Revamping Pokemon, a guide

Started by Opacus January 22nd, 2008 4:11 AM
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  • 22 replies
Age 31
The Netherlands
Seen January 6th, 2010
Posted February 8th, 2009
128 posts
16.2 Years
Oh..so you want to revamp pokemon sprites? Alrighty then...
I'm not gonna take something that's easy to revamp for beginners though: A pokemon Diamond/Pearl sprite. Because I think nearly all pokemon sprites are crappy.
They have their charm to it, but they don't do much for me.
In this case: Girantina.
And for all you people that aint good at reading or don't have the patience to read. I'll keep it short.

(By the way, if you ask nicely, I might just revamp one of your fakemon...)

Phase 0: So yeah, the basic sprite that comes directly from the game:

(Source: www.pokemonelite2000.com)

Phase 1: Before we revamp, we devamp. The shading on pokemon sprites has always been lame and boring in my eyes, so get rid of it.


Phase 2: This is where we start changing some of the colours on the sprite. The pokemon colours are normaly all warm and candy like
and makes you feel like a telletubie. I don't want that though. Less saturation.
(you get less saturation if you drag the colour selector more down, to the gray.)


Phase 3: Added some basic shading to the golden parts. Remember to always set a light source before you start shading.


Phase 4: Basicly only a facelift :) This is where I basicly set the quality level I want the sprite to be overall.


Phase 5: Here is where I started shading some of the metal and the red parts.
Note that I also added some texture like scratches on the metal. This is only to make it look more like metal and less like plastic.


Phase 6: Basicly just some more detailing. Wings were shaded too.


Phase 7: Final phase, finished product. Finished all the shading. Note that you should make sure
that none of the colours are too different from each other, but not too close either.
At the gold parts: The saturation is high. And it's attached on the low saturated grey.
Too much difference can make things look unatached. (Look at phase 3-6, where I didn't change the selout to the grey.
You might also notice that this just looks wrong.)
So:
===>
(Gah, obviously all uploads went fast, except the last one that for some reason took forever...)

Huray it's done!
ber to keep it friendly!
Check out my pixel art thread:
Click me!
Age 31
The Netherlands
Seen January 6th, 2010
Posted February 8th, 2009
128 posts
16.2 Years
Mmm, seems like a nice tut. ^^

Should the result look something like this?

Thanks for the comment, and thanks for taking the time for actually making a sprite with it :)
I hope you don't mind, but I made a revamp, of your revamp, so to speak :)


This adresses some of the problems I thought there were on your sprite.
There were too many colours, pixel art is all about using the least colours to get the best result.
This goes back to old consoles were pixel artists were forced to work with less colours since the machines couldn't handle alot of colours back then.
(It got quite complicated, often with only a number of colours allowed per so many pixels, and only from a set pallete etc)
However, this has still remained. I rarerlly, ever, go pass 32 colours. even on the biggest pixels I made. Since there is really no need.
So, I knocked of some colours. Especially since there were a few colours that were so close to each other you could barelly see the difference.
And, too many colours can make it look gradiented. Which is ugly.
Further, the colours are pretty nice.
But, this I should have mentioned before, less saturation is generally good. But NOT on yellow.
See, when you down-sature yellow, it becomes an army green/beige like colour.
Same goes for orange.

It's nice though, my stuff wasn't as good at your age :)
Check out my pixel art thread:
Click me!
Age 31
The Netherlands
Seen January 6th, 2010
Posted February 8th, 2009
128 posts
16.2 Years


There is mine. Kinda dark to start with, but i think I did a half-decent attempt.
Hey, yeah this is pretty good :)
Thanks for trying out the tut.
Anyway, it does have a few errors. Such as some cropped op colours, some banding. Also, too many colours that are too close to each other. A bit more contrast wouldn't hurt.
I might make an edit later if you'd like :)

you know, you made some very good guide..
THis can be very usefull for some beginning spriters..
Im impressed how it turned out, very nice ;)
goodjob
Thanks mate :)

Yeah this is a very good guide, it's hard to do they style you do. You know since you hav the accent colors, like the blue over the gold, and the red in the shadows. But you are amazing.
Yes, that's called hue-shifting. You know the colours selector, we all do. The thing is simple:
Instead of that you take a darker part of the same colour, you make it darker, but you ALSO slide the bar a bit to the left or right. For example: You take yellow as the lightest colours, light orange as the first shade, dark orange/red as the second, and brown as the darkest.
This can give lovely effects. It's an advanced technique however, practice, practice, and
eventually you will get the hang of it.
And thank you ;)
Check out my pixel art thread:
Click me!
Male
Seen 5 Days Ago
Posted August 21st, 2021
5,853 posts
17 Years
Well this is an impressive and very detailed tutorial (though it is a bit too specific at times), thanks for your contribution to the section. I've also gone ahead and added it to the resources thread so that others may benefit from it.

That said, you don't need 4 examples for a tutorial, so if you want, just remove those examples from your first post just so that it's only about the tutorial.

But yeah, once again, thanks~
Age 31
The Netherlands
Seen January 6th, 2010
Posted February 8th, 2009
128 posts
16.2 Years
Well this is an impressive and very detailed tutorial (though it is a bit too specific at times), thanks for your contribution to the section. I've also gone ahead and added it to the resources thread so that others may benefit from it.

That said, you don't need 4 examples for a tutorial, so if you want, just remove those examples from your first post just so that it's only about the tutorial.

But yeah, once again, thanks~
Wowa, that's awesome. Thank you =)
About the too detailed thing: I guess you can be right about that. I just wanted to miss nothing, and especially point out some common mistakes.

Vipers right, This Tut will surely help many beginners :D
And... Thanx i'm gonna try it out right now!

;)
Thank you, please do!
And if you do and want critique, feel free to post it here and I'll give you my two cents =)
Check out my pixel art thread:
Click me!

BeachBoy

S P A R K of madness

Age 31
Male
Texas
Seen November 17th, 2016
Posted November 16th, 2016
8,396 posts
15.3 Years
Great read and guide. Can finally teach more and more people in our community, and I liked how you presented it.

I'm going to get to work on revamps now, come here wailord! :D
credit to easterly
Age 33
Seen June 2nd, 2014
Posted January 23rd, 2012
2,010 posts
19.7 Years
Thank you Allstories.
However, I am not entirelly sure what you mean exactly with your last sentence.
It's just that so few people here actually draw their own pixel art, instead opting to just recolor and/or edit existing sprites, which might be okay every once in a while, but SO many people do it that this forum has become this vapid, artistic wasteland. Your tutorial is useful for helping people color better, but on the other hand, recolors probably aren't something we need more of.
Age 31
The Netherlands
Seen January 6th, 2010
Posted February 8th, 2009
128 posts
16.2 Years
It's just that so few people here actually draw their own pixel art, instead opting to just recolor and/or edit existing sprites, which might be okay every once in a while, but SO many people do it that this forum has become this vapid, artistic wasteland. Your tutorial is useful for helping people color better, but on the other hand, recolors probably aren't something we need more of.
Completely true. I guess I'll try to cook up a general pixel art tutorial aswell :)
Check out my pixel art thread:
Click me!

[NovaPirate]

And the rest went riding on.

In that cardboard box down the street.
Seen February 13th, 2011
Posted December 28th, 2009
802 posts
17.5 Years
you forgot about when you revamp D/P sprites, they're still too big for RSE sprite standards so you should resize them to rse standards 64 by 64 pixels. DP's sprites are in the 82 by 82(?) pixel standards.
Why would you need to do that. You're revamping, not devamping.

Gaah.
This signature is under construction.
But dun worry.
It will most likely stay like this FOREVAH.
Because I'm nowhere near as active as I used to be.
-[NP]
Age 31
The Netherlands
Seen January 6th, 2010
Posted February 8th, 2009
128 posts
16.2 Years
you forgot about when you revamp D/P sprites, they're still too big for RSE sprite standards so you should resize them to rse standards 64 by 64 pixels. DP's sprites are in the 82 by 82(?) pixel standards.
Yeah. Though this is true, I don't see the relevance of this post.
Check out my pixel art thread:
Click me!