Need help with owl character.
Printed From: Pixel Joint
Category: Pixel Art
Forum Name: WIP (Work In Progress)
Forum Discription: Get crits and comments on your pixel WIPs and other art too!
URL: https://pixeljoint.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=11498
Printed Date: 29 December 2025 at 2:59pm
Topic: Need help with owl character.
Posted By: Pantamime
Subject: Need help with owl character.
Date Posted: 03 January 2011 at 1:31pm
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Hello, I am new to pixel art and staring sprite work for a game I want to create.
Been workin on this for a long time. Any advice would be helpful. Are the wings placed ok? The step? any way to improve the shading?
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Replies:
Posted By: jalonso
Date Posted: 03 January 2011 at 3:03pm
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Generally speaking its ok. It has form and volume and it does read... However, at this stage its not pixelart. You have Oekaki (pixelart's little brother). The difference is precision and deliberate pixel placement. In your brain don't 'paint' with pixels, instead use light to define the areas with only the pixels that are needed and nothing else. Smooth and soften with AA. Use jaggy areas to your advantage by coloring the lineart where needed. The wings especially have far too much sqribbling to read well (see 'hall of fame' in front gallery page. This is from the noobtorial thread:   ------------- |
Posted By: Pantamime
Date Posted: 03 January 2011 at 3:38pm
| Thanks for the reply. I have to learn more about the correct pixel placement i think. It looks a lot messier than i want it to. I will check out those suggestion, i need to learn AA. Gonna work on it some and repost for criticism. |
Posted By: ChrisButton
Date Posted: 03 January 2011 at 5:41pm
| You should call him 'Gand-OWL-f' |
Posted By: Pantamime
Date Posted: 03 January 2011 at 7:05pm
Lol I like the name. I cleaned him up a bit and re-detailed face. The highlighting around waist is for belt. Kinda redesigned the bottom of robe as well. How is it looking so far?
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Posted By: Ichitoko
Date Posted: 03 January 2011 at 10:48pm
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Looking much cleaner. C:
Some of the brown hues and blue hues are similar, so you could probably ax one (or a few) of them to make color management easier. Instead of the lines you have on the wings now, it would look better if you defined actual feathers. |
Posted By: Pantamime
Date Posted: 05 January 2011 at 3:30am
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Thanks for the replies. I redesigned the placement of the wings although i am not anywere near happy with them. It is turning out harder than i thought to pixelate wings lol.
Changed his robe to a white/gray. I am about 5 frames deep in a very amature walking animation for this guy, but i am going to keep working on his look/attitude before I think of finishing that. I want him to look a little aggressive and a little hunched. Since he has the birdy feet he uses a can to stabilize himself.
Any tips on drawing wings would be the greatest help. Any tips at all would be great actually. I appreciate your guys input a lot. I am still kinda new to this only about 4 days of experience, so i apologize for my not up to snuff sprites. I only want to learn and be able to create good eye catching and detailed characters.
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Posted By: jalonso
Date Posted: 05 January 2011 at 8:43am
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Originally posted by Pantamime ...It is turning out harder than i thought to pixelate wings lol. This new design doesn't work as well as you original did. Like all art, pixelart is a visual communication so you need to focus on having your ideas read clearly. The wings will give you problems until you understand that pixelart likes 'less'. Things like feathers might seem to need a lot of pixels but to read and communicate you need the least amount of pixels. As I mentioned before place in your brain the 'lights' and 'shadows' of a feathered wing and ignore the feathers. This is a little bigger than your piece but clearly shows that the feathers are created by just indicating the dark and light within the feathers ../files/icons/full/fairy_beta.gif">  This is more in the scale you are working on. Notice here too the feather 'effect' is creating by indicating some dark and light within the wing using the least amount of pixels  This example, also in the same scale, is similar to the red bird but with slightly more pixelwork.  Feathers are difficult even for the experienced so don't give up. You'll learn a lot about handling pixels from this piece. The scratchy/messy business within the wings in your piece indicate that you are fighting your brain. You understand that feathers are busy and full of details and made of many lines...you are trying to force that in. An example. If you made a tree you would most likely use the same technique of over drawing/pixelling/sqruibbling as you have in the wings. Your brain knows that trees have a lot of tiny leaves and trying to place them all in leads to a pixel pudding. However drawing by light and shadow you would get better results. ../files/icons/full/fahristfinall.gif">  ../files/icons/full/tree.png"> ------------- |
Posted By: Pantamime
Date Posted: 05 January 2011 at 11:19am
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OMG you are awesome!! Thank you so much for posting those pics. Everythime i tried to find a winged sprite pixel art I'd only find random crap. This definately will help me out.
That is crazy how you use less to create the effects, but it makes complete sense now. I am going to re-work the original wing draft and scratch these other 2 ideas I have been toiling with. (the one i posted with wing folded down and another with wing as arm.)They both look messy and cluttered too much stuff draping over the character.
All those pics have the perfect wing placement and that last pic is pretty close to what I am doing actually. An Owl-Human hybrid.
I will post an update later. But for now i took a break from all these wings to see if i could get pixeling down a little better with a regular human. What do you think? Am i still using too much? (I just scribbled the smoke rose together so i know that needs attention, i think thats a problem i get distracted with ideas too quick and lose focus on making things actually read through.
Thanks much!!!
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Posted By: jalonso
Date Posted: 05 January 2011 at 11:39am
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Concentrate on one thing at a time. The techniques used in the wings also apply to fabric, hair and pretty much anything at all...its pixel placement precision. Once you cross that hurdle you'll be on your way :)
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Posted By: Pantamime
Date Posted: 05 January 2011 at 11:44am
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LOL yea I know I need to stick with one idea. But after hitting my head on deask over those wings for all yesterday i wanted to try to draw up anoher one of my sketches. I think i realise it is my palette choice and the way i dont understand pixel clusters.
I am going to do some more reading on that and hopefully this next Owl draft will be easier on the eyes :) . Thanks for your replies!!
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