doing sprites more efficiently?

[mirelle]

I just thought that I can draw some wisdom from you guys.

I've been trying to find an -efficient- way of doing sprites, since I'm a newbie in digital art, and I'm still fumbling around with how to use tools and whatsoever properly.


^ this sprite took me 20 hours, and that's with only one expression done. Can anyone share their experience with making sprites, how much time did it take for each character, useful tips et cetera? it'll really help along the way

optional question: is this thing good enough?

[Auro-Cyanide]

I spend about 6-8 hours on a normal sprite (1 pose, 1 outfit, full set of emotions) in a style like what I do for BCM. Unfortunately, the only thing I've found to increase speed is practice. As you get better with the tools and you learn the best way you personally work, you get faster.

You can also increase your speed by getting rid of distractions. I'm significantly faster when I just work on something and don't stop to look at anything. In fact, I'm getting distracted right now >_>

[Deji]

Ditto to what Auro said.

I'm able to draw a character sprite with one pose and one outfit and a basic set of emotions in 3-4ish hours, sometimes more if the sprite is big and detailed.

When I was studying illustration, it was drilled in my head that everything was due yesterday and we should be as fast as possible, so I'm always trying to get faster and keep a decent level of quality.

In my process, I've identified 4 "steps" when making simple sprites, and I've tried speeding up each of them by practicing and noticing where are my flaws.

1. Sketch.
Very rough, so I have a base idea of what I'm doing.
First done in 2-3 minutes with a few rough lines, then drawn on top in a more distinguishable manner, but still not refined. If it's not colored, it shouldn't take more than 30 mins.

2. Inking.
No refined sketch stage, I refine everything in this stage (even re-sketch some parts if my base sketch doesn't help much x'D) and try to make sure where I want the lines to go right away, in order to avoid redrawing lines over and over (and the need of a refined base sketch). I google a lot of references in this part and take pictures of myself with the webcam to get things right.
Depending on the complexity of the sprite, it takes between 30 and 60 mins.

3. Coloring.
It depends on the kind of coloring: the more detailed or if I'm not sued to color like that, the longer it take. It usually takes between 1 and 2 hours.

4. Facial emotions.
I used to sketch each emotion first, then ink it, then color it. Now I draw it straight away, and in the case of mouths, I draw an color each in a single layer quickly; I've done it so many times it's pretty mechanical and quick by now. Usually takes between 45 mins and 1 hour.

Hope it helps (:

[nyaatrap]

Inking is mostly experience. But you can speed up your flat coloring easily with just a bit of knowledge. Learn Clipping layer and Layer mask, use invert selection method, and select/dis-select with a pen tool customized for it, e.t.c. Shading is part of style, though I think shade first, color later is faster way (at least to me).
One important thing is how to organize layers. Because many time wasting is caused by painting on a wrong layer.

[tigerkidde]

Hi Mirelle,

In a similar boat to you. Using an older Photoshop.

I'm stepping back from digital art as I've assessed I'm lacking core art skills even in the traditional arena. Once in a blue moon, I get what I call a "critical hit", boosts my confidence until I realize it was a fluke. Practicing above advice.

Common interface errors I've had learning the tools:
Using the wrong brush, e.g. using a pencil at size 1 instead of my usual size 3, made the lines look weak and squiggly. Drawing was half in one brush and half in pencil.

Working from an exported JPEG instead of the master file.

Nudging a layer to the left when renaming it (I liked to use Ctrl Shift Left Arrow to highlight text, but this also nudges a layer to the left and used to take me a while to notice).

Working in the correct layer. Many times, I've colored in my line art layer or colored the body in my hair layer.

Changing a layer effect like Lighten, Darken, Multiply, quickly starts to impact your ability to undo in history. Catching one of the above mistakes later becomes a manual fix.

[Zylinder]

I hate linearting so much, I've actually developed a way to make a sprite without drawing a single line.

It's a bit hard to explain, so here, I took down the process to accompany the explanation instead : http://puu.sh/1LAku

Basically I paint the whole sprite without lining it, on a single layer. Once I'm done, I merge everything. From the layers' options, I choose 'blending option' --> 'stroke' and then whichever line thickness is suitable.

This gives off the effect at picture 5 with all the flying black bits. The black mess is actually the leftovers from my painting from all the incomplete erasing. Then I simply erase all the leftovers and the jaggy edges until I get a smooth black line.

Once I get the line, I just duplicate the whole drawing's layer, color in the parts with whichever color I want, and use the overlay/multiply layer options until I get the effect I want. In this case, I had a layer set to multiply and one to color dodge. Of course, you can still use this lining method even when you paint with colors, but this is even faster.

The final product would look like this:


The down side is that you may have lesser control over your colors. As you can see the face is darker than the rest of her skin but that's nothing you can't solve with a bit of color balance and extra painting.

Overall, I finished the whole sprite in an hour, but a real sprite would take about twice the time.

... And yes, your sprite is good enough. I love the crispness of the shadows and the lines!

[mirelle]

Thank you so much for the advices! you're all literal gods //bows

I hate linearting so much, I've actually developed a way to make a sprite without drawing a single line.

quite contrarily, I found myself hating more on base colors that linearts, lol. using SAI makes the base coloring a bit messy for me that i had to shift to photoshop and vector all the bases. D: But developing a style like that... applaud-worthy. XD

Working in the correct layer. Many times, I've colored in my line art layer or colored the body in my hair layer.

ouch, this. did it a lot. had to restart all over.

nking is mostly experience. But you can speed up your flat coloring easily with just a bit of knowledge. Learn Clipping layer and Layer mask, use invert selection method, and select/dis-select with a pen tool customized for it, e.t.c.

clipping masks work like a charm. and the invert method.... hmm, gotta try that.

When I was studying illustration, it was drilled in my head that everything was due yesterday and we should be as fast as possible, so I'm always trying to get faster and keep a decent level of quality.

hahah this. Reminds me of my own lecturer. he told us to make a sketch on A3 paper in 10 minutes. Thanks a lot for the briefing, I'm sure it'll help a lot!

I spend about 6-8 hours on a normal sprite (1 pose, 1 outfit, full set of emotions) in a style like what I do for BCM. Unfortunately, the only thing I've found to increase speed is practice. As you get better with the tools and you learn the best way you personally work, you get faster.

You can also increase your speed by getting rid of distractions. I'm significantly faster when I just work on something and don't stop to look at anything. In fact, I'm getting distracted right now >_>

Practice is everything, I suppose. Need to find more personal time between me and tablet. ;P
While working without distractions is much faster, it adds up that lot of stress as well and I end up getting to stressed to continue sometimes *sob*

[dramspringfeald]

Sadly there is no "Do art now" button you just have to take a breath, play some loud fast music, Keep snacks and water around you at all times and have an alarm go off every 2 hours or so to save your brain and eyes.

The only way to get faster is well to get faster and maybe look at Vectors

[Endorphin]

I hate linearting so much, I've actually developed a way to make a sprite without drawing a single line.

I understand you so much. <3

Sadly there is no "Do art now" button you just have to take a breath, play some loud fast music, Keep snacks and water around you at all times and have an alarm go off every 2 hours or so to save your brain and eyes.

Or slow, repetitive music that annoys everybody who's not in some trance-like state. :'D

I'd really advise you to customize your keys. =o
I like drawing with my right hand and having my left on the keyboard.
My buttons are like this, but this is something everybody has to decide for themselves.
A: decrease brush size
S: switch between swatches
D: increase brush size
W: change alpha mode (?) [makes brush into eraser, SAI only]
F: flip image (with support button in PS)
C: rotate image (in PS)
This way, I easily have everything in reach (I hate using support buttons like Ctrl+Z so even "Undo" has a different key =D") without moving to much.
If you analyse which tools you use the most you can save a lot of time this way. :>

- R.

[nyaatrap]

Exchange normal/transparency color is one of the most useful function SAI has. It allows to draw in inking, basecoloring, shading, and even masking with just one tool. I like to use this shortcut much.

using SAI makes the base coloring a bit messy for me that i had to shift to photoshop and vector all the bases. D:

Ahhh that's a huge lose. SAI has one of the most accurate selection tool which allows you to do base coloring in several minutes.

[mugenjohncel]

It's up to you if you'll follow my advice but my technique is without any doubt... THE FASTEST and MOST EFFICIENT one out there...



Click here to view my technique...
http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewto ... 11#p202911

"POOF" (Disappears)

[Hellboy]

I don't do any inking or lineart. Colors go directly over the pencils in Painter.
Another quick way to do it is to use a base color and use the burn and dodge tools to create highlights and shadows. I use Photoimpact for this, its even faster. But I enjoy Painter workflow more for coloring.