Alaby's Sprites

[Alaby]

Hi everyone!

Im new here at the forums, and I am happy to have found this great community. I hope I can be a part of it as well.

Just as a brief intro, I just graduated from film school, and my passion is to eventually work for a game company.

I am trying to learn how to make sprites now so that I can integrate them into Game Maker. After reading the "Spriting Dictionary" on here, I got motivated to try to make my first sprite, it is here! Please let me know how I can improve and what I could change, Im very open to C&C, thank you!

Sprite:


Reference Image:

[E-Man]

Hello, and welcome to the forum!

I see you have a nice sprite there, but might i suggest you do something about the black lines on the ball to make them pop out a bit more? As they are now, there are flat and not very interesting. Try adding some shades of grey to the lines.

As for the overall shading, it's not terrible, but I honestly think you could use fewer colors to make it look better. As a rule of thumb, if a shade looks too similar to another shade of the same color, be sure to make it darker (or lighter if you're doing highlights). Also, would it be too much of a hassle for you to look into how spheres are shaded. Your basket ball doesn't look like it is shaded like a normal sphere and I think it wouldn't hurt to shade it just like that.

Other than that, you're off to a great start!

[Alaby]

Thank you soo much for the feedback E-man!! I hadn't had time to modify it until now (will devote more time now to sprite making).

I went in and added grey lines. I tried adding them mostly where the sunlight would hit the ball. Also I reduced the number of shades on the ball to 3, and I rounded them a little bit to represent that it is a sphere. Is this better now? Im not sure about the highlight color.. It seems to me like it is a bit off... I tried experimenting with others but the results seemed to be worse.. Is this how its supposed to look?

Thanks again for the feedback!

[E-Man]

Well, I can say that it looks a lot better now! Of course, since I'm not very perfect with sprites, you might want to ask the over users on this site for help. They give better critique than I do.

[Hiynastrike]

you could probably use some dithering to simulate the bumps that run around the ball

[DragonDePlatino]

Hiya, and welcome to the forums!

I noticed quite a bit of your sprite, but a lot of it could be amended by looking into some pixel art tutorials. Personally, I got my start in pixel art using Derek Yu's tutorial: http://makegames.tumblr.com/post/4264869...t-tutorial

...And wow, looking back on that tutorial after 2 years...I can actually see a lot of mistakes in his final sprite myself. And that's another thing about pixel art...Respect people, but take everything they say with a grain of salt. ^^;



Anyways, to execute Blackraven's idea, you should add a little bit of dithering and see how it'll turn out. As Derek says, not all pixel art needs dithering, but it can be quite nice when used well...There's my quick attempt at it.

You'll also want to add some anti-aliasing. If you look at the edge of the photograph of the basketball, you'll realize there are some brighter pixels that are used to "blur" the outside of the basketball. There's a method to this madness in pixel art called anti-aliasing, and the PixelJoint Pixel Art Tutorial shows you the method to it.

[Alaby]

Nice to meet you Hiyna and Dragon

Well, first of all, thank you for the feedback! I really appreciate you guys taking the time to write back, I value it a lot. Your comments have made me realize many things, and I feel that I am learning a lot more than I thought I could by myself!

I read Derek's tutorial, as well as a bit of the PixelJoint Tutorial, and here's my new version! I am more happy with it than the last for sure.

Changes: Added a soft shadow, dithered two shades, and did some anti aliasing on the outside of the ball. Heres the pic:



Is it acceptable to have a white BG? Or should I go back to grey?

[Hiynastrike]

Wow... I think you could saturate the colors a bit more... like make them more orange

[Gors]

this sprite isn't that good, the black lines on the surface of tha ball is throwing it off quite badly. the highlight on them could be less harsh, and there should be anti-alias to smoothen and curve the lines. right now theyre kind of angled

[DragonDePlatino]

Nice to meet you Hiyna and Dragon

Your welcome! But yeah, Gors does have a point. Try darkening the black highlights a bit and it'll look nicer.

As for the background, I can only recommend you use a transparent one or draw some sort of a backdrop. It would be easier to just keep it transparent but if you did that then you'd have to get rid of the AA on the outside of the ball. Except for technical things like sprite sheets, solid-color backgrounds aren't that popular.

[Alaby]

Hi guys, thank you much for your input!

I am going to be more dedicated to sprite making from now on, I really want to get further with this. You guys are helping me to learn a lot

Heres the next WIP I worked on today. This time, I saturated a bit more the colors as suggested by Hiyna, and I tried to AA the black lines around the border by adding a transition color to the edges. I think it looks better, but I am not sure if I put them in the right places. I added two shades around the black lines to contrast between shadows and highlights.

Also, I made the highlight on the ball less apparent, because I plan on implementing this to a game where the ball will change direction many times, and I do not want it to look like the light direction is changing every time it flips.

New one:


Old one:

[Alaby]

Im starting to work on another asset for my mini game now. I want a concrete wall around the level. It will be a top down view, Im getting the idea from a tutorial in Game Maker. Heres a screenshot of the game in the tutorial:



I want to replace the clown with the ball, and also the other sprites. The wall I am working on now will replace the wooden crates around the level.

Here is my concrete:



I did a test to reapeat and rotate the sprite so it wouldn't be obvious it repeats:

[Hiynastrike]

to be honest... It looks more like Granite than Concrete
I suggest smoothing it out more with less smaller stone colors in it

Kinda like this

Spoiler

[Alaby]

Thanks Hiyna!

I went back to it and tried to modify it so it looks more like the concrete you provided. I was actually looking for a nice reference but couldn't find any until you posted it

Also I cleaned it up a bit, and did another repetition test. Here they are:

[Gors]

I think the pores could be smaller, but otherwise they're ok for what they will be used for