LP's place with sprites in it

[LunchPolice]

LunchPolice's SPRITE THREAD
Because my last topic was made ages ago and I'd rather start anew.


Hey guys. I decided to make some fighting-gameish sprites of some roleplay characters from another forum.


Here's my own character, Narome. He's part-man part-beast
and has to suck the life energy out of living creatures with
his shoulder tentacles in order to survive.


This guy was created by this dude called engima. I decided
to sprite him because his design looked really simple.

Critique on the spriting, animation, or really any comments
whatsoever would great! I'm not particularly experienced with
this style so I could probably learn a lot from you guys.
Thanks in advance.

[megaMasquerain]

I feel like there are parts of the animations that are really sexily smooth (Narome's legs and the purple guy's face) but they're shadowed out by the jumpy animations of the other parts (Narome's green arm and the purple guy's top hat and (our) right hand)

I'd think Narome's feet and hair would move, and that his tentacles could be a lot more interestingly animated. Make them more dramatic. Right now they're just bouncing up and down by his sides, like they're lifeless.



Ignore my inability to understand anatomy. This is just a potential pose for the tentacles. The arrows were just an idea I had for animation - have the tentacles circle around, looking for opportunities to strike, kind of like a vulture circling a dead guy.

Of course, take this all with a grain of salt, since I'm no animator.

[LunchPolice]

Thanks for putting the time into a good response, means a lot
So far I haven't be able to make every aspect of a sprite move smoothly. I'm pretty inexperienced in the
way of animation so I guess that kind of polish will come with time.

Making the hair and feet move should be easy enough. As for the tentacles, I agree. I just wasn't really
sure what to do with them - I may edit the animation later with your suggestions in mind. After all, they
are a part of his body so you'd think they'd be more dynamic. Circling around sounds good.

Will probably post edited versions or new animations later.
Here's a big picture of Narome for reference.

[Goemar]

The dude's right arm (our left) looks wrong, as if it's broken.
His left arm (our right) is too close to him, his elbow needs to be moved away to make it look more like a fighting stance and less like he's rubbing his nipple.
A hair bounce (remember body's and hair don't bounce at the same time!) and a better tentacle animation would greatly improve it.

As for the blob guy, his left hand flicks up too much and also looks a bit too far back. Even armless characters (such as Rayman) have kinda invisible arms to keep everything looking right. His hat bounce also looks really forced at the moment.

Don't be put off, they're really not bad, and I believe you're skilled enough to get them looking really froody. For now I'd get the base sprite sorted out before trying to animate anything, as it could save you a lot of time.

[LunchPolice]

As for the blob guy, his left hand flicks up too much and also looks a bit too far back. Even armless characters (such as Rayman) have kinda invisible arms to keep everything looking right. His hat bounce also looks really forced at the moment.

I definitely see what you mean with the hand. Now that I look at it, it looks rather uncomfortable. I'll get to him after I touch up Narome.

Don't be put off, they're really not bad, and I believe you're skilled enough to get them looking really froody.

Thanks! I'll try my best.

For now I'd get the base sprite sorted out before trying to animate anything, as it could save you a lot of time.

Will do.

Here is a roughly drawn update. Am I understanding your advice? I moved his green arm back a bit, like you said.
Hopefully that looks a little more fightingish. I left his human arm for now because while you said it looks wrong,
I'm unsure of how to fix it. The tentacles(actually called punctors) are in a slightly more battle ready pose now,
too.

Does this look any better? I'd like to know before doing the shading and clean up work.

[LunchPolice]

... Well I guess I'll get back to the stance once I recieve feedback on my latest update.
In the meantime I'VE BEEN EXTREMELY BORED so I attempted a walk cycle for Narome.

Very rough draft because I'm terrible at this kind of thing and I want to make sure it
looks okay to start with. Remember he's a fighting game character so this is more of
a shuffle. Think Ryu or Ken.

[LunchPolice]

Drew the upper body. I think it's looking alright.

Comments on... ANYTHING in this topic would be sweet.
Though it's not like I blame anyone. I haven't updated this thread in god knows how long. Sometimes it takes a while for inspiration to strike!

[Previous]

He looks like he's limping, pressing a hand against his hurting chest.
I don't really know how to fix it, since I never did anything like that. Maybe the (character's) left knee should not move forward that much and the upper body should thrust less?

[LunchPolice]

Hello chatroom buddy.
Thanks for the critique!
Some people on other forums suggested I add an
extra frame to smoothen the loop. So I did, hoping
it would fix the "stagger" effect.



Any better? I know you gave me some specific
advice but I thought I'd try this first to see if it'd
fix the problem. If it didn't, I'll try altering the
movement of the left knee and upper body.

[Keiang]

I think part of the issue is the angle of the lower torso. He looks like he's limping towards the left of the viewer, instead of moving side to side.

[LunchPolice]

Alright how 'bout this?

[Previous]

He's still limping, yea.

Maybe because the far leg appears to be slightly longer and the entire far half of the body seems kinda dragged down.

[Frario]

I just simply rotated your sprite, because I think it looked a bit out of balance. It doesn't fix the problem, but it might help you see it.

[Cobalt Blue]

he's not moving his leg foward to move sideways, he's expanding his entire body.

[LunchPolice]

I'll probably restart the walk cycle entirely later on. I'll try my best to not make the same mistakes I made last time. Thanks a bunch for the crit, guys.

For now, here's the updated stance sprite.

Thoughts?