My Original Post

un0mic said, January 05, 2015, 06:23:14 pm

Is there any info on this here anywhere? Tips and/or tricks? Ive been searching and if so im not sure what to search for.

The Mugen project i'm creating only has original characters like this. process has been fun but i think im doing things wrong because of the many pallets that my char has even tho he is only 1 color.

anywho any info on this or to point me in the right direction will be much appreciated.

So, my process so far is to

1. take video of all wanted normals, specials, supers and finishers for character.
2. take still shots from the video. using the long way of VLC snapshot. or programs will cull option makes things quicker, but sometimes skips animations one might need
3. take the snapshots and make a sprite sheet(s) using gimp then paintshop pro
4. take sprite sheets and make individual sprites using paintshop pro then idraw3
5. open sprite on KFM or another char (sometimes it asks me to share sprite palette)

but i have diff pallet for the frames...

I'll start by adding more detail to what raoniluna said, since it's really good feedback.

1. Control lighting. In other words, use artificial light preferably.
   - This is to make sure that all sprites in the same sheet and across different characters looks consistent. Don't film outside because the time of day will affect the way sprites look.
2. Have a one color background, anything covering the background in a ridiculous color works, like the usual lime green or something like that, the more it differs from the colors of the character the better.
   - This is basically the green-screening technique that everyone uses. If you're planning to have one of your characters use a green colored costume, have them wear a different color and then just fix that latter through palettes (for example, sub-zero's actual costume in MK3 was red instead of blue, because they were using a blue background).
3. Do a progressive and controlled reduction of image colors. You can start with 32bit, do some adjustments then reduce to 24/16 and then to 8bit with preferably a pre-made palette based of the character colors.
   - Normal picture/film footage usually has way more colors than those that would be efficient in a fighting game. You want to keep color count to a minimum so that you don't have such a hard time making alternate palettes later.

My feedback is the following:
1. The camera seems to be too high up and should be moved closer to the ground... you can tell by looking at the feet, paritcularly. You'd probably want the feet to appear flatter against the ground so it doesn't end up looking like the character's tip-toeing through the stage. Here's a behind the scenes shoot of how they captured graphics in MK1:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VG0x7f4BkQY[/youtube]

2. This is just a guess, but: Move slower. Don't capture moves at real speed. Capture them at a slow motion speed so you can then hand-pick the frames you want to use later for each move (you won't need ALL of them). This will help with the choppiness.

3. Avoid really small details in outfits as they will end up going unnoticed.

the quality went WAY down when making it a gif for some reason. but hey im getting it done