Hi All!

I have been working on this Monster pic, I like where it is
going but I believe the texture and horn colouration is in need of improvment, the background colour may not have been the best choise but for now I'd like to focus on the monster itself any suggestions for improvment?
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I had read thru that tutorial and that was where I learned my dithering tricks from,whats so bad about the banding? If the banding is bad what can I do instead?

I'm a little new to Pixel art aswell. whats fugly?

I am sorry but I am at a loss as to how I can improve the appearance!

Everything I say is my opinion only and everyone has their own which is just as valid so an apology is never required.
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When pixelling and changing colors or editing them make sure you leave no stray pixels. In '2' the green pixels are strays in your art.

Also in '2' in red pixels is 'line quality' overlaid with yours. Generally speaking lines in pixelart like to be stepped so that its a smooth as possible. For example, a line of pixelart that is (each number is a pixel count) 1-2-3-5-8-11 is going to look better than 1-3-2-5-4-7. The added benefit of good line quality is that you have to AA less, thus controlling things on a pixel level. Sometimes you can't do this but you always want to have the best lines possible even when the lines are colored and won't even show too much. With black lines you always want to keep them real clean.

My edit is just a quickie and is just to show you a visual. Click the image to zoom in and see what you see.

Kay I tried something similar to your version on his mouth
what do you think?

That wasn't the final piece however I'm still on it.

The light source appears to be from more top down. This is indicated by the strongest element of your piece the horns which drive the attention downward onto the face.
The issue is that your have drawn the rest of the figure with your light source oriented from a front and to our left origin. The shadows on his body as it curves away to the right are heavy but to the left they are not. This suggests that he is either not as heavily curved on that side or angled to the side somewhat (which is NOT implied by the symmetry you have in place).

Another point that catches my eye is that this monster is highly chaotic in shape and design. You use a lot of erratic lines and texturing which is meant to show a somewhat rough and bumpy figure. Literally every part of this guy is loose on control. EXCEPT THE PUPILS They are so geometric that they feel out of place.

Suggestions: Try widening the shadow on our left side (his right) to give more curvature to his body. Be careful with this as you put yourself in danger of pillowing it. Consider your light source intentions and ensure that everything is in line with your desires. Pupils! And maybe you can throw a bit of that green color you are using on his eyebrows as a highlight to make them not seem so flat by comparison to the rest of the piece.

It has more depth than the original.

Thoughts anyone?

Do you think his arms are to thin in comparison with its legs?

When he said the eyes are to geometricle you literally took of one pixel. Now I realize when you are looking at the picture closely it makes a bigger difference but from no zoom it seems to make almost no difference at all. So when he said that he meant more then just a rounded geometric square.

Other then that you could probably call it done. If you are happy with it thr means it is done, to me at least. If you want a challenge try adding a spiral patterns in the horns. Doing so can do no harm and will only improve you as a pixel artist. I see how much better your current is to your first version. That's an awesome improvement so good job.

Hi Turon ! You've gotten through a pretty neat progression so far. You can call it done if you like, there's a clear improvement since your first post.

tho you can always improve ! I edited you piece to show a few things :



First things is I changed the color palette a little bit : you had a kind of dark muddy yellow that wasn't really useful and had pretty much the same value as the orange you use for the horns and the shadows of the yellow areas so I merged em together and use the remaining color slot to add a darker brown I used on the eyebrows to define volume and in the darker areas to add more depth.
Don't be affraid to tweak colors too, put your palette on the side and see wich colors are really necessary and those you can change. It's about optimization.

I think you've got most of the important things in PA : anti-aliasing, lights and shadows. these are not perfect but you're in the right direction. The outline is still a little jaggy tho.

You can still improve it by adding highlights and shadows here and there to define shapes more clearly and add details. For example, the yellow color can be used on the horns for some highlights, a few white pixels on the face can help too (like on the lip for example)

Now it's all about detailing and artistic choices.

(I also changed the red frame, didn't feel like it had much use except affect readability)

Hope it helps ! I'm not great considering critics

Edited by FrostPumpkin - 28 May 2014 at 12:40pm