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[Sar]

maybe make it more of an uppercut so it flows from the idle?

Yeah, that's one thought I had... basically, I don't want to add too many extra frames that aren't really really useful, because I'll have to draw those frames over and over for clothes and stuff, so if I can keep it to a couple of frames and still have it look good, I might change it.

Will there be various version of the little guy with different outfits or will it be modular in some way?

Modular is the current plan, certainly - the demo with the private-eye and Indiana-Jones-style characters was a test to see how different a look I could get from a small set of changes. I'm currently in the process of splitting up the stuff I've got so far into separate legs/torso-and-arms/head parts to make it easier to add new clothes/etc. ... the downside is that it'll be up to people using the sprites to combine the different parts and set up animations using the relevant frames in whatever order/timing they prefer at runtime, but hopefully it'll give enough flexibility to be fairly useful.

[Sar]

Double post because I'm an atrocious attention whore:

Modular is the current plan, certainly

Here's a brief idea of how it'll work, this is the breakdown of the parts of the walk animation:




(Background grey inserted so the white character is actually visible over the forum background...)

[feeblethemighty]

Wow! This is a truly genius idea. 

All i can think is River City Ransom with these guys running around.

[Sar]

Painted and modularised few more animations:



(As demonstrated, the first frame of the dying one can be used for pain as well... I guess the middle frame could be used for crouching-down-and-picking-something-up in a pinch, but hey...)


EDIT: Also, I re-did the punch after all, he now spins all the way around:

[Sar]

Example completed sprite sheet - "Mr Tofumochi":


I guess this could be used as-is, but in the end - before the end of part 1 - I'll zip up the separate component sheets which this was built from and provide them as file downloads, to avoid leaving huge images all over the thread. I already scaled this down by 50% in each dimension to make it less obtrusive... I also have all these frames flipped left/right and re-shaded so as to allow display in the opposite direction as well, without the lighting looking funny.

This is the format I'm going for, anyway, with all the animation sets I plan to include:

Row 1: 6-frame walk animation
Row 2: 6-frame run animation
Row 3: 3-frame push; 3-frame pull
Row 4: 3-frame idle; 1-frame nod; 2-frame shake head
Row 5: 4-frame climb; 2-frame punch;
Row 6: 3-frame jump; 2-frame kick; 1-frame portrait
Row 7: 3-frame throw; 3-frame die

Several of these animations make use of the first idle 'stand' frame for a start or in-between frame, or display in a non-literal order.

For examples:
The 'punch' animation should more accurately be "idle 1; punch 1; punch 2; punch 1; idle 1".
The 'jump' should be "idle 1; jump 3" (to start the jump, if not instant), then "jump 1" for the whole 'up' part and "jump 2" for the whole down part, then "jump 3; idle 1" for the landing.
The 'shake head' relies on an 'idle 1' in the middle, i.e. "idle 1; shake 1; idle 1; shake 2".

(These should probably be obvious from the aniGIFs in the first post, of course.)

[Sar]

So hey, now I've more or less got the parts split and the animations done, I'm looking at what kind of costumes to dress the guy up in. I'll do an assortment of 'normal' clothes first - shirts and trousers and underwear and shoes and so on - and I'm inclined to do the PI and adventurer from the dress-up demo and then maybe a generic military set, but does anyone have any kind of request/suggestions?

[Pencerkoff]

Hello this is Pencerkoff

First thing... about the punch animation.  I think it looks a little strange because he punches in the same frame that steps.  If I may suggest a 3-frame setup (that may not even work, it's just a thought)...

1.  Pull arm back, begin to step forward.
2.  Put foot down (finish stepping) move the arm forward to begin the punch.
3.  Shift whole body forward along with the rest of the punch.

As for clothes, something casual like a wife-beater and jeans would be nice.  I could see a game using this guy as a main character as well as some NPCs that just need to look like people walking around.  A t-shirt in a few colors would be nice too.

-PENCERKOFF

[Sar]

First thing... about the punch animation.  I think it looks a little strange because he punches in the same frame that steps.

It's possibly true, but... well, I wanted to keep the attack animations short so there wouldn't be any need for a long lag between hitting the punch button and getting the action out. (Or perhaps "there wouldn't be any need for game developers using these sprites to not use frames I spent ages drawing because they delay the action too much"...;-)

As for clothes, something casual like a wife-beater and jeans would be nice.  I could see a game using this guy as a main character as well as some NPCs that just need to look like people walking around.  A t-shirt in a few colors would be nice too.

Jeans, check; t-shirt, check. Wifebeater... on the list.

I've got [male] underwear, jeans and long-and-short-sleeved t-shirts done so far:




(Although it seems I need to pay a bit more attention to the position of the belt buckle, now I look at it again...)

[Ivan]

Looks great!!

Needs some sort of environment though as most other people's stuff is pixelarty, so this wouldn't fit.

[Sar]

So, three days after I made the first post in this thread, I drove my girlfriend up to Lincoln for a job interview she was convinced she wouldn't even get offered; she got the job, and the rest of the month turned into lots of arranging and driving all over the place and telephoning people and buying new-hosue stuff, so I've not had time to do nearly so much as I'd anticipated on this guy. I've got several bits of clothing (jeans, t-shirts, smart shirts, ties, hair, facial hair) done, but it's also all stuck in Photoshop documents right now and I'm about to drive her and her stuff up to Lincoln to move in (she starts tomorrow), so I won't have time to save it all out to sprite-sheets and upload it 'til tomorrow. So if anyone thinks it doesn't count as an Assemblee entry 'cause I haven't had the time to upload it tonight, you're a horrible person with no compassion who will die cold and alone, and I bet you kick baby seals and club puppies to death for fun.

[Sar]

OK, I'm home and I've got the various layers of the PSD saved out as PNGs and uploaded in a zip in the first post. I didn't get to finish as much as I'd have liked, but hey - it's perfectly usable as it is, just not as widely-varied as I wanted.

[HanClinto]

Are these links dead for anyone other than me?

Edit: n/m -- must have been my connection before.  These sprites look fantastic!

--clint