2021-03-14 - Festival of Eggs Submissions

[Ashywolf]

8 hours ago, Seriva Senkalora said:

Just to make sure I understand this correctly:

Are we allowed to use the grey egg and the cracking sequence from this post as a base?

Or only the outlines?

 

 

You can use the grey egg, and the cracking sequence, if desired. Those are both default DC egg assets, and they are free to use by anyone for both Dragon Requests and Festival of Eggs art. So if you are not comfortable doing custom shading from nothing, go ahead and use that. Not sure what you mean about the cracking sequence though. Submissions for the event are just a single egg image, you aren't making all the cracking frames.

 

That is, unless you are planning to make an animation, as Eggy0 mentions below.

Edited March 19, 2021 by Ashywolf

[Eggy0]

1 hour ago, Ashywolf said:

 

Not sure what you mean about the cracking sequence though. Submissions for the event are just a single egg image, you aren't making all the cracking frames.

Think they meant if they could use it for the submission in some manner. I believe that's possible, if anything I distinctly remember there being some (animated) eggs that incorporated the egg cracking sequence. E.g. the one that hatches into a cell/DNA strand which starts evolving

[Spyridon]

This is proving tougher than I thought.

 

I have been using Adobe Photoshop 2021, the Pencil, Eraser (Anti Aliase off), Lasso, and Eyedropper tools.

 

Every night, I take the Eraser and run it along the edges. But when I go to download the PNG version into imgur, all these extra pixels appear in the preview. Yet when I click on the image, it looks clean.

 

Are there tricks I'm missing to ensure the clean edges?

 

Edit: I forgot to mention I used the symmetry option and transformation tool to ensured a mirrored shading and to ensure proportions respectively. Don't know if transforming the image down caused those things to appear.

Edited March 19, 2021 by Spyridon

[Seriva Senkalora]

@DragonLady86, @Ashywolf and @Eggy0

Thanks for the answers.

Edited March 19, 2021 by Seriva Senkalora

[Keileon]

1 hour ago, Spyridon said:

This is proving tougher than I thought.

 

I have been using Adobe Photoshop 2021, the Pencil, Eraser (Anti Aliase off), Lasso, and Eyedropper tools.

 

Every night, I take the Eraser and run it along the edges. But when I go to download the PNG version into imgur, all these extra pixels appear in the preview. Yet when I click on the image, it looks clean.

 

Are there tricks I'm missing to ensure the clean edges?

 

Edit: I forgot to mention I used the symmetry option and transformation tool to ensured a mirrored shading and to ensure proportions respectively. Don't know if transforming the image down caused those things to appear.

Transforming pixel art will usually cause anti-aliasing, yes, unless you find a way to set it to Nearest Neighbor (I have an older version of Photoshop which I believe does NOT have the option, but I don't know about yours).

[Spyridon]

26 minutes ago, Keileon said:

Transforming pixel art will usually cause anti-aliasing, yes, unless you find a way to set it to Nearest Neighbor (I have an older version of Photoshop which I believe does NOT have the option, but I don't know about yours).

 

I double checked and it is set to Nearest Neighbor so I'm not sure what else it could be. Thanks though for the confirmation. Something in google actually recommended the correct settings.

 

Edit: talk about desperation. I used the magic wand (anti-alias off) on the background, select inverse, cut out the image, and pasted onto a new layer. The new download actually shows the image clearly.

 

Edit: Well that download had a background that I don't want since it's just there to allow to see white against the transparent field. I noticed when I removed it, the anti-aliased edges came back.

Edited March 19, 2021 by Spyridon

[Lost_Unicorn]

@Spyridon Is there a particular reason why you decided to use Photoshop for that? It's unnecessary, and I mention that because you seem to be jumping through hoops to make it work. You could, for example, just use Paint instead (don't know how it works on Win10, but any older will do) without any jumping.

If you made sure your image is clean and PNG is saved clean - then it's clean. Imgur can add compression if you view it from mobile, etc.

[Kaini]

11 minutes ago, Lost_Unicorn said:

@Spyridon Is there a particular reason why you decided to use Photoshop for that? It's unnecessary, and I mention that because you seem to be jumping through hoops to make it work. You could, for example, just use Paint instead (don't know how it works on Win10, but any older will do) without any jumping.

If you made sure your image is clean and PNG is saved clean - then it's clean. Imgur can add compression if you view it from mobile, etc.

 

There's nothing wrong with using photoshop. I use photoshop for sprites, and they save just fine. And paint by itself isn't going to be sufficient, since you can't save transparency.

[Keileon]

2 hours ago, Spyridon said:

Edit: Well that download had a background that I don't want since it's just there to allow to see white against the transparent field. I noticed when I removed it, the anti-aliased edges came back.

Photoshop's magic wand anti-aliases by default, so make sure you turn that off too!

[Glaciarie]

If anyone is having trouble with the art program they picked, you guys can try piskel (https://www.piskelapp.com/) its free, no need to download, easy to make anymations, and better than using paint since it has layers and stuff

[Ashywolf]

@Spyridon If you need any specific advice on your egg, you're welcome to send it my way in a private message and I can tell you what's up.

 

I use Windows XP MSpaint for the sprite, and then aseprite for animating and dealing with transparency.

Edited March 20, 2021 by Ashywolf

[chariset]

My entry is in.  Eeeee...

 

I use Corel PaintShopPro and go pixel by pixel.  I sort of cut my teeth on Paint, so I'm not used to all the bells and whistles of a 'real' graphics editing program.

 

I was feeling lazy, so I just grabbed a regular egg sprite off DC, traced the outline onto another layer, and was off to the races.

[Keileon]

I do all my spritework these days in Paint Tool SAI. The newer version, SAI 2, has transparency options, and both versions come with a non-antialiased tool in the form of the Binary brush. It's simpler to work with than Photoshop, so if anyone has both programs and isn't sure what to use, I recommend SAI.

[wobster109]

@Ashywolf Can I PM you for egg advice too? Mine got sent back with feedback to use more contrast in the shading. I'm having trouble getting the shading nice while also having the colors be easy to see in both the bright and dark areas.

[Eggy0]

I personally use Pro Motion NG for any pixel art, haha. It's not a free program though, but it's well suited for pixel art and has many tools useful for that purpose. Although free programs like Paint.NET and GIMP should be sufficient enough as well - all that's really needed is a brush tool without AA, the ability to pick your colors, and transparency support. Tools like Pro Motion NG simply offer extra features specifically catered to pixel art. I'm pretty sure I once did spriting in Paint.NET in the far past

[Ashywolf]

Any software works provided you can turn off blending tools and automatic anti-aliasing. Pixel software works well since it typically lacks that functionality period, so it's difficult to go "wrong".

[egwenna]

Where do you host your art in order to submit? We were told that photobucket doesn't work and we're not sure what to use instead.

[Glaciarie]

1 hour ago, egwenna said:

Where do you host your art in order to submit? We were told that photobucket doesn't work and we're not sure what to use instead.

 

I used imgur for mine

[sh20000sh]

You can also use forum image uploader. Most secure option from revealing to public.

[Fuzzbucket]

Also safest in terms of not vanishing if the image hosting site goes down (like tinypic did...)

[Eggy0]

Another option that you could look into is Postimage. I typically use Imgur by default, although I've learned to use Postimage on a different website after reading somewhere that Imgur was blocked for one of the people hosting a collab art project. So far I've not had issues with this website, although my habits lie in using Imgur more lol.

[egwenna]

5 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

Also safest in terms of not vanishing if the image hosting site goes down (like tinypic did...)

 

Rennze was having trouble getting that to work. We'll have to try again.

[spatio]

 

This post may be helpful for those struggling with image hosting.

[Shokomon]

And sent! Let's see if this egg gets in this time around.

 

Also, I use MS Paint for sprite work. Then use Lunapic Online Image Editor for transparency. I can delete history which is good. 

 

I had another image editor I used that I really liked, but it died. 

[wobster109]

Just wondering, am I allowed to trace my own photos? I have never traced anything in the past, this is entirely for future reference. But let's say I want to sprite an apple for Halloween. Can I take my own, original photo, and trace that?