Dorsal redesign?

[SkyWolf25]

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 I will not respond to any other permissions and delete them! 

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Before modifications may be made, the artist will be contacted and must consent. If the artist does not respond within 30 days of being contacted, permission is granted by default.

 

Technically, if Shiro deletes your PM and does not reply in 30 days, permission is granted by default and you're free to try out updates. You can try PMing them if you want to try that out.

As TJ has made varying answers and the Vampire update thread hadn't been closed till the sprites were updated, I'll leave this open for now.

[absofacto]

@Fuzzbucket I know but TJ said if i go through the process he might consider it. 30 days without and answer grants automatic permission if I'm reading the rules correctly.

edit:
@SkyWolf25 sorry I didn't see your reply omg, thank you

Edited September 20, 2018 by absofacto

[Shokomon]

Also, I don't know when Shiro left, but I assume it's at least a couple of years.

 

People can change their minds in even less of a time frame.

[absofacto]

@Shokomon I think she left in 2015 if I'm correct. Hopefully she comes around I'm assuming not tho

Edited September 20, 2018 by absofacto

[cbussiere]

On 9/18/2018 at 7:17 AM, Dalek Raptor said:

I would say yes. Normally sprite updates are normally done in private as well (praying that the white hatchies get one soon XD)

The White hatchlings are one of my favorites! ;o; They're so cute...

Anyway, I wouldn't be against an updated Dorsal.

[angelicdragonpuppy]

I realize the point is mostly moot, but--

 

I do think Dorsals are the roughest of all sprites in the cave, largely for lack of shading. The current "shading" is, as far as I can tell, a single darker shade of every color present, and nothing else. Dark Greens, Stones, Papers, Geodes... a few of the oldest breeds are in fairly rough shape, too, but I think Dorsals have it worst.

 

That being said, I'm not a huge fan of sprite updates--something is always lost, no matter how much is improved--but if more do happen, I hope it's just the oldest, roughest breeds getting faithful remakes and spriters personally tweaking any of their newer stuff they find necessary. I don't want to see a massive rush to overhaul ALL the older breeds; a lot of them have held up pretty darn well and are still lovely to look at, even if not as detailed as newer things.

[Moonlight_Eevee]

1 hour ago, cbussiere said:

The White hatchlings are one of my favorites! ;o; They're so cute...

Anyway, I wouldn't be against an updated Dorsal.

I just want to see that flabby thigh fixed

[Starbit]

I am fed up of sprites being remade, especially without the participation of the original artist. I was sad to see the Seasonals changed, and I definitely do not want the Balloons or Dorsals touched. 

 

If the artist wants to update their work, fine. But this spree of fixing what isn't broken amounts to revisionist history for me. I've been working on a Sunstone x Balloon lineage for years, to potentially have that altered because someone feels the Balloons aren't good enough anymore is awful. Shiro quite clearly does not want to grant permission for any edits to their sprites - whatever happened with the Seasonals was behind closed doors and they may have agreed to it. Please lets stop redrawing art that does not belong to us. You wouldn't redraw the Mona Lisa.

[RealWilliamShakespeare]

4 hours ago, Starbit-Plushie said:

I am fed up of sprites being remade, especially without the participation of the original artist. I was sad to see the Seasonals changed, and I definitely do not want the Balloons or Dorsals touched. 

 

If the artist wants to update their work, fine. But this spree of fixing what isn't broken amounts to revisionist history for me. I've been working on a Sunstone x Balloon lineage for years, to potentially have that altered because someone feels the Balloons aren't good enough anymore is awful. Shiro quite clearly does not want to grant permission for any edits to their sprites - whatever happened with the Seasonals was behind closed doors and they may have agreed to it. Please lets stop redrawing art that does not belong to us. You wouldn't redraw the Mona Lisa.

 

The standard of art on this website has improved vastly. In order to get new dragons in the cave, the art has to be beautiful - realistically proportioned, immaculately shaded, like, as realistic as possible with it still being a mythical creature, and being a minuscule pixel art sprite. While artists have to work meticulously just to get their work on the websites, the old sprites just don't fit that anymore: they look out of place, especially considering about 80% of the art on the site is of this similar, realistic standard. And that standard is required because TJ has mentioned he wants the site to look that way - to be presentable, and everything be in-line and to that standard. That is why older, out-of-line art has been redone in the first place. C'mon, look at the Dorsals compared to, say, the new Boreals. In comparison, there is virtually non-existent shading, wacky anatomy (that neck curve? Broken wrist? Back legs?) They look positively out of place.

 

While I agree somewhat that touching without permission shouldn't be done, it actually states in the artist's agreement - that Shiro would have signed - that without consent within a certain time period, permission would be automatically granted. Shiro would have known this. By the looks of things, Shiro doesn't care. If Da Vinci had given the Mona Lisa to a museum, signed an agreement to them stating they could change it if he didn't respond within 30 days, and then disappeared from the country, I'm sure someone would have come around and painted over it as soon as it had started to faded. The two situations aren't comparable.

[Fuzzbucket]

I'm with starbit. (Sorry not to quote names in full but my tablet can be a pain!) Sure art standards are rising but that isn't a good enough reason to change history. Just because an older sprite wouldn't make it today doesn't mean it has to be painted over. Btw wasn't shiro working before the current agreement anyway?

[Alrexwolf]

If it were up to me, albinos, balloons, mints, waverunners, dorsals, pyros, and waterhorses would all get anatomy updates. Like what happened with the seasonals and red - don't change the position, keep the features, just make it more anatomically correct.

 

There are a lot of dragons I don't like - brimstones, black teas, neotropicals, frilled, for example - but I still don't think they need an update to higher standards because their anatomy isn't distracting. They all have that old DC style, but they're at least more solid in terms of looking like actual realistic animals. 

 

If any sprite is going to get a redo, I really hope it's waverunners first. Balloons at least have that dinosaur joke sprite aesthetic going on, waterhorses are supposed to be weird little aqua steeds, and albinos have lore for their weird necks. Waverunners, though... just look like scythes with a tail. It would also be cool to see them get an anatomy update because electric dragons and storm riders look so cool, but waverunners make a storm rider lineage look weird imo. 

 

tl;dr: sprites should be updated for anatomy, but not because of style - seasonals did a great job at fixing the anatomy while keeping the style. People just don't like change. 

[Sazandora]

I can understand why people don't want older sprites to be replaced. But the revamped sprites don't look all that different from the old versions -- they got the same exact poses and colors and everything, but with some anatomy updates. I didn't care all that much about Seasonals before the revamp, but when the revamp happened I began to like them a lot more since they didn't look so old and wonky anymore. Same goes for Reds and especially Vampires. I don't like some old breeds like Dorsals or Guardians because the sprites look so outdated and simplistic compared to the much more detailed sprites of some newer breeds, but I'm sure I could appreciate them a lot better if they were updated.

[RealWilliamShakespeare]

The last two comments precisely.

 

If the sprites were to be completely changed, like the Golds were, I wouldn’t support that. As others have mentioned across the forums, even the Silvers go a little too far in editing the style even though the poses are kept almost perfect. I firmly believe that the Reds and Vampires are the best sprite updates we’ve had. The poses and style have remained almost exactly the same, with slight anatomy fixes where necessary, and shading/texturing actually added. They’re wonderful. If the Dorsals were to be done like them, I might actually like the breed lmao.

[Dracaena]

I can't speak about vampire artwork as I don't collect them and didn't even realize they had been changed.  I don't have a single one on my scroll and there wouldn't ever be one. 

 

The red dragons aren't as unchanged as you seem to think.  The color is different, it's no longer the deep red it used to be, the far wing coming forward has changed the silhouette and thus much of my lineages.  They did a nice job on the scales but overall used too much lightening and changed the color from a lineage standpoint.  I wouldn't be working on my red checkers anymore.

 

I wouldn't speak of what happened to my beloved silvers as mine are now all retired and I don't feel like raising my blood pressure.  If this continues, how many years before the demand for an aether or pipio redesign comes up?

[HeatherMarie]

5 hours ago, Alrexwolf said:

If it were up to me, albinos, balloons, mints, waverunners, dorsals, pyros, and waterhorses would all get anatomy updates. Like what happened with the seasonals and red - don't change the position, keep the features, just make it more anatomically correct.

 

 

The Reds positions were most definitely changed, at least on the hatchlings. The Seasonal hatchlings were more subtle but also had a bit of a position change. The 'features' were not kept either, when it comes to the Red's old storybook-type appearance. 

 

I really have to agree with those who don't understand the push for every single old sprite to be updated. Yes, the majority of new releases in the past couple years are of much better quality then the 'original' or older sprites.... So what? That does not automatically mean every old sprite suddenly isn't good anymore or that they *need* to be changed to 'keep up' or whatever. Personally I *love* that there are still older breeds in this game that have that 'amateur' feel to them, that actually look more like *drawings* (which is what those sprites on our scroll are actually supposed to be). This entire game is actually based around keeping a 'scroll' full of information you've recorded about dragons you've seen.... I personally think the older sprites often 'fit' with that whole concept a lot better then some of the newer more 'realistic' sprites. 

 

I wouldn't mind updates if they were only focused on fixing anatomy issues (that Albino's neck still bothers a lot of us!), but that's *never* actually the case. Never. Poses are changed, shading is changed, the overall look is 'sleeked up', and it loses the old feel. Always. The Reds and Seasonals are pretty much the only 'big' update that actually remained fairly close to the old ones, but even those were tweaked noticeably beyond simple anatomy fixes. 

 

[skwerl56767]

   I don't recall many people saying things NEED to be updated. What we're saying is, IF the sprites will be updated at one point, or if the artists are considering it, etc., we would be okay with it. One can ask why that matters, but I'm remembering the blow-up about the Silver update... I'm sure there are lots of artists that appreciate vocalized opinions before they make anything official.
   Also it's important to note that just because a part of the community says a sprite is looking old or wonky, or that it's always been a bit iffy, or that it just doesn't like it, or it needs to be "up to standards" or whatever the reason is, doesn't mean changes will be made or that we somehow have democratic power over the sprites on the site, because the fact is, we don't. For all we know, Shiro is suddenly going to start replying to PMs one day and say "No, no, no, and no, stop asking," and that will be that. Literally the only thing making a Dorsal redesign a plausible idea right now is the fact that the artist's contract has a loophole concerning artists who leave the site and can't/won't answer for permissions; and unless Shiro is one of those people who gets stuck in a rut of grudge for years on end, and will continue not answering PMs, there's also a chance that she may have changed her mind on things or has simply stopped caring about her old art on here anyway. I can say from experience that artists cringe at their old art, and in my case, as long as I have a log, or screenshot, or the old image itself saved locally on my machine for posterity, I'm willing to remake art, provided my skills have changed enough that the difference is noticeable and the old mistakes that peeve me are fixed. We technically already have this system in place, too (I had to look at dragcave.wikia to know what Gold sprite you guys were talking about)! Most of the other artists I know are the same way.
   We should also remember that ultimately, the sprites and whatever changes made to them are beholden to the original makers... even I will one day look at a sprite update and think "Oh... that's not what I expected...", and there's not much that can be done about it. Artist property is artist property :'D (barring the permission loophole, although part of me believes the loophole is intended for permissions such as "can I make fanart/recolor the sprite for personal use/etc.", considering TJ said there's currently no process for sprite updates).

   Also, I don't believe any sprites that meet DC's standards enough (especially the newer releases, they were accepted and released by TJ for a reason) will ever be updated. Once people run out of old sprites to update, the people who like the updates might call for changes to be made to sprites that already meet DC standards, but the chances of those changes ever happening are slim to none (even with sprites as old as Black Teas or Electrics!). They meet the standards, and the standards are semi-realistic to realistic, which is a neutral, broadly-accepted art style; what's to change? Plus, people are lazy and the artists aren't being paid to contribute to the site, so nitpicky critiques with old sprites are likely to be ignored (i.e. the Electric's head is really big compared to the other dragons', the White is the only dragon with a prop in its sprite, etc.). So I wouldn't fear about this sprite-update trend taking off slowly over several years up to the point where releases that are new right now are suddenly being demanded to be changed. I can only see that happening if TJ suddenly changes the standards and the new dragons look completely out of place compared to the old, and that would mean making the sprites more cartoony, not less. DC's current trend is "make it as realistic as possible"; going more cartoony would be quite the 180 and half the site wouldn't take it seriously for a couple of days.

   As for the lore, I can see how the old sprites can tie into it, and how the newer sprites have a harder time of that; and technically, if you're drawing your dragons on your scroll for many years, then newer breeds you acquire would look nicer than the first (older) ones because you're increasing your drawing skill. At the same time though, wouldn't that mean, lore-wise, that the dragon-tamer can draw Reds really well - even better than newer breeds - if he collects them off-and-on for three years? There would be a noticeable artistic improvement even though it's the same dragon with the same pose and everything, so I question if the lore really matters that much when it comes to the spritework (as much as I love the lore ties). If we're going strictly with the lore, then DC would need a complete redesign where we physically draw our own dragons' portraits for the scroll using concept art given by the conceptor/artists as a reference, but that's a complex site mechanic that we don't want in DC. So even though I like lore ties, I don't see it being a problem when it comes to sprite updates.

   EDIT: Broke up my text wall a bit.

Edited October 6, 2018 by skwerl56767

[absofacto]

@skwerl56767 reading the last paragraph made me laugh drawing our own sounds fun

 

But yeah saying even the new sprites would need to be updated is ridiculous there is a definite point where updates are no longer needed.

 

and just overall for everything said, I really just want the dorsals redesigned the others dont bother me all that much

 

and I actually really do love the wave runners!! I wouldnt want them changed  other than minor tweaks. (and I sort of dont want the balloon dragon updated to current standards because it would probably look like fetish art I'm sorry)

 

Also assuming from Shiros words I think; they dont want absolutely anything to do with DC now. I have other thoughts on the matter but I would like to stay out of drama as much as I possibly can;;

 

Also it might be because I don't care about lineages but, why would a sprite change ruin a lineage? the pattern remains unchanged all that differs is the sprite :?

 

and why should your lineage, affect everyone elses experience of the site?

[Fuzzbucket]

There are several sprites I very much dislike. Some are new and presumably up to current standards. It isn't only about updating older stuff. It's basically all down to personal taste. I'm ok with the reds, but they weren't a minor change at all. I loathe one dragon released in 2018. That's life. I love my dorsals.

 

Full disclosure: I am 73 years old and don't look that great. But I'm me and no-one gets to update me. The End.

[RealWilliamShakespeare]

Why is it that new art has to be worked on painstakingly and meticulously, with every detail perfect, in order to even get considered for being in-cave, while old art can sit with blatant anatomical errors and non-existent shading? I don't understand how that's acceptable, quite honestly.

[Fuzzbucket]

Same reason that food hygiene regulations have got ultra tight. When I was a kid there were none. Times change. I could ask you how a dragon I find ugly and anatomically deeply wrong got through this very year. Horses for courses.

[Alrexwolf]

Ya, but a restaurant could never exist these days running on old (none) food safety practices. Usually, when a policy is updated, things have to change to meet it.

 

And unfortunately what is standard is up to TJ's - and in cave spriter's - discretion. Apparently there's nothing wrong, the artists and TJ picked a perfect sprite, we just can't use our eyes right and don't know what perspective is : ) 

 

I'm a little salt about that. But the sprite meets TJ's standards. Dorsal dragons don't meet the standard at all - there's not just one big flaw, there are many.

 

I guess it's like. A restaurant can still operate with a few DOH violations. But if they have enough they get shut down and have to change their ways. Certain newer sprites have 1-2 violations. Dorsal have like dozens of level J violations and that's the difference.

[osean]

I am neither for or against sprite updates and do not want to say anything negative about anyone’s work. If they get updated they get updated, if they don’t they don’t. There are dragon sprites that I like more then others but I consider that more my aesthetic then the sprites being good or not. 

[Moonlight_Eevee]

Comparing the sprites to Pokémon because Pokémon is one of the biggest sprite games around. You go around collecting monsters and as times changed, so did their sprite work. While other people prefer the new art, others prefer the old artwork. For instance, let's compare the old Furret shiny sprite from the original gen 2 to the one today. The old and original shiny sprite for a Furret, it was pink with brown stripes but they changed that and a lot of the original sprites (both regular and shiny) in gen 3 and that just killed me. For me, gen 2 had some of the best sprites and colouring around even it looks terrible to others. 

 

It's the same thing as Dragon Cave while there are no "shiny" dragons figuratively speaking, sometimes the old sprites are there because people like the old vibes they give of how far dragon cave has come. We shouldn't complain or whine about what needs updating (even though some of them actually do like the albino's neck and the white hatchies thigh) jmho

[RealWilliamShakespeare]

34 minutes ago, Dalek Raptor said:

Comparing the sprites to Pokémon because Pokémon is one of the biggest sprite games around. You go around collecting monsters and as times changed, so did their sprite work. While other people prefer the new art, others prefer the old artwork. For instance, let's compare the old Furret shiny sprite from the original gen 2 to the one today. The old and original shiny sprite for a Furret, it was pink with brown stripes but they changed that and a lot of the original sprites (both regular and shiny) in gen 3 and that just killed me. For me, gen 2 had some of the best sprites and colouring around even it looks terrible to others. 

 

It's the same thing as Dragon Cave while there are no "shiny" dragons figuratively speaking, sometimes the old sprites are there because people like the old vibes they give of how far dragon cave has come. We shouldn't complain or whine about what needs updating (even though some of them actually do like the albino's neck and the white hatchies thigh) jmho

 

While that is true, imagine if the Green sprite Mew was kept the same in comparison to its look in Sun and Moon. Wouldn’t be considered acceptable. The art standards have changed and should be upheld. Yes some people prefer the older sprites, but that doesn’t mean they should be kept through into the newer games. When the art standards change, the art should keep up. Besides, if you want to see how far the site has come, the old sprites will always be available to view on the Wiki.

[Alrexwolf]

It's too bad that the sprite locations/url change so much.

 

Because if they didnt, this wouldn't be an issue. People could just use css to see the old sprites if they loved them so much.

 

Also, I think Pokemon is a poor comparison because their sprite changes are mostly arbitrary - color changes/shifts, etc. No one wants the designs to change, just an anatomy update. No one is calling for things like Black Teas to get an update even though they're in the older style, because they're anatomically sound.