The Joker(Heath Ledger)

[Neo_Zurz]

Spoiler (click to show)

anim.gif - 0.02MB
I decided to work on a Joker for Mugen (based off of Heath ledger's performance) because everyone knows how awesome he was and I don't really need to explain further. so far i've just finished his first anim for now and this is his standing anim. maybe I'll enhance later on. I have alot of ideas for this character and really want to make him.
it'll just be very difficult to hand draw all his sprites.



If anyone REALLY wanted to help I do have a little something in mind that would speed up the process.
The sprite isn't the best but I'm working on it.
the colors might seem strange but not to worry, pretty much every single article of clothing has totally unique colors. this is for the purpose of a more flexible pallette, so if you want to change the colors later on, you can have red pants green coat white hair black face yellow shoes silver hands and a turqoise vest. so if you change the shade of purple in one area of his clothing it won't show the color is reused anywhere else.
I'm new to spriting so I have a lot to learn about the animation process and speeding it up. if anyone's wondering I'm supposing that it would take me around a year to draw ALL the sprites I wanted for him. if I work fast that is. coding isn't too much of a prob so don't worry about that part too much. I'm a little bad at AI though, so If you REALLY wanted a bad ass joker a good AI coder could come forward. but all the same, I'm well prepared to do everything myself in the first place. Just an idea thrown out there if you wanted to see the process sped up. I hate crappy animation so I'll try to do my best with fluidity. you can already see I did a decent enough job. I need to work on folds and highlights and stuff. I tried to get the costume accurate enough, his coat has like two break so i figured that would go over his leg like it does. and his tie and undershirt etc. I think he had an undercoat or something, but I didn't draw it, that would be too much for me.

old^

[CaseyAmazing AwesomeGuy]

looks sweet. but he looks a bit big.

[Neo_Zurz]

*sprite changed(next page)

[Zaxxon Q Blaque]

The hair needs to be a bit more green-ish.  Other than that and the size, great job.

[Tony 3rd]

he might be the joker, but his body is still of a human being.

on the pic you posted, the legs are on a very uncomfortable position.

the breathing is almost there.... change the position of the legs, reduce the velocity of each frame (so it does not look like he has asthma) and you might have a winner.

and change the hands. they are too small compared to the body.

this site gives you some insights on how to draw sprites in general, and how would you go to animate them
http://web.cs.wpi.edu/~claypool/courses/frontiers-06/samples/pixel-artist/default.html

[BC]

i agree with tony3rd.

breathing will look great if slowed down... legs look weird.

[Neo_Zurz]

welll you can change the color of the hair by modifying the pallete. if you look closely I put spots of green toned die on his hair to imitate the way it was in the movie. so if you say changed his pallete to a light yellow for hair, to make it look nice you'd make those green spots lighter and yellower. and the size won't be too bad if I fix up the ammount of detail.
*edit
well I was touching it up right now, give me a sec to update him before you guys say anything else, i'm sure your comments will still be relevant, but just tell me what you think visually again after I reupdate him lol i've been to that site, and countless others, the only one that helped was one that told me to draw him on a piece of paper, retrace him slightly differently on another and scan those in and color in with pixel art. anyone have any secret techniques to drawing multiple frames quicker I'm all ears. ++ that anim is a sample anim, the speed is different on mugen.
**edit
just reupdated standing anim http://www.zshare.net/image/191852010a1f88f7/

[CaseyAmazing AwesomeGuy]

lol, love how when someone is working on a character everyone puts there little edits in. just like the character bloodrayne. i like that we do that, dont get me wrong, i just find it funny.

[Neo_Zurz]

I love how everyone bashes a character on its initial release

[tetsuo9999]

Nuff said.

[Tony 3rd]

I love how everyone bashes a character on its initial release

i don't think its bashing.

bashing would be "YOU SUCK! ledger was way better than this piece of ****"

At least what i'm doing is constructive critcism,

and the "initial release" is often where most bugs are solved. that is why a game should spent months on beta testing before hitting the streets. that is capcom had several location tests before the actual release of SFIV. heck, you can't even install wow this days without having to install several patches.

Look at SF2. its "initial release" was fantastic and ground breaking. it did not stopped them from doing more than 15 versions of the same game. each fixing the bugs from the previous one (and adding their own to the table).


not to mention that saying "awesome work" and tapping you in the back would not change nothing, but would give you a wrong impression of the actual status of your work. why settle for Dan, when you sure have the potential to be Gouki? (not everyone would go the length process of doing a character from scratch).

now for actual feedback on the new Anim.

velocity is quite there. you can slow it down a bit... even tough it looks like he is breathing too hard, like he is nervous or something.
maybe, if you cut a frame or two, or even, get his chest to expand a little less would do the trick.

the position of the legs... did not changed, so the same I mentioned before still stands.

why not having his legs closed, like he actually does in that poster where he is on his back, holding a card?


you could also make his... lips 1 pixel thicker. and have the red lipstick actually reaching his mouth.

you could have his head a bit lower, the way it is now, looks like he has no neck, instead of leaning the head foward.

[Neo_Zurz]

I was referring to something off topic unrelated, I'm not angry about these comments at all, if you were around when I released my first char you'd know what I was talking about.

nuff said

yeah that's what I was referring too. I updated that char 9 times, and this one jackass never took down this bashing vid of the first version, needless to say I went on smoothing him out, and still can, but when so few show actual positive support toward something you don't really feeling like breaking your back for an empty audience. now back on topic. ok for his head, to me at least when I watched the movie his neck always looked hunched over like that. like he had no neck. I actually drew him with more neck at first but this way felt closer to the way his coat came up. I was thinking on cutting down the vest one or 2 pixels on the last two frames in regards to that chest thing. as for his lips. the red does extend to the edge of his face, but I made it get progressively darker as it curves around his cheek. so you could change the palette to just make that part brighter since it's totally flexible. at first I had it bright red all the way, but the dark progression made it feel like his mouth was more 3d. and as for making the lip thicker i'm playing around with that right now, let you know how I feel about it when I'm sure. yet again when I first drew him I had his legs straight, but it looked dorky, so I redrew them more spread like he looks when he's standing in the street, and I don't think it looks that bizarre :/ yet again anim vel on that link is only example, but I see what you mean about the chest, honestly it looks ok for now, but I was brooding over it myself anyway. its difficult to change the drawing at pixel quality because it's not how I drew it originally :/ ++ if anyone wants they can offer to touch up and refine his sprites after I initially finish each one :O
*edit

so cut edge of vest a little, also to reference the size thing, a simple solution for anyone it concerns will be to change the x and y size to .9 when I release him and voila, he'll be more like the size of kof and cvs characters.

example of palette customization

[NiO ErZeBeTh]

jsu a suggestion...could you try to use Johnny from GG as a base for sprites, they are HIres one, I think you can handle those...

anyways, is an interesting proyect dude!

[superill]

SWEET CHARACTER!!!! R.I.P. HEATH LEDGER

[BC]

change the abnormal leg position and you'll have a winner.

[Cyclysm]

Try Another Iori as a sprite base

because this doesn't look so good 

[NiO ErZeBeTh]

Try Another Iori as a sprite base

because this doesn't look so good 

I already use it, so I can say the same...

http://mugenguild.com/forumx/index.php?topic=87291.msg753401#new

I was planing on make him a char but in kof style....  anyways, like cyclism says, another Iori is a really good base or maybe in cvs style Kyosuke.

if you are planing Hires, I would stay with Johnny from GG

[bWWd]

Im tired of this Dark Knight propaganda , people are acting very weird if actor will die before movie release.

[Gmasta]

lol hit me

[tetsuo9999]

lol no