Thank you for the suggestions, as of right now I want this character to have 3 big spikes on his head that I have thought out where it comes from the back right (where the hair grows from and extends over his head) and becomes big spikes.

Like so: (each spike is represented by a different color on the head. Do you see what I am saying or is this a bad way to describe it?)
(P.S. Yes I do know this looks like a horses main or flat top hair)