Digit-5 and Project Captain N

[GaryCXJk]

So, based on the title, you might think one or two things:

1. What is Digit-5?
   
2. Are you still working on Project Captain N?
   

For the first question, Digit-5 is essentially two things. First, it's the collective story-verse for my various stories, including my novels. These stories are not necessarily connected in any way, and even often take place in their own world. I just collect them under Digit-5 because, well, it's simple. Digit-5 is named after a universe I created where there's a star system where six planets orbit around the star in the same ellipse, the Digit-5 solar system.

Digit-5 is also what I refer my sprite style to, as it was actually made for a certain softcore erotic sprite comic I wanted to make that took place in the same universe, sort of. From there I decided to practice a little with the style, trying to make several clothing styles, as well as different poses. This is where I used my sprite style as a test for certain characters, mostly fan characters, but some original content as well. I haven't included original content, but you can find some of it on my tumblr. Try to guess what my link is.

Now, I do have to admit, most of these humanoid characters are based on two base sprites, a male and a female sprite. They also have mostly the same pose, but this is modular, the base sprites are there because I wanted to give everything a somewhat unified sprite style. Now whether I've succeeded or not is up for debate, some do need some tweaks, either minor or major, in order for them to fit. It's mostly shading and lighting related, but they're mostly here as a way for me to practice.

As for the second question, yes, I am starting Project Captain N again, but no, it won't be a Flash animation project, nor will it be a sprite comic project. I just decided, I'm already working on practicing my skills, why not just do a form of Project Captain N? Just simple sprites that can be used for any Captain N or Nintendo related project, all in a somewhat unified style.

Now, this opening post will not be updated often, instead I'll overwrite the original image file, which means you might need to refresh the image in order to see some changes. I'll also leave a link here for you to see the initial image. I'll only update the opening post when the sheet becomes too big and I need to post additional ones, or a character gets removed from the initial sheet to get his or her own sheet. I will make additional posts whenever I make something new or make updates.

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Initial sprite sheet

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[GaryCXJk]

I've added two new characters to the sheet.



I'm not too happy with the Power Armor version of Samus, to be honest, but I don't really have a lot to work with when it comes to size. Just consider this one a work in progress, there's a lot that needs to be done, but, for now I already have a basis. Maybe it will look a bit better if I pose it.



Since Steven Bomb is coming again, I decided to create a sprite of Kirby wearing a Steven Universe hat. Wig. For that though I did need a base sprite for Kirby. I've also made two versions of Steven, one with and one without the gem. At the moment the gem doesn't look that great, so I'm going to need to think about the size and placement, which is why I included the gemless version. If I get the time I'll try to Kirby-fy the rest of the Crystal Gems, but I might just work on an actual idle pose and basic animations.

Not too happy with the colors, it uses the colors from one of the DS games for the skin, but on some screens and some browsers it looks too saturated. The rest of the colors I just had to figure out myself. I might give the eyes a blue-ish tint at the bottom, might add something to it.

[SmithyGCN]

I know that you're going for a uniform base for all your humanoid characters, but the idle standing pose for each one is pretty static and uninteresting and says nothing of the characters' personalities. It might even help your Samus if you found a better pose for each character. As for Samus in this pose, you might want to make the shoulders not so close to the head.
For Kirby, I think the gem looks fine, but you could get more mileage out of the palette by reusing the colors for Kirby's skin with his gem.

[GaryCXJk]

That's not the idle pose, though. That's essentially the t-pose of this style, essentially mannequin versions of the characters.

[GaryCXJk]

I've decided to start Mona after StevenBomb 4. I wanted to give her a more rounder shape, so the head's a bit bigger. It had to somewhat reflect the WarioWare style.




This is Mona's walk cycle. I made it after I made Bubbles. The movements are stiff, but that's because I wanted to replicate the original WarioWare walk cycle she had in one of the games. When I get around to other characters I'll give them a more complete walk cycle, probably using six or eight frames.



Bubbles I mainly made because of Project Captain N. Bubbles isn't really too hard to make, so it didn't take me long.



Okay, I honestly got nothing much to say about Gwen. The biggest problem I did encounter was the fact that the series has matchstick women, heck, even the men are thin as heck. I mean, sure, they're not really THAT thin, but it does make it hard to make small-sized sprites of the characters. I'm still planning on making Courtney, as I ship Gwen and Courtney. I ship them. Gwen and Courtney for OTP.

[SchAlternate]

Mona's walk cycle doesn't convey any sense of forward movement, since her legs are completely stiff and her vertical position remains intact.

EDIT: Ignore what I say about the stiff legs, I misread you post. Still, she needs to bop up and down in some way.

Remember, we bop up and down when we walk.


Also, for the love of god, I get that you made those upscaled sprites so we can see the original sprite's details with ease, but we only need one preview that's at most 4 times the size of the original sprites. We don't need five of them, or one that's 16 times bigger than the original. Thanks.

[GaryCXJk]

About the upscaling, yeah, I figured that was a bit overkill. I did it mostly for my tumblr page, and they're not nearly as annoyingly big as they are here. I might change them in the future.

Mona's walk cycle, funnily, didn't bop up and down in the original sprite as well, which was kind of amusing, but did feel a bit strange to sprite. Normally I would actually make it bop a bit. Just check it out in WarioWare: Twisted. Now what I might change is having the front leg lift up a bit, as that would be more pose accurate, although I had a lot of trouble with doing that, so I ended up just leveling it.

I think most of it is also due to all sprites being condensed into a two-dimensional plane. Most sprites use some sense of depth, for example, by having the characters be viewed from a very slight angle downwards. My style doesn't allow that, which is a limiting factor.

For example, take Megaman Zero sprites. You can see the back leg be slightly shifted upwards, to give it a sense of distance and perspective. It's a more realistic take on drawing something, as nothing is completely flat, but that's a limit I gave myself when making these sprites.

Ironically I work better with a 3D reference.

Oh, right.



I've redone suited Samus, mostly to give her a lot of details. There's still a lot that could be improved, right now she looks like she could be tipped over with only one finger, but that's just me. Once I think it's ready I might try the Fusion suit.