Tips, Ideas, Guides...

[Nami]

Hi,

I want to start helping and contributing to The Mana World through pixelling, I am new to all this so I guess I would need some help.

I currently use GIMP so maybe if you guys can post any tips, pointers and things useful for me to know etc etc.

Many thanks,

[Crush]

Hello Nami.

When I understood you correctly, you want to be a pixel artist, but you don't know how to do pixel art yet.

The best starting point is our graphical guidelines page on the wiki. You will find a list of tutorials at the end. The tutorial by Tsugumo is especially interesting. After you followed that tutorial you should know the basics you need to contribute.
http://wiki.themanaworld.org/index.php/Guidelines

[Alige]

Greetings Nami.

Pixel art is fairly simple but goes through a lot of rules before it gets in game. I first suggest you to start with icons since it is not a big work like an entire spritesheet. Feel free to start making some personal ideas first then when you'll feel confident enough, you can start by asking what developers need.

When you want to create an icon, start by following these rules. Please note that these apply to most of the art, there are some special cases, as always.

• The icon must be 32x32 pixels.
• The icon must have a transparent background.
• The lightsource comes from the top left of the icon. Look at current items to see how the lightsource works.
• You must avoid using blurring tools, just use the pencil. I know, pixel art takes time...
• Avoid perfect shapes, meaning which squares and circles are to be avoided.
• Avoid taking an image from the internet and modify it, just start from scratch.

Complete this standard checklist before posting your work, well do as far as you can. Check on the internet if you don't know exactly what each of them are.

• Shading
• Texture
• Outline
• Lightning
• Anti-Aliasing
• Perspective

Don't hesitate to contact me by a PM if you need some advice about a work in progress (WIP) of yours.
Best regards,
Ali-G

[Nami]

Thanks a bunch Crush and Ali, the tutorials have been a great help and Ali, your check list will play a big part in my concoctions, very much appreciated.

One thing i feel I need help in, is lineart, I find it difficult to perfect...any pointers again?

Many thanks,

[Crush]

One thing i feel I need help in, is lineart, I find it difficult to perfect...any pointers again?

It's hard to tell what kind of advice you need without you showing us a sample of your work.

[Nami]

One thing i feel I need help in, is lineart, I find it difficult to perfect...any pointers again?

It's hard to tell what kind of advice you need without you showing us a sample of your work.

Well, I am working on something at the moment, I'll upload it as soon as I have done.

[TeZeR.D]

One thing i feel I need help in, is lineart, I find it difficult to perfect...any pointers again?

It's hard to tell what kind of advice you need without you showing us a sample of your work.

Well, I am working on something at the moment, I'll upload it as soon as I have done.

Itll be easier if you post your work in progress.

[Nami]

Here is my first draft of a Wolf's tooth.

[Nami]

quick update....
Although I'm still not entirely happy with the shape, open to any idea's and suggestions to improve.

[Crush]

It seems to me like you used a soft brush for shading the "shade3" version. The resulting look is very different from the existing graphics. It would look out of place when put into the game.

The principle number one of the pixel art style is to use a restricted color palette and stick to it by using only tools which do not create mixed colors. I would recommend you to pick the brightest, darkest and an average shade of the colors you used and then redo the shading with only these colors while using the pencil tool with the "Circle (01)" brush (not scaled), hard edges and 100% opacity.

The first one looks better, but it is also using much more shades than necessary.

[Nami]

It seems to me like you used a soft brush for shading the "shade3" version. The resulting look is very different from the existing graphics. It would look out of place when put into the game.

The principle number one of the pixel art style is to use a restricted color palette and stick to it by using only tools which do not create mixed colors. I would recommend you to pick the brightest, darkest and an average shade of the colors you used and then redo the shading with only these colors while using the pencil tool with the "Circle (01)" brush (not scaled), hard edges and 100% opacity.

The first one looks better, but it is also using much more shades than necessary.

Ok, thanks I will take these into account on my next draft, what about the shape, what do you think?

[Nami]

Here is a redrawn one, from scratch, i used less and lighter colour's so it looks like off-white, I also changed the lineart thanks to Matt.
Again, comments and suggested improvements are welcome.

[Nami]

after some discussion in irc, we figured it would be better to use this item as a necklace/charm sort of thing, so heres my first rough draft...

[salmondine]

Here is a redrawn one, from scratch, i used less and lighter colour's so it looks like off-white, I also changed the lineart thanks to Matt.
Again, comments and suggested improvements are welcome.

I really like this shape, the shading can still be improved, a wolf kill wouldn't drop a necklace, it would drop a tooth.
A tooth that could be made into a necklace later.

So I advise working more on the last tooth image, it has a great outline now that clearly shows what it is
try to shade it to show better top left lighting and try to limit the colors used to 6.

The tooth could be smaller, if you can manage it, but it does not have to be. if it is going to be crafted into a necklace when finished then
as the necklace image shows you seem to be aware of this.

sorry I miss you on IRC we have different timezones ...timezones suck =]
I have to say that viewing your starting images and what you have here so far, you are making great progress...it is a process so don't give up!

[edit] to remove the white in gimp, first create an alpha channel, then use the color select tool, select by clicking on the white area and press delete ... presto the white is gone and you have a transparent background.

you can use gimp for this after using whatever graphics program you wish to create an image in. [/edit]

[Nami]

Thanks for the advise Salmondine.
I am better at using GIMP now thanks to Ali-G.
Time zones do suck
I will try and use what you have said in my work.

Thanks,