OKAY. so Ive just spent the last 30 minutes making some pixel-art for an article, only to find the article upload section is unavailable? ANYHOW...
I was making a house for my rpg and decided to do a step by step diagram, to show its progress and to help those who find the whole Iso. Pixel art thing difficult, which it really isn't...really.
The steps aren't very gradual im afraid, but still it MIGHT help some people
1)Make a base area.Note information- Basic isometric, horizontal shapes go along in twos and up in ones.
2)Create a box! Make another base area above the orignal, "above" depending on how high you want your house! Join the corners with vertical lines and delete the inbetween lines.
3)Add a roof! For style and character, make some lines curved. Break the rules, they don't have to be perfect when adding character!
4)Add other details! Using the first technique, make windows, doors and chimneys, although my chimney is delibratley warped.
5)Add basic color, where light hits the house etc.I used a stormy-blue for slate-style tiles.
6)Add more details slowly and carefully, thinking about where the light source is coming from.
7)Um... add even more detail! pixels here and there. Perfection is the key but not always- Put the house in a location, mines in a grassy field with a muddy path leading to the door.
Final Image. Note simple background, lighter in color, black outline left around the perimeter of the sprite. Some green pixels used at the base of the house, as if the grass is growing long around the sides of the building!
Very nice building sprite. I like how it turned out, but I had a little trouble fallowing the steps & use them from building more complex organic sprites.
Thanks Brandon. Did you mean the way they're laid out, or as in the way I wrote them? As I said, they don't seem to be very gradual! Hopefully people can study the final image and realise how some effects are achieved, thats what I use to do. Buy game magazines, study the sprites in screenshots and eventually techniques began to click into place. Still, Im learning!
Your comment looks like an excuse to start yet ANOTHER argument. Showing my drawing off? My dear, if we're comparing it to your standards-then hell, everyone's showing off.
lol, phizzy, i'm just curious as to what you expect in terms of description, like what exactly are you expecting him to describe?
digital dreams, that's a good method for quick iso building pixelling. also like brandon cassata said it's not very effective when it comes to organic sprites; not your fault though. it's mainly because they jsut require different methods, especially with the line art. colouring can be transferred over to many forms of pixelling, but line art can vary from subtle differences to great differences; for instance, the differences between fighting game characters and rpg characters varies greatly, even one rpg compared to another may have great amounts of differences or very little.
nice house though hint, since you already lightened the roof, it would be better to do the same with all the other darker lines: the window outlines and the exterior wood designs or whatever they're called
Thanks sensation, at least your being helpful! Yeah i was going to but I couldnt be bothered to get picky, even though i babble on about perfection, in some cases, being the key. Its not really meant to be an in-depth article, I just wanted to produce and explain a diagram that showed progress, and that gave a reasonable pixel house.
Can someone ban Phizzy? Any topic started by Digital Dreams turns into a flame-war because of him!
And as for the article - good! Maybe you could add it to http://www.klikacademy.com, or maybe if you had the time you could do a whole course (beware, this takes time). And so what if he's showing off his work? That's partly what these forums are for, and it's something everyone has done when they're particularly proud of a bit of work. Grow up Phizzy, and DD, just ignore him.
Thanks noodle, Im glad someones finally seeing whats going on. Well I might do another "article" later on, for a tree or something perhaps. Yeah Ill post it on Klik academy sometime!! Probably later tonight!
Its an opinion come sly, bitchy comment, thats what the people with sense have actually noticed,- the fact that hes doing it in all my threads and in many others to.
Its really nice pixel art, but I dont think its that helpful. You explain the stages of creating, but you dont actually tell people how to do all the detail and shading, for example if you say 'add windows!' It won't help people create windows any better.
but you see thats how I learnt. I studied different examples, I never looked at colouring techniques etc. I just realised where you have to place highlights and shadows, textures etc, by looking at different examples. Man its so damn easy if you just go around looking a pixel art all night!
That's a nice picture for sure, but it is almost useless as an article.
However, I fully rest the flame-warriness of this topic in Digital Dreams court. Phizzy made a REAL comment on what he thought you were doing, and you used it as an excuse to start a flamewar; then blame it on him. Nice try, but I can read.
@Digital Dreams: It is an awesome final product indeed, but I'd like to see a few more steps between both 2 to 3 and 3 to 4. That'd give the artist a better overview to the artwork. But great work!
Just one advice, get rid of the black outlines (if you want) and add more blending colors to get it a more realistic look rather than a pixel house. Don't get me wrong, it's just my thought.