Animated Battler- Ralph (and Friends)

[charlesthehurst 691]

So, here's Ralph with a four frame Idle pose.

With two different sized gifs to show the animation. (Yes, totally aware the colors got messed up)

I'm trying to do some major animating practice.  Who knows, I might come up with some animated stuff for people to use.

Gifs in spoiler

 

 

OLD

 

NEW (Yes the gifs are crappy X_X)

 

 

EDIT: Some stills of Actor 1, 2 and 3.

 

 

Opinions, comments, want to see more of this?

Edited January 6, 2014 by charlesthehurst

[AJNR 156]

He looks like he's dancing more than he's battling but it's great nevertheless. Why did you add shading in the fourth frame all of a sudden, if I may ask? A lot of people would find it useful if animated battlers were created appropriately from the RTP (Looking at you, Yanfly's Animated Battlers). If you want to avoid animating the legs and feet, you could try "bouncing" the battler

 

 

 

 

Edited December 6, 2013 by AJNR

[charlesthehurst 691]

I tried the bouncing, but I wasn't too keen on it.  The frame rate on the gif doesn't help the dancing look either lol.

The shading on the last frame was caused by the gif (these things hate me)

[Cecillia 652]

For some reason, I agree. He looks like he's dancing maybe because of the way he is bobbing his head. Maybe try playing with the pixels of his head placement on the last frame to prevent a head bop. I like what you did with his arms though. You could try bouncing again, but he might look jello-like.

[Galv 1,387]

Maybe his arms should move differently to each other and a little less head bob. I think he looks like he's cheering for his team to win. Great movement, though!

[charlesthehurst 691]

Ralph, the tiny dancer lol.

 

I just tried to do a bouncing animation again.  I think he's too small for it to look okay.  It's too jittery for a sprite this small.

I've got an idea with him, so I'll update later on.

[AJNR 156]

Try starting with his head lurching down a pixel, he's not really going to stand up straight in battle. Try seperating the arms, body, head and legs into different layers so that they don't clash. But for all I know, you already know this stuff.

[Holder 333]

I don't think you need to do much more to it, I'd say you've got a lot of frames being used but that's about it. You don't need a capcom amount of detail going on.

I took it down to four frames and messed about a bit, tweaked when the right arm moved and generally faffed on:

Basically if you spend ages working on this idle pose, ask yourself if you're going to be able to put the same amount of time into each and every pose and battler thereafter. Just advice from experience, make it over complicated by slightly altering pixels here and there in each frame will make it a complicated process every time.

[Coolie 148]

He looks like he's doing curls with weights.

[Tsarmina 2,612]

I think the dancing effect is from the synchronized arm/head move lol. Like he's jutting his chin out and moving his arms at the same time so that might be it...also, his legs don't move at all so it's sort of like he's only alive from the waist up...

[charlesthehurst 691]

Okay, an update as promised.

[Galv 1,387]

I still think it looks like he's doing curls like Will said.

Here's just a couple-minute quick example editing your edits to see what I meant by different arm movement from each other:

 

 

(I think this guy still looks like he's doing curls hehe)

[Bunni89 85]

I really like both the new one and Galv's edit! But I was thinking.. it's not really that any of the animations are bad, it just depends on what kind of fighter he is. Like for example is he actually gonna have a weapon or just battle barehanded? If he's a fist fighter than the "doing curls" version might actually fit! It could be sort of like a taunt (CHECK OUT MAH BICEPS) or a sign that the character's impatient and started doing a bit of exercise because he's so hyped up to punch things!

But if he's meant to hold a sword and shield then Galv's pose edit would work better. Though that one actually looks strange to me as a barehanded pose. Less curls and more "everyone, look at my hand! I shall sniff it!" (no offense XD) I think I'm overanalyzing because everyone's drawn attention to the poses, I wouldn't think any of them looked awkward in an actual battle.

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Haha Bunni, I totally get what you mean XD

Galv's looks like he's doing the Egyptian Pharaoh arm movement dance ^-^ it it's very cute. But yeah, charles's still look like curls. It's definitely the way the hands move up at the end.

[OneCutStudio 353]

I still think it looks like he's doing curls like Will said.

Here's just a couple-minute quick example editing your edits to see what I meant by different arm movement from each other:

 

 

(I think this guy still looks like he's doing curls hehe)

It's almost as if he is playing an invisible violin. Hmm....I like it regardless.

[charlesthehurst 691]

@Galv

That does look like he's still curling lol  but now I get what you mean.

 

@Bunni

My hope is to create bases that I can reuse for attack animations.  Swinging, Thrusting, Bow, Gun and maybe Punches/Kicks.  So I want his Idle pose to be rather universal and generic.

 

@Tsarmina

So it's the hands going up that cause the curl effect?  Me thinks I'll have to change that.

[charlesthehurst 691]

Okay, so I took a break from animating to do some still sprites.  

[Tsarmina 2,612]

Me likey, Charles. ^-^ They all look slightly cropped off on the top of their heads--just a little bit, but--meh.

[charlesthehurst 691]

My OC, love him to death.  The cape look okay?

[Tsarmina 2,612]

The cape actually looks really good, especially if you don't lean in and stare right at it (which, sadly, is what I did haha). His hair is still cropped off on top (gah pixels are hard to work with) and his torso-to-foot armor/clothes sort of look like one large chunk. I'm not entirely sure what it's supposed to be.

[Bunni89 85]

Strange thing I noticed.. there's kinda like a white spot on his forehead. Is that supposed to be there? its like a dot of the light colour of his skin, randomly stuck in the bit where the shading from the hair should be coming down. Might actually look cool if you put a marking there but at the moment it looks like a mistake.

Also everyone's heads seem to be flat and square on the top o.O it's a bit too obvious that thats where the size limit tapers off, maybe try and create the illusion of roundness instead of just slicing off the bits that poke out. The Ralph sprite is good because his puffy hair seems to have a bit of a curve at the back.

[charlesthehurst 691]

That spot on his forehead is a mistake I forgot to fix XD

 

I hadn't really realized how obvious the flat heads are (specially the green hair dude)  Suppose I have to fix that.  

[Bunni89 85]

Its no biggie, it just becomes easy to notice when they're all together like that with the same head pattern...

[Neverward 210]

Those sprites are looking top notch, I especially like your OC he's cute! And yeah I'd say its the arms moving up and down that's making the 'curling' workout look for sure.

[charlesthehurst 691]

Actor 1 is all done, base wise.

 

I've decided to hold off on animating them till I get a proper grip on the base model.

I made some slight edits on the top of some of the heads to de-flatten them.  Did it work?