User blog:Sunder4321/Sprites: The Beauty of Concepts Part 1

So this isn't really a tutorial, more of a way I do some sprites, but you can count it as a tutorial if you want. Hoping this isn't another one of those boring blog posts.

Concept Art. It isn't really the first thing people think of if their making sprites. But, Concept Art is where it all starts. Playdom started using Concept Art for their heroes to style their sprites, whether its the design or the position.

You might or might not have noticed my new Spec Op going on in here, so I'd like to show you the process of how I'll be making the sprite of my Spec Op's Reward Hero, Echo. You probably don't know who the heck that is, so go to her wiki page to know more info. I'll be using Concept Art (obviously, its the main reason for this whole blog post) to make her sprite base.

Step 1: Design
The first step is to find some pics online. Usually the character may have had a few costume changes over the years, so I'll just be picking one or two. After I find the costumes I like, I'll use that as a reference for my sketch.



I actually used two costumes to construct her look, her modern attire and her New Avengers costume, and meshed them together to have this design (the sketch is a little bad, I know). Now that we have the costume we'll use, let's go to the next step.

Step 2: Poses
We're going to decide on the pose for the character. It was a challenge getting the right proportions and to show who the character is through the pose. I had to do a lot of idle poses to get what I wanted.



I ended up choosing 3 positions that I like. I took some inspiration from actual M:AA sprites (The 1st is one from Elektra) so that I get the right placements and sizes. The 3rd option seems to me the most natural out of all of them. My last choice was the 3rd position. Although I like the 1st and 2nd one, they aren't what the character is.

Step 3: Shading and Proportions
Now that I got the costume design and the position I want, I'll be doing the actual base for the sprite. I'll trace over the 3rd position and change up some off-proportioned parts of the body. The next thing I do is look through some M:AA sprites to know the shading and the lighting on the sprite (for more of shading, go here).



I added some more details into it like the ripped pants and the face print on her face. I also made a larger head next to it so that when I scan it on the computer, I'll get a better look at each detail. The base isn't perfect, but hey, it's just the base. Anything else can change when I convert it to sprite form.

So that's it for this blog post. Stay tuned for Part 2 where I'll show the finished sprite!