Experimental Sprite Comic: Death By Chibi (take 2)

[Lordthenightknight]

First of all, forget the first three words in the name. I'm going to change those. This is not a sprite comic. It's an imitation of that. Why? Because admittedly it started out as one with heavily modified sprites, and after being told those are no longer acceptable on this site, I redid it using original pixel art. But since I was so used to the style, I decided to make them look like gaming sprites (like Kid Radd).

Second of all, go ahead and trash most of the strips. They suck. The writing is often disjointed, and the art still needs a lot of work (the first story will likely get restarted after I upgrade the art). But the point of these threads are to help artists get better, so go ahead and let me know what I need to improve (just you don't need to tell me about needing shadows or that characters look like modified Final Fantasy sprites; I'm already going to fix those).

Third of all, don't think this is easy. It's not. I still have to make sure every pixel works. Some parts will take hours to look right, especially when I think it looks good when it's zoomed in, but looks wrong at the size I plan to use.

Fourth of all, I admit I cut and paste a lot (as noted in one reply here). In some scenes that's inevitable. But I'm still working on making the scenes more dynamic this strip the stars are not the same each panel.

[Guildmaster Van]

(I mean, those bashers would have attacked 8-Bit Theater if it was made recently)

You've learned nothing.

[Lordthenightknight]

Wait. The posters stating what boiled down to "sprite comics are *bleep* and you're a dump *bleep* for using them" were trying to teach me something?

I think I'll listen to constructive criticism instead.

Wait, I did listen to the constructive criticism. Right there in my first post here, I admit I copped to all the legit flaws that were pointed out, including copyright violation.

[Lordthenightknight]

Anyway, the first strip of the new story is up.

[NaniNani]

Sprite comics have been dead for quite some time. There's not much more you or anyone can do with it. You're entering a battle that was already long lost. Anyways...

Any artistic advice I can give is:
1. All your characters have around one pose and expression, two if you count them standing sideways. Go look at the Final Fantasy VI sprites again. They show expressions like happiness, shock, embarassment, fatigue, etc. Yours don't. It gets quite dull to look at.

2. Your backgrounds give no sense of space or depth. the table in http://deathbychibi.comicgenesis.com/d/20090119.html could be sitting on the floor for all I know. Try using shadows. Also, try to find ways to show where floors end and walls begin. If your comic was black and white no one would be able to tell and would think the doors were installed into the ground.

3. As for your writing, well, I didn't really read it. I read a bit here but it didn't really seem my thing.

Good luck, I suppose.
(Though to be honest I think you'd get more hits if you tried to draw it, even if you're a really bad artist)

[Lordthenightknight]

First of all, it's not a sprite comic. It's an imitation of one. Since the pictures are made from a paint program, and not rendered by game code and (sprite comics use screencaps from those), these are not actual sprites.

But you're right the art needed some work. When I revisit that arc, I plan to give them more poses, and work on improving how to distinguish things.

[Guildmaster Van]

First of all, it's not a sprite comic. It's an imitation of one. Since the pictures are made from a paint program, and not rendered by game code and (sprite comics use screencaps from those), these are not actual sprites

It's a sprite comic (You even use the words "sprite comic" in this thread's title), and you've still learned nothing.

[Jollyrodgers4]

I always thought Sprite comics would benefit from using flash to animate the guys moving. Other than that be careful with some of your color choices. The Table legs are there in the above mentioned Critique but the color matches the floor too well. You need to make it pop a bit.

As for the writing. Not bad!

[Lordthenightknight]

Again, I'll work on that. In fact, shadows seem like a good way to fix the mic problem with the latest strip.

As for this being a sprite comic, calling it that in the title doesn't make it one. I just chose the name (which is a subtitle for the comic) because it sounded funny at the time.

This is a pixel art comic. These pictures are by my own hand (holding a mouse). A sprite is an image rendered by a video game system into a bitmap. Sprite rips are just copies of those.

Since what I made did not come from any video game data, they're not sprites. So claiming I learned nothing shows your ignorance, not mine. This is a pixel art comic made to look like a sprite comic. It's no more an actual sprite comic than Roy Liechtenstein's painting are comic books.

[NaniNani]

I dunno. It looks like a duck, quacks like a duck....
Yes, it IS a sprite comic. We look at your comic and we see sprites, and they're in a comic. It doesn't matter how they were drawn. It's like saying a comic isn't a comic because it was done in red pen instead of black. I've watched my friends make sprites in paint, and you know what they called them? Sprites!
Yeah, you're gonna have to take a lot of crap for your artisitc choice probably your whole webcomic life.

[Lordthenightknight]

It DOES matter how they are drawn. One method would get the comic taken down for copyright violation. The latter is pixel art.

Now I admit the subtitle "Experimental Sprite Comic" is not helpful with this. Something like "Imitation Sprite Comic" would work better or "Experimental Pixel Art Comic", but if you have any suggestions of a subtitle that would get the point across, I'm all for some.

Also, I'm going to later put in a first comic that notes most of the strips up to the "Kilospear" story should probably be ignored in terms of a narrative. There was too much making it up as I went along (in both writing and art). I'm keeping those up (the way several wecomic artists keep their early, crappy strips up), but I'll restart that story as an RPG spoof. For now, "Kilospear" is where I start focusing on a solid story

But it will not all be pixel art. I have a scanner again, and can put some drawings up there, as I did already. But this way would be like the way some RPGs use drawings of characters during some scenes.

[Lordthenightknight]

Seriously, I really would like a better subtitle for the comic, and would be grateful for some suggestions.

EDIT: Okay, just thought of one the other day. "I can't believe it's not a sprite comic." Not the best name (putting it mildly), but it hopefully gets the point across. The next strip (which is uploaded, but will show up at 11:00 pm PST) should make it even more clear I'm doing actual drawing (just with a mouse rather than a pencil, which I can do), and not sprites.

Also revamped the look of the sight to make it easier on the eyes.

[SevenCurrents]

If you are going to continue with the sprite comic/MSPaint art thing, a few things to note:

1) Your comics appear visually uninspired. Looking through what you have, the majority of the space in each panel are text bubbles, empty space, or repeating tiled backgrounds. The majority of your characters are copied and pasted without any sense of mood, expression, or any sort of emoting beyond your text. The successful comics that adhere to this format consistently wow you with their detail while using fantastically minimalist form. I assume you are inspired by 8-bit Theater. Take a look at their pages, the backgrounds are highly detailed. The characters, while pixelated, are detailed and have a variety of expressions. Currently, my eyes slide over your pages without finding anything to hook me. Vary things up, and for goodness sake don't copy and paste every frame. One or two for tension is fine, but currently this is most of your comic.

2) Currently, your aim seems jumbled between a variety of ideas. What is your purpose? Are you telling a story? Are you making a joke? What exactly are you trying to accomplish? In anything, you need to figure this out before you can move forward. Figure out what the message you are trying to convey with your comic as a whole, and then move with that. Even 8-bit has an overarching goal: to tell a comedic version of the FF1 plot. If you are going on a strip-by-strip basis, you best have a solid theme or message in each comic, or your readers will feel let down. Once you figure out your aim, things will start to fall together.

3) You insist you are not using existing sprites, that all of yours are hand drawn, yet they all look like rehashes or recolors of existing sprites. I've recognized dozens of recolors of FF6 sprites. Technically, yes, you are making your own. If you want to really impress this community and keep readers, start drawing them from scratch. Pixel by pixel, make your own characters, your own style, and none will be able to say you are ripping off someone else's content.

4) If you are going to do it, go all or nothing. Don't churn out a page just to churn out a page. Make something you can be honestly proud of. Make each page better than the last in every way. If it takes you a week, it takes you a week. Most people would rather wait and be impressed than see lackluster pages. As each page gets better by you pouring yourself into it, the speed in which you can make them will slowly improve as well. Eventually, you'll be able to meet faster art times.

5) Don't limit yourself to Sprite Comics. Folk who do this usually think "I can't draw, but I can redo sprites and still have something that looks good!" This is a bad way of thinking. This way is keeping yourself from rejection based upon insecurities in your own art. If you suck at drawing and do nothing, you suck at drawing. If you suck at drawing and try your damnedest to get better, you suck at drawing less over time. Every artist started out with crappy sketechs. Don't be afraid to fail, beacause all it will do is make you better by learning what not to do.

I used to do Sprite-comics back when I was a kid in the 90s. I got over it in favor of making something I could truly call my own. Someday, you probably will too.

[Lordthenightknight]

If you are going to continue with the sprite comic/MSPaint art thing, a few things to note:

1) Your comics appear visually uninspired. Looking through what you have, the majority of the space in each panel are text bubbles, empty space, or repeating tiled backgrounds. The majority of your characters are copied and pasted without any sense of mood, expression, or any sort of emoting beyond your text. The successful comics that adhere to this format consistently wow you with their detail while using fantastically minimalist form. I assume you are inspired by 8-bit Theater. Take a look at their pages, the backgrounds are highly detailed. The characters, while pixelated, are detailed and have a variety of expressions. Currently, my eyes slide over your pages without finding anything to hook me. Vary things up, and for goodness sake don't copy and paste every frame. One or two for tension is fine, but currently this is most of your comic.

I agree the panels repeating isn't imaginative, and I'm working on making them more dynamic.

2) Currently, your aim seems jumbled between a variety of ideas. What is your purpose? Are you telling a story? Are you making a joke? What exactly are you trying to accomplish? In anything, you need to figure this out before you can move forward. Figure out what the message you are trying to convey with your comic as a whole, and then move with that. Even 8-bit has an overarching goal: to tell a comedic version of the FF1 plot. If you are going on a strip-by-strip basis, you best have a solid theme or message in each comic, or your readers will feel let down. Once you figure out your aim, things will start to fall together.

The first several strips should be ignored, for reasons I've just stated a couple posts up. The story wasn't really coherent, nor planned well. The current arc is meant to be more coherent and straightforward in its story. There will be some strips of other stories, for filler purposes.

3) You insist you are not using existing sprites, that all of yours are hand drawn, yet they all look like rehashes or recolors of existing sprites. I've recognized dozens of recolors of FF6 sprites. Technically, yes, you are making your own. If you want to really impress this community and keep readers, start drawing them from scratch. Pixel by pixel, make your own characters, your own style, and none will be able to say you are ripping off someone else's content.

That's why I plan to start those over to have a unique look. And the last few strips are completely original drawings.

4) If you are going to do it, go all or nothing. Don't churn out a page just to churn out a page. Make something you can be honestly proud of. Make each page better than the last in every way. If it takes you a week, it takes you a week. Most people would rather wait and be impressed than see lackluster pages. As each page gets better by you pouring yourself into it, the speed in which you can make them will slowly improve as well. Eventually, you'll be able to meet faster art times.

Again, the last few strips are getting at.

5) Don't limit yourself to Sprite Comics. Folk who do this usually think "I can't draw, but I can redo sprites and still have something that looks good!" This is a bad way of thinking. This way is keeping yourself from rejection based upon insecurities in your own art. If you suck at drawing and do nothing, you suck at drawing. If you suck at drawing and try your damnedest to get better, you suck at drawing less over time. Every artist started out with crappy sketechs. Don't be afraid to fail, beacause all it will do is make you better by learning what not to do.

I can draw. I just didn't have a scanner for a long time. I also need to practice my drawing more.

I used to do Sprite-comics back when I was a kid in the 90s. I got over it in favor of making something I could truly call my own. Someday, you probably will too.

Since I draw these myself, and these characters and setting are original it IS something I can truly call my own.

Aside from the last part, which forgets that these are not sprites, your comments are valid, and I'm taking them to heart.

My goal is to achieve the look of the best 2D video games, but with original art. That is not easy to do, and don't think it is. If you've seen some sprites from games like Symphony of the Night up close, those have extreme detail, that is very subtle. Trying to get pixel art that looks that detailed is still hard. It requires a lot of attention to how colors look in terms of shading and what they represent.

[SevenCurrents]

Aside from the last part, which forgets that these are not sprites, your comments are valid, and I'm taking them to heart.

My goal is to achieve the look of the best 2D video games, but with original art. That is not easy to do, and don't think it is. If you've seen some sprites from games like Symphony of the Night up close, those have extreme detail, that is very subtle. Trying to get pixel art that looks that detailed is still hard. It requires a lot of attention to how colors look in terms of shading and what they represent.

Your last few pages look like they took the backgrounds and ships, and even the title from Gradius and recolored them.

Gradius:


Your comic:
http://deathbychibi.comicgenesis.com/d/20090518.html

I believe entirely that your drew them from scratch, because I have no reason to think otherwise aside from the gross similarities. This is part of the inherent problem you will face with this medium. Unless you drastically make your own style you will always seem to be plagiarizing, regardless of if the claims have any merit. It's your word versus your audience, and your audience won't stick around to argue.

[Lordthenightknight]

Actually, that's because many space shooters have backgrounds like that. See R-Type.

But really thinking about it, the only way to make it clear it's not actually sprites would be a new art style.

So just one question. Are you impressed by the face pictures in the last two strips? Those are more pixel drawings than sprite imitations. If I did the art of the rest of the comic more on that style (broader lines and less following video game sprites and tiles conventions), would that make it clear it's not a sprite comic?

EDIT: I'd still do some sprite pictures, but those would be for fun. And they'd still by my own pictures.

[Lordthenightknight]

This is what I mean. I have comparison pictures for Princess Pinkstar and the shoot-em-up ship. So does their new look come across as more like pixel art than sprites?

[VeryCuddlyCornpone]

Yeah, I think those are more along the lines of what you're aiming for. Glad to see you're open to trying new things.

[Lordthenightknight]

Well that's much of the point of this section. The users give comic makers feedback and suggestions, and the makers see what information is useful and what they can apply to improve their comics.

Getting flamed isn't useful, but the past several replies have been helpful for me, and I thank most of you for that.

[SevenCurrents]

Better. Much better.

Now you need to keep pushing the envelope here. Your new sprites are considerably larger, this is better than the opposite of drawing small. Try to keep your characters, ships, faces, etc at the largest size shown or larger, unless there is another image in the frame which is taking priority. Consider that your page is currently at roughly 700 pixels by 1200 pixels. Your frame needs to be made smaller (which I would do anyhow, 600x800 is the largest I'd suggest, considering you have additional materials on your page like comments and you want to limit scrolling for the comic itself). Also consider that your standing characters/ships/whatever the frame is of should be at least half of the content of each frame. Currently, you are focusing on dead space. This is fine for panoramic shots to establish that yes, space is awesome and vast and such, but on every frame it will make your art diminished.

Just because video games inspired this, doesn't mean you have to limit yourself to side-scroller, as well. Take a look at some other space-opera comics (I'd recommend Outsider: http://www.well-of-souls.com/outsider/ ) and see how this artist depects space ships. He uses 3-d rendering and sketch-work, but that doesn't mean his perspectives and angles exclude pixel art. In fact, taking what you are doing here, and applying it to a wider range of angles, expressions, and features might make for a pretty damn awesome effect.

Think about this guy:



Aside for web memes, he is entirely pixel art. Push yourself to this sort of level while keeping true to your medium. It would be impressive, demonstrate a damn good quality of colors and design skills, and would have enough of a novelty factor to attract people to you regardless of your story.

Don't ditch the side-scrolling aspect either. It's pretty cool to pay homage to the source, but go beyond it too.

Move zig!

~edited once for clarity~