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How to convert drawings in mugen sprites (Read 13107 times)

Started by demongorne, October 06, 2021, 05:49:44 pm
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How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#1  October 06, 2021, 05:49:44 pm
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Hello mates, i would like to know a way to turn my drawings in sprites for mugen a nd fighter factory, basically I'm planning to make drawings of snk chars but in cvs/capcom stylestyle and then convert them in sprites, is that possible?
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#2  October 06, 2021, 06:06:10 pm
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Yeah, that's how they did the sprites for Street Fighter II.

You need to buy a scanner so that you can get good conversion from paper to digital.  Don't use a phone to take pictures.  It will be too hard to maintain scale.  Make sure you're using plain white paper, and use a straight edge or ruler for guide lines (not graph paper).  You will then have to do quite a bit of clean up on the computer side of things.  Colorize and palletize your sprites with the computer.  You can use gray scale for shading on paper.

Is it worth the effort?  I dunno.  Maybe!  *shrug*
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#3  October 06, 2021, 07:33:41 pm
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Now thwn, this is an attempt i did with Marco Rossi nbc sprite, the size is quite the same than the original but the proportion are more like capcom chars i did just a frame as sample 
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#4  October 08, 2021, 11:49:36 pm
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    • network.mugenguild.com/cyanide/
So thats nicely detailed but pencil is a terrible medium for clean up. Before you bring it in i would trace your pencil with a solid coloured pen like a sharpie. Then scan that in. You may still need clean up but way less.

You can avoid some by making the scanned image 2 colours so its just b&w. Then clean artifacts. Then colour and shade. Or if you colour and shade the original. After you bring it in reduce the colour depth to remove unnecessary colours. Psp lets you say "my image has 8 colours" and itll do its best on merging the similar ones together.


In M.U.G.E.N there is no magic button

They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it's not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance.
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#5  October 10, 2021, 09:27:41 pm
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Hello mate, yes the main problem is when i scale the drawing many details getting lost. So i made a smaller drawing
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#6  October 11, 2021, 10:35:40 am
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  • Legendary XIII
  • I am the eye of the storm to come!
    • New Zealand
    • network.mugenguild.com/cyanide/
Its not about size but sprite cleanliness. Your drawing is very good. But its terrible to convert into a usable sprite. Look at all the messy half black half white bits that remove the clear cuts between 1 colour and another. Trace over it with a black pen. Preferably a nice one not a ballpoint. Then scan it in again. Don't add shading. If you want shading in the original do it with the end colour. Easier not to though. The fill tool will allow more consistency. 1st though you need clean lines.


In M.U.G.E.N there is no magic button

They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it's not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance.
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#7  October 11, 2021, 01:20:59 pm
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I see I'll take care of this for the next drawings, here's ta new attempt 

left hand fixed
Last Edit: October 11, 2021, 01:33:59 pm by demongorne
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#8  October 11, 2021, 07:01:33 pm
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Aof2 Takuma drawing 
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#9  October 11, 2021, 07:23:25 pm
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If you resize stuff to be smaller, of course you'll lose details. It's the same exact thing we told you the other time when talking about resizing sprites, it can be applied to scanned drawings too.
You can draw the most beautiful and ultra detailed face, but if you make it smaller it will become a mess.

The only thing you need to do to have relatively less time spent on the sprite is to make the sprite simpler. Less details at a bigger scale, so when resized you'll lose less details.
No shading (or as little as possible), just lineart.
The lineart must be as clean as possible.

This is what I would do then:
- resize that, retrace it on another layer then work on it.
- Set a palette index, the number of colours you want to use for the sprite. If you're trying to make a CvS sprite, use 15 colours in total, not counting the BG colour.
With that restriction you'll learn to understand what colours to use.

Also use the right references!!

Look at how Capcom drew the characters in the old days:



The lines are clean, there's no shading, they're also very simple, no pencil lines.
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#10  October 11, 2021, 07:57:51 pm
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All right, I clean it up

Many thanks for your tips mates they was very useful, I  wasn't of this intermediate step of cleaning up, I gotta say that the whole process is very long and difficult, regardless this is the sprite cleaned and scaled (still not completed) 
Last Edit: October 11, 2021, 09:46:58 pm by demongorne
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#11  October 14, 2021, 07:27:47 am
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  • Legendary XIII
  • I am the eye of the storm to come!
    • New Zealand
    • network.mugenguild.com/cyanide/
Still using pencil dude. Use a flatter medium like a ball point or a felt tip before you scan. Pencil will make your life hell.


In M.U.G.E.N there is no magic button

They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it's not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance.
Re: How to convert drawings in mugen sprites
#12  October 14, 2021, 06:19:21 pm
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All right i got it, thanks again for these precious hints mate.