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[dspencer]

I'm trying to start seriously learning how to make nice looking pixel art. Please help me make it better!

To start, some tiles and a background from a game I'm working on (character is borrowed for prototyping)

[Storsorgen]

Hey Dspencer! My feedback is going to be very based on my own tastes, but here goes.

Notice how the snow and the spikes in the back are shaded? I think you should apply that to all the tiles so you get a feel of volume for them.  also believe that you could go with bigger chunks of rock for the ground, as the current one is quite 'noisy'.

For the colors, can get a good start by checking complimentary colors for your basic ground tile, you coud try using this page for example http://paletton.com/.

[Cobralad]

maybe you should start with smaller sprites, like 16x16. Right now youre trying to bite too much with those 32x32 tiles.

[maruki]

I agree with @Cobralad. I'd also suggest reading a bit of color theory and trying to pixel things using a restricted palette to train your eye on how color works in pixel art.

[dspencer]

Thank you guys for the feedback. I'll try reducing size+palette. Do you have any recommended reading?

[dspencer]

Did some reading, and tried remaking those tiles. I still need to add full borders to them, but is this the right track? Should I try to have all of my tiles share the same palette, or is it ok to have different color palettes between, say, ice and cave tiles? I guess this is all stylistic but I'm still not experienced enough to have opinions on my own style...


EDIT: put together, with some snow:


Hrm, I chose background colors pretty quickly based on contrast w/ the foreground, and I think that works, but they don't really fit the scene. Does it work to have similar bg / fg hue and just desaturate + brighten/darken a lot?

EDIT II: Yeah, looks better like this I think:

[Cobralad]

I think first one reads better but its because that snow pile reads like a background cloud to me. Its generally a good idea to make collision borders the brightest or darkest place on the level.

[niqle]

I'll write down some advice tomorrow. Too tired atm.