Lemma Soft Forums

Hey guys. I'm actually the author of Haircuts (http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewto ... =11&t=9220) and 99 Luftballons (http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewto ... =11&t=9251), if you've ever heard of them. If you haven't then check them out! ./shameless plug

Anyway, one main complaint I got was the lack of character sprites. I was wondering - what are the main options for someone who is bad at drawing and wants to put sprites in his VN?

I feel your pain. T_T

Well, you could get those free sprites that are either available here or at bass. (And I think there are a whole lot others that I know nothing about.)
Or if you want original art, you could look for an artist at the recruitment section. There are a lot of artists here, I'm sure you'll be able to find one.

Bass?

This one. ^^
You have to credit their site though. (I think.)

Drawing isn't that hard to learn if you study it a little, the problem is that most people don't study at all and just try to draw on their own, which gets them nowhere. Also, people believe that "good artist" just get that way because they were born artists... Not true at all.

It's really a worthwhile skill to have, keeps the creative part of your mind going And you'll never get bored because there's always something new to draw! It's sad that most people don't even try to learn it within their lifetimes when anyone can learn to draw with a little effort. I've seen people go from stick figures to photo-realistic art within a couple months. It's not that hard at all.

But yeah, if you don't want to step into the amazing world of drawing, just hire someone who already has. People are going to kill me for this, but I don't suggest using Bass for your sprites- it's really tacky to use commonly used sprites in your games, specially if you're a good writer that has super-unique characters to share.

Now I'm interested in drawing.
*NEXT GAME GETS PUSHED BACK A YEAR*
I don't even know how to get started though.

Fawn wrote:Drawing isn't that hard to learn if you study it a little, the problem is that most people don't study at all and just try to draw on their own, which gets them nowhere. Also, people believe that "good artist" just get that way because they were born artists... Not true at all.

It's really a worthwhile skill to have, keeps the creative part of your mind going And you'll never get bored because there's always something new to draw! It's sad that most people don't even try to learn it within their lifetimes when anyone can learn to draw with a little effort. I've seen people go from stick figures to photo-realistic art within a couple months. It's not that hard at all.

I totally agree on this one but it's making me feel guilty as well.
I did try to learn but someone insulted my drawings, so I just decided to practice on coloring. T_T

Fawn wrote:But yeah, if you don't want to step into the amazing world of drawing, just hire someone who already has. People are going to kill me for this, but I don't suggest using Bass for your sprites- it's really tacky to use commonly used sprites in your games, specially if you're a good writer that has super-unique characters to share.

Another point I agree on, that's why I'd rather recruit one than use those free resources, I think I'll only use the sprites there if I ever make short VNs that are just for fun or something that I'm sure no one would take seriously. XD

Erisau wrote:I don't even know how to get started though.

You could check some various tutorials out or you could buy that book called "How to draw manga." They have different volumes, and most of them are sold at a very small cost in bookstores.

Art isn't really limited to just drawing and a good visual novel doesn't necessarily need a high level of technical art ability to make. If you're clever, creative, and have a stroke of ingenuity, you could pull off a good creation right now by yourself.

You need to be kind of a good programmer/designer though, so that you can make some spiffy interfaces with limited art, like in the case of Digital.

Look at this guy's game:

http://store.steampowered.com/app/107300/

I've seen plenty of RPG Maker games with better sprites and tilesets, and yet it's this one (an XNA/custom build) that's raking in Recettear levels of the cash right now because it has PERSONALITY.

So make sure your game has PERSONALITY. Art is only one way to achieve that.

SilverxBlue wrote:I totally agree on this one but it's making me feel guilty as well.
I did try to learn but someone insulted my drawings, so I just decided to practice on coloring. T_T

That's terrible that someone insulted your work. It always upsets me that people do that to growing artists. I know I would not have taken up the hobby if I had not had my work as a child praised so often.

I would recommend picking up a pencil (or pen) and find a doodle-worthy surface and then draw something you see.
Drawing human figures is really tough but that's only because the viewer knows what it "should" look like even if its exaggerated. There's something in the brain that is really sensitive to what human representations look like.

Hire an artist. Unique sprites, even if they aren't always as good as some of the available free ones, are infinitely better. You are forced to compromise on character design when you have to use public resources. While learning to do your own art is okay, it comes with a lot of drawbacks. Back when I was unemployed with no money and tons of free time, I invested a lot of time to learning art. Did it pan out? Sadly, no. It gave me a lot of understanding behind the practice, but it was simply something that I was just no good at even with practice (Dreams of the Skies was my masterpiece). Nowadays, I do the script, the coding, and all the other random jobs of putting together a game, in addition to working a 60-70 hr work week minimum (salary sucks sometimes...) If I was to attempt to take over the art department again, I'd be sacrificing the others for something that has an almost non-existent chance of paying off. My game would never get done and I'd be constantly frustrated.

Sometimes, no matter how much you don't want to, you have to cut your losses and invest in the talents you are good at while getting assistance from those whose talents reside elsewhere. Besides, not only is it a lot more fun making something with someone else, but they often see things in character development that you might have missed if you had done it solo.

Erisau wrote:Now I'm interested in drawing.
*NEXT GAME GETS PUSHED BACK A YEAR*
I don't even know how to get started though.

One book I can definitely recommend is 'Drawing on the right side of the brain' ( isbn 0874774241 ).
There's a lot of psycho babble in there, but it's a *great* place to start.

I went from drawing stickfigures to copying a drawing in one afternoon, from there I was drawing pretty realistic hands ( with some helpful tools)... And then i got rsi from knitting lol... But this book is a great confidence boost and the teaching method really seems to work. I think, once you master the first bunch of chapters, you'll see that drawing won't seem as daunting as before.

You might want to check out the drawing for noobs threads over at conceptart.org.
You'll often see 'drawing on the right side of the brain' listed, along with nicolaides ( you really need discipline to follow through this book, it's pretty brutal), and the books by loomis (' fun with a pencil' seems like a nice book, it's really old, but it's one of the least stuffy books on drawing I've flipped through).

I really sympathize for people learning how to draw =(. And unlike others saying "it only takes a couple of months" that's NOT true. That's only if you really do it, like, nonstop and you have buckets of time and you're unemployed or something.

Sadly, even with 3D, there's no magic wand you can wave to just "make something look good right out of the box" in fact, the challenge is even steeper to climb.

I really would love to see a game that got actors to play the characters and just used artful photography and Photoshop. There was a game like that here once, and delta flamed it to hell but it was pretty awesome for what it dared to do ... and didn't do, aka use anime art or toon art or any drawn art at all.

Is there a good alternative for Photoshop for coloring and editing and such?

Easy Paint Tool SAI, but it's not free. It is, however, massively cheaper.

I also like ArtRage, but I've never bumped into anyone else than uses it besides me. D=