Quo's Sprites (Current Project: Lucavi Recolors)

[Quo]

Original Post:

spoiler

Make no mistake, I've been doing sprites of all different kinds for a LONG time. And sometimes I do really well.

Sometimes they suck giant whale phallus...

But I can't say anything I do is ever stellar. That kind of comes with the territory of being a jack-of-all-trades/master-of-none. I can draw, I can write, I can sprite, I've got some slight web design / database skillz, and I can even play a bit of piano. Just none of them better than amateur level for the most part... :() So I made something. And that something is a sprite. Because of all the above, that's the easiest (and probably why I do it so much-- moreso than anything else I do by far). I sorta consider it my avatar-character (which I will make a mugshot for and replace my current avatar with), since it's made in the likeness of the character that the name "Quo" originates from. It's only one frame, but I figure I should see what people think of it before trying to make a whole sheet of this...

Also, it's late and I'm lazy. Sue me.

tl;dr: Sprite. I made one. Does it suck? (See below)

EDIT [09/09/09]: Updated the Quo sprite
EDIT [09/10/09]: Updated Quo sprite again
EDIT [09/14/09]: Added Belias Recolor
EDIT [09/15/09]: Updated Belias Recolor
EDIT [09/17/09]: Added Zalera Recolor
EDIT [09/17/09]: Updated Zalera Recolor
EDIT [09/22/09]: Added Hashmal Recolor
EDIT [10/02/09]: Updated Hashmal Recolor
EDIT [10/02/09]: Added Ultima Recolor

[Asmo X]

It doesn't completely suck, no. Its too dark though and you need to use some dark shading under the far side of the face where it's in front of the collar. The way the shirt tails down at the front makes it look like it's cinched around the waist without anything to suggest why. Also, there's some slight pillow shading (that's where you shade right around an object) but overall it's pretty good. Biggest tip is to just make it lighter.

[Xifanie]

The hair shouldn't be the same color as the vest, and points Asmo mentioned.

[Kagebunji]

Not bad for a first-timer, but colors are too dark as mentioned by Asmo.

[mav]

Nice sprite. Better than my cheap shit and much better than a couple sprites I've seen here. As mentioned, try lightening up the palette. Your picked really nice colors, they're just a little too dark to see.

[Zozma]

if you were to do it just right, you could free up one of those "red" shades for something else

reds and even purples work relatively well with a skine toned hair sheen...

[MiKeMiTchi]

Well, things to remember: hardwork and patience. haha.
Yup, lighten the colors as others said.

[Quo]

Not bad for a first-timer

Make no mistake, I've been doing sprites of all different kinds for a LONG time.

Anyway, I wasn't expecting there to be so much commentary about the darkness of the colors. To be honest, that's more of a preference thing. I have an adversity to light colors.

[Zozma]

being darker than other sprites, it will stand out as something obviously added in as opposed to something that looks like it always belonged there.

it doesn't need a drastic lightening tho.

[MiKeMiTchi]

Shading will always be a problem at start.
Get used to it.

Also, dark colors look bad when that sprite goes to a shadowed area in a map,
since the shadow makes the colors darker.

[Asmo X]

There are lots of sprites that use dark colours. This sprite looks poorly lit. There's a bit of a difference.

[mav]

Trust me, using existing palettes will work out on this one. Lemme think...Male Wizard's red robe may be too bright, but it's got the crimson color you want...

I dunno off the top of my head, but just take an existing sprite's colors--it'll work out well for you.

[Quo]

Trust me, using existing palettes will work out on this one. Lemme think...Male Wizard's red robe may be too bright, but it's got the crimson color you want...

I dunno off the top of my head, but just take an existing sprite's colors--it'll work out well for you.

I got all the colors by just sampling from pre-existing sprites within the game (I do that all the time). In this case, the Dark Knights

I also tried to keep most of the original shading in-tact. I pretty much just edited the torso to make it look like the shirt is untucked like it's supposed to be.

Anyway-- the new sprite is in the first post... what's everybody think?

[Sen]

use darker shading at the line under the shirt's collar

[Tersius]

I also decided to try and start a new habit of saving the different stages of the sprite so I can go back to previous ones if need be. Good habit to have. I've been a fool to not be doing that all along...

If you are doing this in Gimp, I'd recommend using layers to do this.  It's very handy for experimenting because it allows you to rapidly see a before and after of your change.  IE you put your change in a new layer on top of the sprite and just click the eye icon to hide/show it.  

To further aid this you can have a zoomed in view (for editing), and a zoomed out view that shows what it would look like in game.  This way you can quickly track down which parts of the new or old version "don't look right".

[mav]

This one looks much better. Good job. I can't tell if you brightened the sprite or not, but the change in hair color was a smart move. Though I agree with Sen:

use darker shading at the line under the shirt's collar

[Quo]

If you can believe it, I've started from scratch all over again... (My bad~)

I also refrained from messing with anything except for the shirt tails this time. I trust SE more than I trust myself with shading... >>;;

Hopefully I can actually start on the damn sheet now. I promised to make a sprite for somebody next, and I need to finish this first...

[ArkDelgato]

I just love the look of Ramza in that shirt.
He just looks so laid back and happy.

[Sen]

I'm seeing it as Ramza on the aftermath of the LionWar
Living peaceful and happy

[Asmo X]

Colours are much better. I like the one in the middle.