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[DanFessler]

Randomly Generated Clouds!

Explain yourself, yo!

[Thomas Finch]

@Thomas Finch: Good stuff! I guess you've used logic that says two adjacent tiles cannot be the same? Some of them come out quite rectangular though, those look a bit weird.

Nope! That's not how I did it. Yeah, it still needs a tiny bit of tweaking, but at this point 90% of the clouds look great to me, so I'm happy for now.

Explain yourself, yo!

Okay!

Each cloud is made of a random number of individual 'poofs' that were drawn by my artist. In total there are about 80 or so poofs (7 layers each). Here is a small sample: http://imgur.com/3kUfHCf

The poofs are all programmed into position using a 2D Array, then a couple loops draw the 7th column of every poof in the cloud formation. Then they draw the 6th column of all poofs, then the 5th and so on. The later something is drawn, the more on top it appear. So everything from the 7th column appears on the bottom layer, and the earlier columns appear higher.

In fact, I was bored, so I decided to make a gif of how the cloud is drawn:


EDIT: Something I completely forgot to mention! When a cloud is created it draws all of those layers to a SURFACE, then I convert the surface into a sprite the size of the cloud. So every step, the only work the game is doing is drawing the new sprite. The game does not have to draw each individual layer of every poof every step.

[surt]

Surely heightmap per "poof" plus z-buffer would be easier?

[JobLeonard]

Interesting method! More like a painter layering strokes.

[Cranky]

Okay!

Each cloud is made of a random number of individual 'poofs' that were drawn by my artist. In total there are about 80 or so poofs (7 layers each). Here is a small sample: http://imgur.com/3kUfHCf

The poofs are all programmed into position using a 2D Array, then a couple loops draw the 7th column of every poof in the cloud formation. Then they draw the 6th column of all poofs, then the 5th and so on. The later something is drawn, the more on top it appear. So everything from the 7th column appears on the bottom layer, and the earlier columns appear higher.

In fact, I was bored, so I decided to make a gif of how the cloud is drawn:

In case your engine supports it:
You can just use normal sprites for the poofs and you can achieve the same effect in 2 passes:
first draw the poofs in solid black (for the silhouettes),
then change srcblend to srccolor, destblend to destcolor and blendop to blendop_max (this chooses the max of srccolor and destcolor)
and draw all the poofs again in their own color.

Here is a quick test pic I did using your asset:


This way darker colors won't be drawn over lighter colors and you achieve the same effect.
You can also do this in reverse by doing blendop_min.
The black silhouettes are needed just in case the background is lighter than the clouds you are trying to draw.

[Raku]

Those generated clouds are undoubtedly nice, but I'm really interested in that moon in the background and the whole background too. That's some nice dithering

[joeyspacerocks]

Zombie Monster isn't impressed by the Organ Support Machine ...

[Thomas Finch]

Surely heightmap per "poof" plus z-buffer would be easier?

In case your engine supports it:
You can just use normal sprites for the poofs and you can achieve the same effect in 2 passes:
first draw the poofs in solid black (for the silhouettes),
then change srcblend to srccolor, destblend to destcolor and blendop to blendop_max (this chooses the max of srccolor and destcolor)
and draw all the poofs again in their own color.

This way darker colors won't be drawn over lighter colors and you achieve the same effect.
You can also do this in reverse by doing blendop_min.
The black silhouettes are needed just in case the background is lighter than the clouds you are trying to draw.

Thank you for the advice guys but there is something I completely forgot to mention! When a cloud is created it draws all of those layers to a SURFACE, then I convert the surface into a sprite the size of the cloud. So every step, the only work the game is doing is drawing the new sprite. The game does not have to draw each individual layer of every poof every step. As such, your methods may still improve the creation code, but the difference will be negligible either way, because the creation code is already fast. I'll keep your advice in mind when I'm doing a performance pass later though.

Interesting method! More like a painter layering strokes.

Those generated clouds are undoubtedly nice, but I'm really interested in that moon in the background and the whole background too. That's some nice dithering

Thanks guys! I'm really proud of my artist.

[Oleg Klishin]

Piece I made for a space-themed competition on .pixel community on vk.com. I'm happy to tell that I took the first place with it.

[Raku]

Piece I made for a space-themed competition on .pixel community on vk.com. I'm happy to tell that I took the first place with it.

and you deserve it, holy cow. I can't get enough pixelized space scenes where the stars are blue, it's so nice!
This whole scene is really remeniscent of the map screen in Starfox 2

[Oleg Klishin]

and you deserve it, holy cow. I can't get enough pixelized space scenes where the stars are blue, it's so nice!
This whole scene is really remeniscent of the map screen in Starfox 2

Thanks a lot. Well, I googled some space pixels for refs, but never ran into Starfox screenshots. It really resembles map screen you are right. Sadly I never played Starfox myself.

[alexashby]

Hi everyone! I've been working on this for an art test for a game. Was looking for any feedback maybe. I picture this being some sort of dungeon and the creature being this boar skull with an ax and a poison gas aura around him!

[SolarLune]

Piece I made for a space-themed competition on .pixel community on vk.com. I'm happy to tell that I took the first place with it.

This is awesome, indeed. Great, great colors.

[Raku]

little gun man

[Oleg Klishin]

Thamk you all for the feedback, I think I exceeded my own expectations with this one.

[SolarLune]

little gun man

That's pretty cool, but it's a bit tough to read. Maybe you should separate his limbs out more-so from his body to make it easier to see his pose and individual elements.

[JobLeonard]

Hi everyone! I've been working on this for an art test for a game. Was looking for any feedback maybe. I picture this being some sort of dungeon and the creature being this boar skull with an ax and a poison gas aura around him!

I like the look of it, but the walking animation is a bit odd: first he pushes himself forward with his left arm (right from our point of view), then he lifts up the axe handle. My gut feeling says this should happen at (almost) the same time, not sequentially. Barring that weird split the rest of the animation looks good to me.

[framk]

It actually makes sense. I'm assuming the gameobject would be moving during the part where the arm slides back, making it appear stationary in a specific position. It's hard to explain, but to me the cycle makes total sense.

[Blambo]

ye the right arms the one pushing the body forward

[Miguelito]

Although I'm not finding any time to do private stuff at the moment, I really wanted to do a style test for a possible private project. Sometime in the future.

I think you can even see veeeeeeeeery subtle art indications that I started playing Persona 4 Golden if you know what to look for.