Castle Paradox

[DemocraticAnarchist]

Right, this sounds a bit dumb, but anyway. I can draw pretty well using the ohr, psp7 etc. The thing is i cant seem to draw walkabout graphics. Not the up or down ones mind you. just the left and right. The chars always seem to be sliding along, not actually walking. Ideas?
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What cruel person decided lisp should have an s in it?

[Sew]

Example, please.

~Sew

[Flamer]

i know what you mean...

try to counter this problem by shifting the character up one pixel while changing picture...

i found my way to getting fid of it, don't use "flat" feet on both pictures and use an "angled" feet for one of the two.
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If we were a pack of dogs, IM would be a grand Hound, CN would be a very ficious little pitball, and Giz...well, it doesn't matter breed he is, he'd still be a bitch
(no offense to anyone that was mentioned)

[Setu_Firestorm]

That's funny. I draw really good walkabouts, semi-good battle graphics, "so-so" maptiles, and semi-crappy in any other program.
Maybe we should team up.
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Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/georgerpowell
Newgrounds: http://setu-firestorm.newgrounds.com

[jabbercat]

I got really sick of my terrable walkabouts so I did all my walkabouts facing me and no frames of animation.They are actually quite good
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Moogle no longer owes prizes.

[Flamer]

my walkabouts are alright, maptiles are so-so, battle graphics good(after a long period of time, of course) and battle background/any other programs are utter crap...

small pixel drawings are easy to draw for me. the way i get backdrops is by scanning, but i have no scanner anymore...

battle graphics is good because it's not too big, or too small... actually it's a tad too big. but it works out for me somehow.

practice makes perfect (if not close to it) i spent ages on end practicing battle and walkabouts (mainly because it's small and doesn't require a large amount of time to reproduce a similar picture (not via Ctrl+C => Ctrl+V)
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If we were a pack of dogs, IM would be a grand Hound, CN would be a very ficious little pitball, and Giz...well, it doesn't matter breed he is, he'd still be a bitch
(no offense to anyone that was mentioned)

[Setu_Firestorm]

I know what you mean, man. For some strange reason, it's so much easier to create something in a 20 x 20 dimension rather than a 320 x 200 dimension.

It's a hard concept to understand.
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Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/georgerpowell
Newgrounds: http://setu-firestorm.newgrounds.com

[DemocraticAnarchist]

[EDIT] Okay, my damn site wont link to here. So to see what i mean, go to http://democraticanarchist.tripod.com/rok
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What cruel person decided lisp should have an s in it?

[Flamer]

which picture are you pointing at anyway??

if it's the one in the cartoon pics section... i'd say the feet aren't moving and you're just making him hop/bounce/jump
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If we were a pack of dogs, IM would be a grand Hound, CN would be a very ficious little pitball, and Giz...well, it doesn't matter breed he is, he'd still be a bitch
(no offense to anyone that was mentioned)

[DemocraticAnarchist]

Thats the one. The feet do change, and the 1pixel up on the second frame is only to make it look more humanlike. I think.
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What cruel person decided lisp should have an s in it?

[Shadowiii]

I consider myself a walkaround expert (not to be cocky...:p) but I'll give you a few tips.

Ok first, you have to decide whether or not you are drawing them in a super-deformed style (FF) or a regular style (Powerstick Man). Also, you have to decide where the super-deformed is Anime or something else.

Another important pre-step is to look at a picture you drew of the guy, or his hero graphic, or SOMETHING and figure out ALL his details. NEVER EVER DRAW 'spur of the moment.' You have to decide how this person's hair is, what clothing they wear, their gender, everything. Figure this out in as much detail as possible before begining work.

The next thing (after you've decided that) is to draw on the side of the OHR drawing...thing the area you will designate to each area (head, chest, legs) Usually the head and hair a huge; up to 8 pixels. Then 4 and 4 for the remaining. This may sound bad/ugly, but designating your areas really helps. You don't have to draw it into the picture, but you should probably set some guidelines so you don't run out of space (I still do frequently). I personally prefer super-deformed to anytihing else, simply because:
1. More facial detail
2. Easier to draw legs, body, and arms
3. Interesting hair patterns that match the character

However, realistic NPC's can be drawn well too, though I personally am not skilled in that area.

This next part is probably the most important of my mind. Its MANIPULATING BLACK. Black is the best color for walkarounds. I'll say that giving an outline, even if it is just a basic black outline, looks good. Your current walkarounds have nothing defining them from the backdrops. Even though giving them a black-outline is good, it'll probably not be the best thing. Black is best used to trick the viewer into thinking that there is clothing behind a person. Remember, if there is nothing but clear behind a character with a cape, then...there is not cape. If you paint the whole part behind them brown for the cape, it will clash with the character's fore-body and ruin a sense of balance. However, a few well-placed dark brown pixels with black filler look very good. Plus, if a character's arms are close by the body (say, one or two pixels) this is doubly-percieved as both an arm shadow, the cape, AND an outline. I know this sounds dumb, but it really works.

After you've drawn your basic stuff (cruddy colors) and put in the black, shading time. But first lets talk about walking and stuff. I usually first draw a 'standing' sprite simply because that makes it good to work off of. For up/down, I have to modify the standing sprite for each one, but for the side-by-side, the standing can be one of the animations (don't ask me why its like this; it just works this way). Ok back to the spriteing. Shading is the most important part of drawing a good NPC. First, you want to make sure the head looks basically round. I noticed you have some square-headed NPC's on your site. As a rule, NEVER EVER let ANYTHING that is part of the face, hair, or head, square off. No one's face is EVER square. Always diagional if possible. After that, shading (man, I keep getting off topic). Anyway, about the shading...this is somthing you have to find on your own. Hair is the most difficult to shade in my opinion. Remember to use highlights for the closer part of the hair. Use your ideas you thought up earlier and just draw like a madman. If a pixel looks out of place, put a darker shade, or black. Black usually can fix everything. Jsut don't overuse it.

Note: Everything after here got erased in a freak cut/paste incident. Sorry.

First of all, on the up downs, you should have both the character's arms AND legs move. Also, remember that arms dont' just bounce up and down, they go BACK. So...BLACK!! Black can symbolize the guy's arms and legs going back and forth pretty good. I personally hate the bouncing thing (that is, shifting an NPC up and down during the walkaround) because...it just looks bad. Trust me.

Side to side is evil. First, draw a standing. Arms should be down, legs should be straight. Then, for the stepping, one leg should be forward, another backwards, opposite arm forward, other backwards. It is important to add details now. Make the hair bounce up and down. Have his/her shoulder's turn a bit (for the up/downs). These things are hard and may seem insignificant, but they are waht really distingishes a decent NPC from an exceptional one.

Erm, yeah. As you can see, it usually takes me an hour to draw an exceptional NPC. Town NPC's can usually be manipulated off of other towns-people, so once I draw a frame I can just work off of it.

Remember this: the Hero NPC is what everyone sees through the ENTIRE GAME. IT had BETTER LOOK GOOD or the player won't want to play.

Yeah, that's about it.
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But enough talk, have at you!

[Flamer]

wow, thay's a good outline on how to draw most walkabouts (not all, cos there's always one or two that never works)
it helps out to at least read it (even though it is a bit long)
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If we were a pack of dogs, IM would be a grand Hound, CN would be a very ficious little pitball, and Giz...well, it doesn't matter breed he is, he'd still be a bitch
(no offense to anyone that was mentioned)

[DemocraticAnarchist]

Woah, thanks shadowii. That really helped. Btw, those really evil flat headed one pallette THINGS are about 14 months old, im just too lazy to update my site ^_^. They gone now. Anyway, thanks again.
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What cruel person decided lisp should have an s in it?

[Shadowiii]

For the record, I'll have some NPC shots up soon if you want to see, as soon as I finish them and Mr. B finishes the villiage tilemap...

Erm, I was going to add some stuff to my little tutorial, but I forgot what it was. Something about legs I think...ah well.
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But enough talk, have at you!

[MultiColoredWizard]

Kudos on the walkabout guide, Shadowiii. It's everything I would have said but in a more formal way.

Yeah.. Shadow really has the basis here, but I still don't see why he never mentioned anything about making the movements dramatic.