Tips for sprites done in traditional art?

[AERenoir]

I'm pretty sure at some point someone was trying to do Ren'py sprites with scanned traditional art, in the sense that everything (lineart and colouring) was done on paper, not just the lineart.
How do you draw/scan the sprites then? Does that mean you need HUGE pieces of paper? Or just not bother drawing full-body sprites? Or try to design simpler sprites?

(PS: If anyone knows VN titles or WIPs here in Lemmasoft where the sprites are done on paper too, I'd love to see them)

[noeinan]

I think it depends on the type of traditional media you're doing. If it were me, I'd keep my art to a sheet of 11x8 paper so that I could use my scanner. If you use markers, that's easy enough. If paint, I think it would still work if you had a small enough canvas-- you'd just have to cut it off before scanning. (Or try to fenagle it on a flat bed without closing the lid all the way.)

[Anne]

The Parasol Festival, they have a demo (haven't personally played it)

[truefaiterman]

If you scan them with high enough resolution, size won't be a problem.

ASH: The Seeds of Destruction

In this project, the sprites are traditionally made in black and white with a penbrush, and then I put flat colours on them digitally.

I drew them in little Din-A5 sheets of paper, and the scanned pictures at 200dpi were big enough to be put into a 1080p game.

[ketskari]

I hand-painted most of the art for Tell a Demon (link in my signature), using different water-based media (tempera, gouache, watercolors) on watercolor paper.

Does that mean you need HUGE pieces of paper?

For me, yes. My background art is, at minimum, 18" wide, but that's partly due to the medium I'm using, which can be a bit grainy. The larger it is, the less noticeable the grain when it's scanned in. I find grain looks a bit unpleasant on the screen, especially with mediums like charcoal, watercolors painted on cold pressed paper, or paintings on canvas.

How do you draw/scan the sprites then?

Usually I have to scan in parts. For a painting 18" square, I scan one corner, rotate, scan the next corner, rotate, etc.. then put the pieces together in photoshop.

Or just not bother drawing full-body sprites? Or try to design simpler sprites?

I rarely bother with fullbody paintings, although I often make the initial drawings fullbody. I tend to design background art to be pretty closer to the viewer, so I don't need fullbody poses very often. Simpler probably would be better, though.

Other tips:
Before painting, I find it easiest to draw all of the poses for one sprite first, then scan them in and test the drawings on the background art or in game, etc. Then I check for any other errors. For instance, if I have two sprite poses, it helps to check that the proportions are still correct when the sketches are superimposed on top of one another. This can also be done with a lightbox, and I also typically keep a small mirror for checking my drawings on hand.

The reason for all this fuss about the drawing is that water-based media is very dependent on a solid drawing. If the drawing is off, the rest of the painting will be, and I like to avoid wasting paper and minimize time repainting or fixing errors in Photoshop whenever possible.