Tsarmina's Laboratory

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Oh, thank you! The CG screens took sooo long but I'm glad that people like them They seem to be really popular. I guess it's the semi-realism ^-^ And thanks for commenting on the sprites! (They don't usually get much attention  ) Yeah, they're not exactly stellar. Apple, strawberry...it all works.

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Stuff for May's AWESOME futuristic/modern ReStaff Release:

Watercolor Scifi cockpit

 

Cool color themes as usual, because I love me some cool color themes. 

[Tsarmina 2,612]

It's been a while since I last actually created something. The Restaff update content itself was actually made in early May, and the last thing I did was a request on the 25/6ish. So, it's been five or six days since I actually got real stuff done for you guys! Call me a procrastinator. I know.

 

HOWEVER, that streak is being broken! I spent a huge amount of time today creating tiles, especially after I saw all the great tilesets in the weekly Humble Bundle--I was totally inspired. (Thanks much also to Euphie for giving me inspiration for my first set today!)

 

Ahem, as follows.

 

--

A dashing set of Gothic and black tiles--a full interior house including 2 couches, 2 beds, 4 tables, 2 cabinets, 1 mirror, and 2 looping A5 tiles. WHEW! Is that enough for you guys? Thanks to Autodesk for furniture ideas and reference once again!

 

BUT WAIT, there's more!

---

 

My first official self-created Exterior Plants tiles, including 2 trees, 3 bushes, and 1 sprouting seedling. Perfect for more realism-styled games--they aren't exactly RTP, I know ;_;

 

...And that's today's content! Tons of fun stuff for all of you, interior AND exterior, and I will be back fairly soon with a portrait, I expect :3

[Tsarmina 2,612]

I'm back with the promised portrait. It's a remake of the RTP Actor Mira!

 VS 

Tsarie remake of portrait                             VS          RTP version (I don't know who made the full portrait, but it wasn't me)

 

Enjoy! I hope to make more of these soon, because I realize my portraits don't match RTP and anyone who uses RTP faces/chars can't really use my portrait work. Like it, or rather not?

[Euphoria 147]

I like it!

[brickbusterx 5]

Welllllll done those look great!

Keep up the good work.

*sorry if I make you procrastinate.. I'll keep speech to a minimum*

[Tsarmina 2,612]

I like it!

Yay! Then I will definitely keep working on some more RTP Actors :3 I just wonder when I'll get around to doing the guys....

 

 

Welllllll done those look great!

Keep up the good work.

*sorry if I make you procrastinate.. I'll keep speech to a minimum*

Hooray! I'm getting better at making tiles so hopefully...hopefully I can make more, faster.  

Also, a little procrastination every once in a while never hurt anyone, riiiight?

[Euphoria 147]

I haven't seen you do many guys I don't think

[Tsarmina 2,612]

That's too true. Across my approximately 112 portraits....I have done exactly 1 guy.

 

I really need to try them more. ^^

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Hello-lo people! I bought Humble Bundle a couple days ago, and discovered Game Character Hub. It's not exactly my thing--I tried it out and I think I may prefer my good old Photoshop way better--but it did give me some inspiration. As you may know (or maybe not), I create all of my portraits 100% from scratch--no bases (except when I first started), no templates, no color swatches, outlines, nada. And while I do love this method, it takes...a long time. Like a REALLY long time. :\ (Now gear yourself up, because this is going to be a LOOONG post.)

 

Sooo, I decided to make my own generator. I have always considered the facegens of the RPGVXA system to be some sort of abomination and crime against aesthetics. ^^" Just my own humble opinion--and another thing I noticed was that generators tend to spin out characters that look too similar mostly because they have the same poses or big features. Small detail changes as well are big changes can totally change a portrait. 

 

Take Archeia's Emily from Porcupine Prin (all rights to her and EB! So NO, you cannot use these from me!!))

Dem eyelashes~

Now compare with the Emily (err...cover hero) she put in Division Heaven's material stuffs.

ALMOST the same person. Not quite.

Emily and....the other Emily...look almost the same. And they're pretty much the same person physically (both of them represent the cover hero cleric girl >>)

But wow! Their faces look pretty different! Of course, Nessiah (bless you!) didn't just edit the face to make Emily or vice versa--there are some small differences in hair/pose/etc; but it's definitely the eyes that makes Emily look different from her almost-twin.

----

Another example. Sorry I'm using so many examples from you, Archeia. 

Ernest (default Actor 4) vs Sairen (PrinPrin Ep. 1.5)

 VS 

Ernest                         vs                       Sairen             

 

Granted, the age gap should be accounted for, but Ernest and Sairen look pretty similar in terms of clothing and hair, at least. (They use the same sprite.) But first and foremost, their faces are very different (, and it's obvious who's more gorgeous.) 

 

Last example for now, also from Porcupine Princess. Syrn. 

 vs  

Syrn Material Version (cover hero)                      vs           Syrn Porcupine Princess Version (better looking )

Besides the obvious hair differences (and don't mind the sizing), they're pretty similar. Dressed almost identically, and aside from what you might think, upon closer inspection their hair is quite similar.

I think I've made my point. Facial features are important in distinguishing different characters.

 

Rights to all the lovely portraits above go to Archeia, EB, and anyone else who contributed in making these.

 

So, after thrusting all that lovely eye candy that ISN'T by me at you to compare, give your eyes a rub, and keep on reading. So obviously facial differences are important. But pose difference and angle difference are important too. Take a look at these random facegens.

Rights to Liberty~

 

Since the VXA face generator only generates frontal faces, there's not much room for angle/pose deviation. In the end, they all kind of start looking the same, despite the array of facial feature differentiation that they have. 

Now, if you REALLY wanted differentiation, some people use portraits/faces from a variety of artists. But consistency is always the key for graphics in games, and this usually isn't wise unless styles are very similar (ex Archeia matches really well will RTP. <3)

 

So now that I have this whole hullabaloo out of the way, what does this have to do with MY new generator? I'm glad you asked! Welcome to my new generator project, TsarGen.

My messy, hurriedly created logo. I love cyan glows. <3

(Note: TsarGen so far is planned to only generate females...since that's my chosen preference.)

 

Things that will hopefully make my portrait generator not look repetitive include:

• 4 different angles for the head: 3/4 facing left, 3/4 facing right, 1/1 frontal, and 2/2 profile (<<this last one should make Spectre happy)
• 5 different angles/positions for torso (which will blend seamlessly with all head/neck variations): equal shoulders, tilted left, tilted right, raised shoulders, crossed arms, spread arms
• 4+ eye shapes: round, arched, narrow, doe-eyed
• 5+ eye/iris/pupil designs (this is important!): split shade, gradient, starry/glassy, ripple, large pupil
• 5+ lash differentiations: wide-spaced, full, cat eye, flat, low
• 5+ ear positions/type: E-shaped round, angular edge, long, tall pointed, frontal view
• 9+ mouth positions: neutral closed, wide smile, small open, side-view open, side smile, closed smile, neutral open, sad open, cocky grin
• As well as numerous hairstyles, accessories, piercings, face decorations, and clothes

Here's a grainy written-with-images picture if you don't get all those weird terms in the bullet list.

 

I hope with so many pose, angle, and facial differentiations, that this can make a generator successfully pretend to be unrepetitive. Sadly, I have no scripting language, so TsarGen will not be an actual program that you can download and make your own portraits....since I'll be doing all the piecing things and stitching people in good ol' Photoshop. It won't be easy, but I hope to get it done.

 

Each TsarGen portrait will, of course, be done in Tsarmina style because I'm the one developing/drawing them. They should blend in just fine with my hand-drawn scratch portraits. Most TsarGens won't have emosets I'm guessing, but maybe a couple of some of them. It all depends on the success of my generator "program."

 

As for if I'll continue to make make 100% created-from scratch portraits, the answer is Duh Yes. But for NPCs, random people who just need a picture or two--this should do the trick. Hopefully I can make TsarGen have the same generator pieces that would match the Ace generator sprites, therefore letting you use Acegen sprites but TsarGen portraits to go along with them. I suspect this project is not going to be completely foolproof, and I may have to do some editing before I release portraits in case of small artistic discrepancies (Your head's skin tone doesn't match with your shoulder's!), but ultimately, I'm hoping to start generating portraits soon. As for if my pose/position/angle/facial theory will indeed make TsarGen a totally different generator that gives the illusion of non-repetition....only time will tell. ^-^

 

--

Portraits made with TsarGen will probably have the little TG symbol next to them:  It's the same size as an emoticon~

 

Have a great day and I will be developing TsarGen from today on!

 

Special thanks to:

Archeia @Division Heaven: letting me use her portraits and PrinPrin/PorcPrin/handmade work for comparison purposes

Liberty: face generator examples belong to her and EB

[+ Archeia 160]

Hey Tsarmina, I would like to wish you luck on creating a 3/4 bust generator! I tried it myself and there are some things that I wanted to share in case you haven't delved too deep into it yet.

1. Separating shoulders+arms+hands+ to separate layer (for both right and left) will help you so much! Any pose would be virtually possible
2. Try making the chest/body as the solid base but make the neck flexible too so you can make them tilt their heads.
3. Separate the back hair and the bangs, it will save so much time

Other than that, I found myself stopping when I finally reached the whole, redraw props for different proportions. It's a huge undertaking but I think you'll do great

[brickbusterx 5]

What a nice novel I read!.... Oh wait .. That was just a post

Coooooool this sounds like a nice idea! Especially with your own artwork it'll be a nice change from all the default stuff people use.

I really like your different features, angles, small details that can makes a worlds of a difference.

Good luck with it! You'll do awesome.

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Hey Tsarmina, I would like to wish you luck on creating a 3/4 bust generator! I tried it myself and there are some things that I wanted to share in case you haven't delved too deep into it yet.

1. Separating shoulders+arms+hands+ to separate layer (for both right and left) will help you so much! Any pose would be virtually possible
2. Try making the chest/body as the solid base but make the neck flexible too so you can make them tilt their heads.
3. Separate the back hair and the bangs, it will save so much time

Other than that, I found myself stopping when I finally reached the whole, redraw props for different proportions. It's a huge undertaking but I think you'll do great

Thanks Archeia! This will definitely aid me enormously in working with this project. I never thought about separating arms and hands. Now that you mention it, that'll be even better than what I have so far Neck is a good idea too. I was definitely thinking about the back hair and bangs. This is going to end up with like 6 billion different combinations with all the ideas you've given me  But thank you! They will sure help a lot :3 Thank you for supporting me in this endeavour. 

 

 

What a nice novel I read!.... Oh wait .. That was just a post

Coooooool this sounds like a nice idea! Especially with your own artwork it'll be a nice change from all the default stuff people use.

I really like your different features, angles, small details that can makes a worlds of a difference.

Good luck with it! You'll do awesome.

Ehehehe yeah ^^" Maybe I went overboard with the text. Thanks for the support! Yeah, I figured default stuff is great, but I have my own style too I do hope it'll be a lot of difference. I'd hate to turn out like the facegens. *dies*

[Euphoria 147]

You'll be 1000000000x better than the face gens, I'm sure!

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Hehe, thanks for the vote of confidence <3 1,000,000,000  is a pretty big number! I sure hope it works out

[Tsarmina 2,612]

New portrait, new portrait, new portrait! Say hello to Diana.

Base. I hope you guys appreciate her, because I drew her all in one day--and then the Painter file got corrupted. So I had to start her all over, from scratch. And don't get me started on backups! Because guess what? The backups were corrupted too! *mind blown* So yeah, I redrew her in an hour or two. Hello, Asian hair Diana is also part of my Ariel series, yes she's Asian. Her name is Li-YIng "Diana" Yang (洋丽滢) which means "pretty" and "clear." Her last name means "sea."

 

And by the way, she is NOT made using TsarGen in case you all were wondering. Still a 100% scratch portrait!

[When Bugs Roam Ur House 656]

That's too true. Across my approximately 112 portraits....I have done exactly 1 guy.

 

I really need to try them more. ^^

O wow. : O

 

You know, it really is just preference, but i think if you drew more guys, you would prolly like it more.

 

I know i used to draw girls all the time. I really used to not like drawing males. Same with backgrounds; now i like doing both.

 

 

Imho.... what motivated me was having an epiphany-- realizing that there are rarely any famous artists that draw one gender.

That, and i realized i didn't want to stay forever held back from drawing certain things, just because i was uncomfortable or refused to practise. I was in denial about the things i didn't like, and tried to avoid situations that frustrated me; I held too much blinded pride from being "the good artist" as a kid and didn't like threatening that.

 

I'm sure you've seen how much you've improved when comparing how you used to draw girls a few years back. Now imagine if you could do that for guys. : )

 

 

Again, it is your choice. But maybe these are some thoughts that will leave you thinking. 

[Tsarmina 2,612]

I figure that that'll work out. The problem is, I always have so many girl linearts and whatnot ._. When I start a portrait, I don't even think about what gender I'm going to draw. Pooey. Must change my ways Your little anecdote helped me a lot. I'm always worried about how well my drawings will turn out and I could never get guys down. (They always end up looking kind of girly, hmmm.) I'm definitely going to try some more, and this is really motivating. I appreciate your encouragement and mini-lecture!

[Tsarmina 2,612]

And I guess I must be getting back into my rhythm. New portrait for today, too! Or maybe I'm just releasing as much as I can to give to you guys before I leave. ;_; (Not permanently, of course! I would never do that!) I'm leaving June 17-end of July on a loooong trip with barely any Internet connection, and I'm not bringing my tablet, so....yeah. I will not be here. Requests will be postponed, resources of all kinds will be postponed, and my moderating will be postponed. Don't expect to see anything coming during that time, as much as I would love to stay here and draw for y'all. *sadness*

 

Anyway, back into the rhythm. The new portrait is Reyna, who sports an incredible side ponytail if I do say so myself :3 Side ponytail in question was inspired when I saw Serah Farron from Final Fantasy. Though I've never played the games myself, I happened to find a picture and decided long wavy side ponytails were officially cool. ^-^

A little background for Reyna; she has a (fraternal) twin named Eunice, she's part of the Ariel series, she has a smart mouth and a sassy attitude....basically our quintessential cool girl. ^^ I may update her ponytail...could use some extra strands....but for now she's staying as is. Hand-drawn, TsarGen has not advanced to this point yet. ^^" Enjoy!

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Here's a title/screen that I did for a contest yesterday, just to whip something up. (I could use the practice!) I was obviously working more on the title than the actual screen, as you can tell. Dunno if anyone can actually use this but feel free It's not for a game I'm making. I think I would love to do more fruit ones! This was too much fun <3

[Darkwes 36]

Now I can finally make my game about oranges... oh, wait xD

 

looks nice anyway

[Tsarmina 2,612]

An oranges game! What has the world come to? Tankya, though! Appreciate all the nice words.

[brickbusterx 5]

Wow I love how both those portrait hair! They look so life like, very well done.

Also that title card... so fruity it's craaaaazy! Made me want to grab an orange immediately after seeing it.

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Tankyaa! I've been trying to move toward less bright highlights, but I think it only works on certain hair ^^ I don't think it would work on light hair so well, so I guess it all depends on circumstances! Diana's is working for me, though.

 

I love fruit! I think I might do a kiwi one. :3 Or a strawberry one. Or maybe even a coconut one or something! ^^ Have an orange or a clementine! They're 30% off.

[Cait 385]

o.o You're making me wish I had fruit.... I like your fruit word & I think your backgrounds look really nice.  Something I wish I had more talent in.