Very great edit and information Ter13, but I was trying to get Akando to use what he has learned from reading a few tutorials before I made an edit, so he could have learned first hand.
In response to Chaorace
Chaorace wrote:
Very great edit and information Ter13, but I was trying to get Akando to use what he has learned from reading a few tutorials before I made an edit, so he could have learned first hand.

Less an edit so much as my own take on the carnivorous plant trope ubiquitous in gaming thanks to japan.


As for the learning first hand thing, that's why I included my play-by-play. The hardest part for me to learn when it came to graphics was the thought process behind every step.

I've been doing graphic art for games for about thirteen years now, and honestly, I just started understanding the medium maybe a year ago.

Tutorials aren't everything. Sometimes it just takes a bit of jealousy and inspiration. For me, it took a number of people one-upping me, and pointing out my mistakes to finally figure it out. (Thanks Vrocaan!)
Thank you Ter13, that kind of thing is what I need to do better, and I am working on this. I am using yours as a reference and changing the perspective... Challenge accepted.

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I think I made it to unsaturated now lol.


Went ahead and uploaded it to give myself a reference of it at normal size.

Doing without the background to see if that helps.


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No Leafs:

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Nice improvement, it definitely gave it more of a vicious look, only thing it lacks is a definite light source so you can shade in some depth, and if you're going for that bark look on the stalk like Ter13 had it, then you should definitely texture it. Overall very good improvement, just need a few things which I'm sure you can handle using Ter13's as reference
The tutorials linked helped a hell of a lot as well, just Ter13's stuff gave more of a focused idea of what to look at so I knew what I needed to study more of, instead of just everything in general.
Everything is good to study in general too! Lol But yeah I understand what you're saying. I was just trying to get you to use what you learned from those tutorials so you could teach yourself kind of thing like I had to aha
I am having a hell of a time on the texture of the stalk as if I do a really dark color it looks strange. Also I did a defined light source, but it gets lost cause of the leafs, let me upload without the leafs.
Uploaded the one without leafs.

Very true, looking over everything is very beneficial cause I found some shading stuff I forgot about.

The shading kind of gets lost because I shaded in the top left corner, and then re highlighted around the mouth to make it appear like it was sticking out like in Ter's and my original at the end of the oval.
Yes, also please remember light does reflect. Also, I think you should go back to your 3/4th perspective one because it's easier for beginners to shade in that perspective, for me it was atleast.
Could you give me an example of the reflectiveness you are speaking up?

Like how it reflects the color so if you have blue and red, if the light shines on the red then the blue will be tinted red?

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Last attempt of the night with this one, I don't think it is going to change it much but we shall see.

Argh it seems so much smaller when put on the forums, and loses a lot of detail lol.
It seems you rushed to get in the details before even adding depth to the most basic objects first.. sorry for the crappy 5 minute edit, I think you should go back to 3/4th perspective and start from here(obviously change the palette I used here, I quickly grabbed a few colors from graphicsgale)
and add depth to the most basics of shapes then move on to the actual detailing of leaves and all that after you have your light source going.



After you finish doing this you can then move on to the details, like I kinda started but I want to sleep now, and from this it should guide you in where to place your colors. But I really think you should try it from this perspective again.

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I think I am going to sit back and let some of the stuff brew for a few days and then try again.
make it less flat looking, it needs volume.
From what I see, you need to stop everything, and learn fromt he beginning not worrying about shading atm, this will help you build up better, you need your lines correctly. I Mean if you were going for straight lines all around then hey, but you need to clean those up and learn about angles and arcs etc.

I'm not sure I can help you anymore right now becuase I gave you all the help and materials you needed along with Ter13 giving you a very detailed tutorial. ALl I can tell you now, is to read this VERY CAREFULLY. http://makegames.tumblr.com/post/42648699708/ pixel-art-tutorial

Then apply that to this piece, and you should have made a big improvement, trust me. All that's left for you to do is practice. Just skim through the AA part because you don't really need it on this sprite, but it's good to no how to AA in general.
Derek Yu's tutorial is indeed a great place to look. I wish I had that guy's skill and style. Overall, though, your pallette has improved quite a lot. The shading, though, I still think you need to think about geometric shapes.

Remember, the highlight should not be at the edge of a spherical or cylindrical object. Take a look at these shapes, and try to think of your object as a group of geometric shapes:



Once you learn to create a convincing creature, you can start to break the rules in order to adhere to a style.

Take a look at some of my previous work. I break quite a number of rules, but once you pick up a style, you can start to have some fun with it and just go with it.













In response to Ter13
Ter13 wrote:
Derek Yu's tutorial is indeed a great place to look. I wish I had that guy's skill and style. Overall, though, your pallette has improved quite a lot. The shading, though, I still think you need to think about geometric shapes.

Remember, the highlight should not be at the edge of a spherical or cylindrical object. Take a look at these shapes, and try to think of your object as a group of geometric shapes:



Once you learn to create a convincing creature, you can start to break the rules in order to adhere to a style.

Take a look at some of my previous work. I break quite a number of rules, but once you pick up a style, you can start to have some fun with it and just go with it.














Can i have your turf?
In response to D4rk3 Marshmell0w
Go home, Penguin.
Ter13, How can I play "super retro dungeon guy"?
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