Favorite NES Graphics

A place for your artistic side. Discuss techniques and tools for pixel art on the NES, GBC, or similar platforms.

Moderator: Moderators

tepples
Posts: 22708
Joined: Sun Sep 19, 2004 11:12 pm
Location: NE Indiana, USA (NTSC)
Contact:

Post by tepples »

qbradq wrote:Am I the only one that thinks the colors in Willow are a washed out nightmare? I mean seriously, there is hardly any contast at all.
I'm inclined to agree somewhat. A game should still look playable if all hues of $x1-$xC are transformed to $x7, or if the TV's "color" knob (saturation) is dialed down to zero.

$01-$0C: halfway between $0F (black) and $00 (dark gray)
$11-$1C: very close to $00
$21-$2C: very close to $10 (light gray)
$31-$3C: halfway between $10 and $30 (white)
Ian A
Posts: 115
Joined: Sat Feb 27, 2010 8:32 am
Location: Maine

Post by Ian A »

Man, I've checked out pretty much every game you guys listed and my head is starting to hurt. But I'm now more certain than ever if you gave me a screen shot of an NES game I could guess the year.
User avatar
BMF54123
Posts: 410
Joined: Mon Aug 28, 2006 2:52 am
Contact:

Post by BMF54123 »

I always thought KID's games had a really unique art style, very reminiscent of that weird '70s watercolor artwork seen on old Atari 2600 boxes:

Low G Man
ImageImage

Doki Doki Yuuenchi
Image

Isolated Warrior
ImageImageImage

Kick Master
ImageImageImage
User avatar
cartlemmy
Posts: 193
Joined: Fri Sep 24, 2010 4:41 pm
Location: California, USA
Contact:

Post by cartlemmy »

UncleSporky wrote:...Actually that's a very nice tree...
You got me going on this one... So I did some more pixel art.

If I were to make an adventure game for the NES this is what it would probably look like:

Image
nescurious
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed May 04, 2011 7:38 am

Post by nescurious »

cartlemmy wrote:
UncleSporky wrote:...Actually that's a very nice tree...
You got me going on this one... So I did some more pixel art.

If I were to make an adventure game for the NES this is what it would probably look like:
wow! you're really talented, that looks great.
User avatar
qbradq
Posts: 972
Joined: Wed Oct 15, 2008 11:50 am

Post by qbradq »

Dang cartlemmy! That's awesome! Now someone just needs to lick 8-way scrolling and bribe you :D
UncleSporky
Posts: 388
Joined: Sat Nov 17, 2007 8:44 pm

Post by UncleSporky »

Would you take a little criticism? Or basically just some suggestions. I know you just did it for fun but hey why not. :)

There's nothing particularly wrong with the trees, I think they look great, but I wish the smaller trees matched the big one a bit better. It gets really dark near the bottom but the other trees stay light. It doesn't have dithering on top and has it at the bottom, but the small trees are kind of the opposite of that.

I think the green bush thing is a little too chaotic to be easily recognizable. Looks a bit like some kind of tiny alien creature to me, leading the advance of a horde of other tiny alien creatures. Sometimes round Zelda style bushes are ok, I think they would fit fine with your style.

I love the effect of using bigger pixel chunks to stipple the edges of grass and dirt, but I don't know if there's enough of it going on. The diagonals are a bit too regular for me (though I know you might do it that way to save on tiles).

And I think the water effect is a little too regular and square in places, looks a bit odd. Almost like it was larger and you squished it down by resizing it with a selector tool.

I made this to illustrate.

Image

There are two slightly unique 16x16 tiles that will still tile next to each other perfectly on all four sides, just to break up the visible grid a bit. I just tiled them like a checkerboard.
User avatar
cartlemmy
Posts: 193
Joined: Fri Sep 24, 2010 4:41 pm
Location: California, USA
Contact:

Post by cartlemmy »

UncleSporky wrote:Would you take a little criticism...
Good eye UncleSporky :) I actually took the bushes and the water from another project of mine (non-NES) where they were 20x20 tiles, and resized them to 16x16 without cleaning them up at all.

What you did with them looks great.
User avatar
Dwedit
Posts: 4924
Joined: Fri Nov 19, 2004 7:35 pm
Contact:

Post by Dwedit »

Ever tried Rotsprite? It's really good at resizing and rotating sprites, it uses algorithms optimized for pixel art.
Last edited by Dwedit on Wed May 04, 2011 8:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Here come the fortune cookies! Here come the fortune cookies! They're wearing paper hats!
User avatar
cartlemmy
Posts: 193
Joined: Fri Sep 24, 2010 4:41 pm
Location: California, USA
Contact:

Post by cartlemmy »

Dwedit wrote:Ever tried Rotsprite? It's a really good at resizing and rotating sprites, it uses algorithms optimized for pixel art.
I normally just nearest neighbor resize it (like above); then manually adjust it until it looks the way I like it (like I hadn't done above yet). But if there's an easier way it sounds good to me. Thanks.

EDIT: I just checked it out. The results are really impressive.

SECOND EDIT:
I went ahead and made some changes based on your recommendations (and actual modifications):
Image

I have to agree with you it looks better this way.
Ian A
Posts: 115
Joined: Sat Feb 27, 2010 8:32 am
Location: Maine

Post by Ian A »

This thread delivers!

@cartlemmey Damn! That looks awesome! (especially with UncleSporky's touch up!)

EDIT: Even better!

@BMF54123 I had never even heard of any of those games before. Kick master looks pretty awesome, though!
User avatar
Bregalad
Posts: 8056
Joined: Fri Nov 12, 2004 2:49 pm
Location: Divonne-les-bains, France

Post by Bregalad »

I have to admit this looks very good. Congratulations for your great work !
Useless, lumbering half-wits don't scare us.
tepples
Posts: 22708
Joined: Sun Sep 19, 2004 11:12 pm
Location: NE Indiana, USA (NTSC)
Contact:

Post by tepples »

Dwedit wrote:Ever tried Rotsprite? It's really good at resizing and rotating sprites, it uses algorithms optimized for pixel art.
The connection has timed out

I tried the Wayback Machine, and "We were unable to get the robots.txt document to display this page."

I seem to remember reading before that it appears to be something like Scale4x followed by nearest neighbor resampling. Is source code available, or does it work in Wine?
Shiru
Posts: 1161
Joined: Sat Jan 23, 2010 11:41 pm

Post by Shiru »

The link worked today, don't working right now.
tepples
Posts: 22708
Joined: Sun Sep 19, 2004 11:12 pm
Location: NE Indiana, USA (NTSC)
Contact:

Post by tepples »

RotSprite is closed-source and Windows-only. I'm working on rewriting it in Python based on the algorithm's description.
Post Reply