By blckpantha at 2010-10-18

eh thought I should finally start reworking lol

Lol I don't see any problems as of this update after all this is v6(well more of v6.5), but I got my arms how I want them next is to finish the legs. Now if you are referring to the pillowing once again it was a choice.

lol no offense dude but I'm not taking an easy way out I'm choosing to make use of an unused shading it's like choosing to draw over paint and if you can't understand that then you have no place in the art world. As for the animation I'm not asking what's wrong with it I'm asking how would you fix it cause you sit and say "Oh the same thing's wrong", but you never said what, 'cause as a W.I.P. it's prone to have parts that I haven't worked closely on, so let's critique and more actual advice as my art teacher would say.

UUUUGGGHH, is this non arguable subject STILL being argued about??? Leave the shading alone. It's not "The Easy Way Out". You just don't know how to use that lighting the way he's using it. He already said he still needs to work on the legs. The arm Animation actually looks better. Now, all he needs to make the legs look as if they are moving the character forward, rather than stomping the ground.

A good way to do that is by...hm.. Pretty much just make the legs look as if the hollow was putting one foot in front of the other. The legs should fall back, then forward, then up... rather than falling straight to the ground, then slightly forward, then up :/.

I hope that can help understand what needs to be done without any visuals :).

Lol Thx Shadow finally someone gets it. I haven't finished the legs though because of the structure, but yeah that's some good advice on the legs I've started the thigh area to make it more of an up down as well as back and forth. I'll post a newer one as soon as I get this Tosen Hollow form straight.

I'd actually say duke is right on this one. If you can't accept the fact that there are no "rules" to art, then GTFO of the art world. There are conventions, and while many choose to follow said conventions others do what they think looks best. Art is a flowing, ever-winding river. What looked good last year looks like crap this year. So how about everyone just ignores his pillow shading, which he said he already knows about, and give him some constructive criticism (while ignoring the fact that the pillow shading does sort of burn your eyes). For example: The anatomy of the legs looks weird and so it also causes the walking to look strange. I wouldn't even know how to make the walking look right with legs like that, because it really looks like the creatures joints should bend in the opposite direction of a human's legs (like the hind legs of a dog or horse, but it would need four legs to walk/gallop like that). Furthermore, Even though this was only inspired by Allon, Allon's legs were just like a normal human's legs except furry and with horse hooves so make the leg anatomy more human-like. Lastly, I think you could give the leg a fur-like texture because right now it looks like he's wearing tight spandex pants, and I don't think that's what you wanted O.O.

Was that so hard?

This is a very long post.

You know, he did say what he felt was wrong with it in an earlier post in this topic. You posted an updated version, and he replied that what he felt was wrong with it in his earlier post still applies. Yet everyone is jumping down his throat (while hilariously agreeing with him at the same time about the animation and anatomy) saying that he didn't point out what was wrong with it, or that he's be some sort of artistic repressive dictator. All the while you guys ignored his earlier critique, while at the same time essentially being what you're accusing him to be: an elitist for pillow shading - since you guys are absolutely refusing to even think about the possibility it may look better non-pillowed. I'd also hope you guys actually stay on topic again if you really do want to argue about this, otherwise I am going to start throwing out bans. No bullshit "well this can be used with a ball" that has no relation to the piece of work we're suppose to be critiquing.

@Cody
You clearly don't know anything about the art world if you think rules don't matter. You can't just ignore stuff like composition, colors, shape, and line and call it a day. Everyone from Picasso to Jackson Pollock followed these rules to some degree. Conveying a humanoid monster in 3D using 2D graphics has even more rules you need to follow than what I mentioned, otherwise you'll the miss the mark on what you're trying to represent completely.
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I didn't properly critique your thing earlier so I'm going to do so right now. It has potential to be great looking, but right now it's a bit ugly and needs a lot of work. The main issues I see is the animation, lighting, and anatomy (which ties in with the animation+lighting) in parts. The colors could use some work too. I'm also sick of people (including you) defending the use of pillow shading when it could look so much better.

1. Animation:
He's still way too rigid, and looks like a robot that's marching in place. When he lifts his leg up to step forward, you need to convey that better. Make it move forward rather than up. A trick you can use is to make it increase in size, since objects that are closer appear larger. Another trick is to have the leg come down a couple pixels. His body should not stay at the same height during a walk cycle, but rather bob up and down. Add more movement to the hips, and body. Right now the main body just stays the same while the arms, legs, and boobs flail around. Also move and twist the body with the forward movement of the arms and legs. The entire arm should be moving, not just the forearm down. They way you shaped the arm moving forward and backward just has it moving left and right on a flat plane. Actually change the shape and size of the arm a bit to convey that movement better (larger forward, different angle because the arm moved upward, smaller-backward, etc.)

2. Lighting:

It looks like a flat creepy-crawler to me, or something that's being pushed up against a glass window because of the completely uniform shading and colors. The abs look like they they're on the exact same plane as the pecs (or boobs), which looking at reference pics of the hollow you're trying to draw isn't the case. Those abs are further back and the pecs bulge out, but your lighting doesn't suggest that. Also, since he's a satyr he has furry legs, like a goat, though I'm going to assume the best and that you just haven't gotten that far with the legs.

Because of how flat the guy is where you do have shading it makes it look like the guy has massive indents all over his flat body. I mean it works a little bit. You get a general idea what his body is suppose to look like, but I think it would look much much better if you went and redid the shading. Give him more form, make the parts that bulge out actually bulge out.

I will commend you attempting to convey the shading changes on the movement of the body parts but it's pretty strange implementation. Why is there a spot light bouncing back and forth on his chest? Keep in mind that it's not the light source that's moving, it's the body parts. The arms suddenly jump to dark when they move and flatten out more when they move back. You need to smooth that out.

Another issue the lighting(and your use of solid lines) creates is that it separates everything. There's no cohesion, everything seems mashed together. I mean look at the fur on the hands. What you were going for is it's on the side of the hands, but it's just a flat tan blob, and doesn't look like it's at an angle on the backside of the hand. The muscles don't fit together (because they're all their own seperate entity all with the same uniform shading).

The way you did the pillow shading seems like you "want" the light source from the top, but just didn't feel like going all the way. Honestly the best looking part so far is the bottom of the legs where it isn't completely pillow'd, and a light source seems to be coming from the top.

Anatomy:

Well, I addressed most of the things I was gonna address actually with the anatomy in the earlier parts of this massive critique, but there's still some things I want to point out. The head doesn't look like it's attached to the body. There's nothing there to suggest. I would maybe enlarge it a bit, and change the way the hair looks. Actually have the neck com up to the face instead of it being bordered by bright yellow hair that doesn't fit the muted colors of the rest of the body. As I pointed out earlier the abs are pretty weird, and everything is too smooth and rounded. This is a hulking muscle-bound beast, make more angles and sharper changes in shading. Not this bubbly-smooth consistent tint transition you have going on. Here's a very very 30 second edit to sort of show what I'm talking about.


The hands are very weird, I would work on them. Clean up the fingers and what not. The pillow shading really makes it ugly, and you don't really get much of a sense of the shape of the hand. It just looks like a blob that may have a thumb.
Colors could use a bit more work.

As for the colors I don't really like the colors you used. They're incredibly dull, and too grayed out. I would saturate it with a bit more color, and hue-shift the shadows a bit. Same deal with that gray-tan color.

One final question Duke. What type of game are you making this for, and what view angle is said game at? If it's an rpg with a 3/4ths view angle from the sky, I hate to say it but your hollow is drawn at the incorrect angle. It's drawn more like you're on the same level as it, and that you're facing towards it. First person view so to speak.

@ Maggeh Lol dude EXTRA long post much... But it's not for a game and most of the stuff you detailed is good advice once I finish the animation but yeah I figured out the legs already I just haven't gotten to it the only reason they are moving is cause I started a small animation on each part before moving on to separate parts, but I'll take the shading into consideration and I can't in large the head cause this is all in a certain scale(that cause me to have limited area to work) and the hair I haven't started it yet the yellow area is just a marker for it cause the original hair is spiked

I already said it was a non arguable subject. It's pointless arguing about front lighting (Pillow shading in pixel art). That's why Im not even gonna acknowledge it much any more.

Also, I'm Glad I helped out some :). I can't wait to see what you've improved on :P!

Hm... That would be great too :o! Making it more fluid is a plus :)! Plus, since your doing it to make more room for the leg movement, it'll work :)... hopefully lol.