OpenXcom Forum
Contributions => Offtopic => Topic started by: The Reaver of Darkness on November 23, 2017, 04:53:49 am
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Over the last two years or so, I have posted several graphical resources, including a variety of recolors, redesigns, and even some completely original artwork by me. I thought my stuff looked pretty good, but I see others posting artwork and getting WAY more traffic on their threads! I haven't heard any negative feedback or constructive criticism. All I get is ignored.
What am I doing wrong?
Here I will compile most of my graphical works
(https://i.imgur.com/3fOCmPQ.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/Y1V3Jxu.png)
These two images show many of the handheld weapons in my mod. I redesigned the laser pistol and heavy laser into the red/blue design to look like the laser rifle, and I also put a scope onto the laser rifle. I got the brown lasers from AwesomeGuns.Laser mod, and I altered the brown laser rifle to look less like the red/blue version. The brown plasmas with blue and green lights are from Shadow's Terran Plasma mod, which are themselves slightly modified from Chiko's original designs. I made the blue plasma pistol and heavy plasma by hand, and also altered the plasma rifle a bit and made original blue clip designs for the rifle and pistol.
My mod features new ammunition for all of the handheld cannons and launchers. I redesigned the small rocket into the smoke rocket (the white one with the blue tip) and recycled the small rocket's artwork into the alien rocket, since it already has a color pattern very similar to the alien grenade. I tweaked the incendiary rocket and made a fully original graphic for the fusion rocket (the purple and blue one). I added Alien Explosive ammo to the heavy and auto cannons; it looks sort of like the HE ammo. I added conventional ammo to the blaster launcher: explosive, incendiary, stun, and conventional ammo to the small launcher: explosive, incendiary, and smoke. (The explosive blaster bombs are less powerful than the alien's bombs but also cheaper.)
(http://i.imgur.com/FwDpRYI.png)
I built a large workshop graphic based mostly on the small one, and my mod also contains maps for large workshop, general stores, and radar which I made. I made a baseview graphic for the large radar but it's pretty terrible and I hope someone else makes a better one. I'm too lazy to get an image of it but it's basically a flat room with 4 of the small radars hooked up and cords connecting them along the floor.
(http://i.imgur.com/ua3PSR7.png)
This is a decent yet slightly dated screenshot of my Lightning. I've really fallen in love with my Lightning redesign, and after using it quite a bit, I really feel that it is on par with the Firestorm--you totally want it at first, but later game ships are definitely better. Though just the same, Firestorms and Lightnings can easily carry you through to the end of the game--they just can't visit Cydonia.
Since this image, I've made a few graphical fixes and I recently added a bunch of graphical resources to my LIGHTNIA.MCD tileset, though I have yet to go through and touch up the ship maps. I'm particularly proud of the work I did to present existing tile pieces at different angles and such:
- Lightning door both directions, also 2-tile Lightning door
- Purple door imported from Avenger, also with 1-tile variant
- I shifted the position of the Lightning door image to allow it to be placed as a wall piece
- Thin inner walls using Avenger wall textures
- Door for thin wall with X decal
- Stairs going all four directions
- The fourth chair
- Consoles facing all four directions
- 2x2 power source for even-dimension craft
I didn't just flip or mirror the textures. In most cases, I had to adjust the lighting and in some cases I had to re-align textures and compose things from pieces of other things or build some parts by hand. My ultimate goal was to make everything look like it belongs in the original tileset, like it was made by MicroProse, not me.
I'll finish this post with my sectopod laser:
I gave it a green laser and snagged a distorted laser pistol sound from X-Com Files. One of these surprised me with reaction fire in a map the other day. As easy as it was to make this, I'm quite happy with the result. It resolves the old "Sectopod has laser" debate in one nice neat package.
Last thing I'll say: If you choose to comment on my artwork, please direct your comments to my main mod page: https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,5543.0.html (https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,5543.0.html) or to any of my several other relevant threads involving my works. I would ask that we keep this thread about discussing how I can improve my art and/or presentation skills.
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I can't say that I dig the hell out of it, but I certainly don't mind; it would be apt to call it "vanilla as fuck", which is what it is.
Personally I'm more of a fan of clearly pronounced shading like in these two;
(https://dl.dropbox.com/s/q4a2ta6gj3nm1kz/bb3.png) (https://dl.dropbox.com/s/y2wgm4cr4wji9vg/bb32.png)
But it's ok, you're doing alright.
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Hey Reaver.
Interesting question. I think that it points to differing approaches to modding.
There are a few dedicated modders that work to understand modding, and have a vision that they want to implement. Some of these create their own art, while others borrow. Some have loose teams to help them.
If I were in the your shoes, I'd look for the modders that need artists and see what they need then work on that. I did a bit of that for hellrazor and chaosshade a year ago.
It also maybe that some of your work is being used by modders like chaosshade, but not very visibly. She has a lot of projects in various stages, but not alot of them completed, and she often doesnt' post a lot of images on her mods.
That said, keep up the good work. I think that an artist that can provide the whole package : Bigob, handob, floorobs and sprites will always have a place in the community.
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Your arts ain't garbage, but just true to original. Let's face it, mostly players nowadays are young bloods, and they are looking for arts that fits their generation, for me, I liked your art, many Xcom veterans will want these retro designs.
And also, keep it up! Seeing "Xcom style arts" makes me happy than the new tunes and gigs of the world
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I think your artwork is quite fine, I just never commented on it too much because it'd be like interrupting your date with yourself :)
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Your arts ain't garbage, but just true to original. Let's face it, mostly players nowadays are young bloods, and they are looking for arts that fits their generation, for me, I liked your art, many Xcom veterans will want these retro designs.
Me too like your works! I'm an xcom veteran but don't like much vanilla style mods, i'm more for different and "new" things, but neverthless keep it up!!
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Aww thanks guys! Hey I like hearing from you, the more feedback I get the better! Also I just like to talk and feel like I'm part of the community!
I'm not even set on vanilla art style so much as it's just that whenever I see a graphic that's off of the style, it stands out to me and looks like it doesn't belong. I guess I'm just obsessed with fixing the original game without breaking it. It was such an important part of me for so long that I've wanted to make it a really solid, good game without holes, but without anything that really stands above or outside the original design concept.
If I were in the your shoes, I'd look for the modders that need artists and see what they need then work on that. I did a bit of that for hellrazor and chaosshade a year ago.
I see myself as more of a modder. I started doing my own graphics because I needed some specific (or particularly general, perhaps) things that I wasn't able to find in other works. Then I wanted to share my stuff because I think I came up with some decent things. I started pixel art as early as the days of Wolfenstein 3D, I was just a kid and I played around with a pixel editor for the game. I never dreamed I would one day start drawing things that look as good as the stuff in the game, and even today I only accomplish it by copying the style already put forth, but I'm getting better every time I draw something.
I could check for modders who want drawing talents like mine, but I don't think I can accomplish what most are interested in. I tried to do the ED-209 for someone and I demonstrated it's actually a good fit for the 2x2 tile piece, but I wasn't able to touch up the image at all. It was photo-based, so it would take someone with talents very different from mine to clean it up and get the artifacts out.
I can't say that I dig the hell out of it, but I certainly don't mind; it would be apt to call it "vanilla as fuck", which is what it is.
Personally I'm more of a fan of clearly pronounced shading like in these two;
(https://dl.dropbox.com/s/q4a2ta6gj3nm1kz/bb3.png) (https://dl.dropbox.com/s/y2wgm4cr4wji9vg/bb32.png)
That's awesome! Maybe I should call my mod "Vanilla As Fuck".
I like that shiny shading a lot! I actually feel X-Com's original art design left a lot wanting, they could use much better shine, for example. Their humans need to get their proportions fixed. I don't actually like the design as much as I like a consistency of design.
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I don't actually like the design as much as I like a consistency of design.
That's quite funny, because X-com is a game with one of the most inconsistents art styles out there. There wasn't full time graphic artist on the team when they were making the game. Different people made different parts and the only thing keeping it together is in my opinion the limitation to 256 colors.
By the way, people react really unpredictably to art. Don't get discouraged because you are not getting feedback, it doesn't mean anything.
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Man, I love what you made the plasma weapons look like. I was wondering if you would like to do some artwork for me. Im making a huge equipment expansion and im not that good with the images (I keep glitching the floorObs somehow :) ) Tell me if you are interested.
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I'm interested in possibly doing it. What did you have in mind?
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explosives, mines, claymores, different armors like sprint armor, Auto-Canon HWPs, an aluminum Bat :) , possibly some new aliens. things like that.
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So, like completely new things? I work
best only by tweaking things that already exist. I might be able to make these if I have something to work from.
I wonder if I can snag artwork from X-Com: Apocalypse for things like the mines perhaps.
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I could show you what I have so far?
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Of course. Post away!
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here.
there are the types of mines, and one floorOb I cant get to work
there are smoke, incinidary versions of the alien grenades, and HE ammo for the rifle and pistol
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Yeah, I think I can work with these. I'm going to try and enhance the shine a bit and maybe add some perspective. I'll see what happens and post it here.
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thanks.
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You have the wrong palette on these. I'm going to try to switch it to xcom tactical and then get to work. P.S. could you provide explanations of what these items are supposed to be? It'll help inspire my work.
edit: I can't convert the image palettes directly; likely they use different colors than what is available in the tactical palette.
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ok. the green pyramid thing is meant to be a HE explosive disk-Mine, the red one is incendiary, the black one is smoke, FloorAT is the floorOb version of the green one, and the one alien grenade thing is supposed to be an incendiary form of the alien grenade.
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How's this one? I pictured it as a disk-ish object made of interchanging metal and glowy-green discs stacked to be wider at the base. I built the new one from scratch out of the tactical palette and made it bigger, to better fill the 32x16 size of a 2x1 tile inventory object. I also gave it a transparent instead of black background. It should be transparent, anyway, I don't know why it looks green.
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that's really cool. maybe you could make it more human-ish, since you can get it at the start. side note, could you get me the correct color pallet. The one I have is apparently incorrect
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I've got it here but you can also switch a file to it using Falko's tool: https://falkooxc2.pythonanywhere.com/
edit: it won't let me upload the palette file. You can find the correct palette in the image I attached above.
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im using windows paint so that's probably why the pallet wont work
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From what I see all of your stuff deserves more traffic. It is up there with the content people make for newer games that replaces and fills in for default content in a way that enhances some of what's already there. In any case there should be as much content as possible, IMO. Look at Doom! They've got like 60 pump shotguns in their fan resources. And that's fine! Also I like how you decided that brown of the heavy laser was appropriate for the rest. I had an idea like that too, and it just kind of seems like a military research thing, if in a cynical way.