So you want to sprite eh? Even though it would be still a valid option to just use your own art style, heres srb2's, which is what most mods nowadays strive for.
You have 3 main colors, with 2 less prominent extra colors as well to help the piece.
- Highlights
- Base color
- Shadow
- Super Highlights (a small circle on the top of the character; aka the head)
- Super Shadows (a color after Shadows for the border, will explain later)
Each color also has 2 in-between colors, used to make the lines between colors less rigid and blocky, basically, lets say you have a place where you could nicely put half a pixel if it existed and you have 1 in-between color, thats where you put that in-between color, in essence. A bit more complicated with 2 but that's the gist of it, if you dont understand you can look up tutorials or something. (prob shoulda been youre first move tbh)
Now we get to the border, which is simply 1 color below the color it is on; say I have it next to the base color, meaning it should be the shadow color. Now what if it's a shadow? well remember that super shadow color from before? yea, thats what were using, though you want to make sure that only the very edge gets the darkest color, kay?
Now I want to make it clear to put in between colors in the border, and between the border and the neighboring shape, so if the border jerks into a new main color, or if the line between the border and the shape is too rigid and pixely, add in betweens.
Now for one last, kinda edge case scenario, skin and eyes.
Both have only 1 main color and a border one, thats it, though try to treat it like the super shadows, only making the sharpest corners the very darkest, and with skin in particular, say your character is bald, or has a rather large area of skin (like sonic's stomach), there you can add a small highlight, not in the conventional sense, but rather; stick-a-small-L-shape-with-two-pixels-inside-of-it-and-call-it-a-day, kinda way.
If youre wondering what these colors are, take screenshots of srb2, make sure the "main color" of your character is from the lame "green" skincolor ingame, and pick your colors from there, you may even notice some of the princibles here.
Also, feel free to break this a little bit if things look too blurry or gradient or whatnot, youre better off with a sprite unnoticably out of style than one that looks bad, hell skip doesnt even use in between colors in her border, people arent going to care if it looks a little off, since sprites arent looked at too extensivley, especially with animation involved, on a non-back facing sprite.
Now for the workload, find your own way of doing it, i have no idea how to manage it, which is why i can give spriters a lot of support for what they do, because theres waaay to many for anyone like me to even concieve of making.
I hope this helps a little, as i kinda underestimated how long it would take to type this out, at least its better than doing it by hand. (Thanks History class for aching my wrist with quotes)
You have 3 main colors, with 2 less prominent extra colors as well to help the piece.
- Highlights
- Base color
- Shadow
- Super Highlights (a small circle on the top of the character; aka the head)
- Super Shadows (a color after Shadows for the border, will explain later)
Each color also has 2 in-between colors, used to make the lines between colors less rigid and blocky, basically, lets say you have a place where you could nicely put half a pixel if it existed and you have 1 in-between color, thats where you put that in-between color, in essence. A bit more complicated with 2 but that's the gist of it, if you dont understand you can look up tutorials or something. (prob shoulda been youre first move tbh)
Now we get to the border, which is simply 1 color below the color it is on; say I have it next to the base color, meaning it should be the shadow color. Now what if it's a shadow? well remember that super shadow color from before? yea, thats what were using, though you want to make sure that only the very edge gets the darkest color, kay?
Now I want to make it clear to put in between colors in the border, and between the border and the neighboring shape, so if the border jerks into a new main color, or if the line between the border and the shape is too rigid and pixely, add in betweens.
Now for one last, kinda edge case scenario, skin and eyes.
Both have only 1 main color and a border one, thats it, though try to treat it like the super shadows, only making the sharpest corners the very darkest, and with skin in particular, say your character is bald, or has a rather large area of skin (like sonic's stomach), there you can add a small highlight, not in the conventional sense, but rather; stick-a-small-L-shape-with-two-pixels-inside-of-it-and-call-it-a-day, kinda way.
If youre wondering what these colors are, take screenshots of srb2, make sure the "main color" of your character is from the lame "green" skincolor ingame, and pick your colors from there, you may even notice some of the princibles here.
Also, feel free to break this a little bit if things look too blurry or gradient or whatnot, youre better off with a sprite unnoticably out of style than one that looks bad, hell skip doesnt even use in between colors in her border, people arent going to care if it looks a little off, since sprites arent looked at too extensivley, especially with animation involved, on a non-back facing sprite.
Now for the workload, find your own way of doing it, i have no idea how to manage it, which is why i can give spriters a lot of support for what they do, because theres waaay to many for anyone like me to even concieve of making.
I hope this helps a little, as i kinda underestimated how long it would take to type this out, at least its better than doing it by hand. (Thanks History class for aching my wrist with quotes)
This is too long, should make it a guide, so i did.