Kiwi's Bday: results

Well, this is the day. Let's see what i got shall we?

The entries:

• 1 - Colors by Ghost-Silver:
  This was a pretty big surprise, knowing so many artists the first submission i got was from someone i didn't know.
  
  I know I've been stressing "don't go pure green scheme if possible", but this actually looks cool, reminds me a LOT of the female Orc grunts in WoW, the ones in those lil remote villages. i think in this case the clothing colors helped me like this scheme more.
  
  
• 2 - Colors by Zach:I can't tell if he was serious about it, I'm not saying it's bad, but he made it rather quickly.
  
  The fact her skin is only 1 color is pretty bland, the blue used it pretty dark and unexpected, and i kinda find it interesting for it, but i think this would had worked better if she had a lighter secondary color.
  
  
• 3 - Colors by Jimmy:
  Jimmy has been involved into redesigning like 15 characters lately (shhh! itsa secret...) and he's been losing his sanity. The other day he told me "and i could swear the cat spoke to me", and i think he was serious.
  
  As for the colors, Jimmy just doesn't halfass it, he went straight for the evil look. It kinda feel like what Akuma would look like if he was an anthro female lizard. I gotta admit the dark eyes with a glowing iris is something i never even thought about, kinda cool but feels too evil i thinks.
  
  
• 4 - Colors by Undies:I had to pester him to try it, i really had... And u know what? i regret nothing. Because his take on Kiwi was much lighter than everyone else, and quite colorful in fact too.
  
  This was very light compared to all the other ones, the colors are a lot easier on the eyes. It has a mellow feel to it, maybe too mellow for Kiwi, but I totally could use this for other people of her species.
  
  
• 5 - Colors by Bittenhard:Only person to use the chibi version for the submission. Bitten wanted to go with an albino look, which sounded cool. Albino animals always look very beautiful and distinguish themselves a lot.
  
  That sounds pretty cool for Kiwi. Bitten was also the only person to use stripes on Kiwi, which is a cool idea as well. But overall it looks very very grey-ish, it lacks a lot of saturation and just doesnt look appealing the way it came out. It needed a tweak somehow.
  

The verdict?

Well, to b honest, i hoped for more entries and more colorful and diverse submissions. Although i'm not 100% happy with any of the entries, I have to say that even though Ghost silver did the most generic one, it's the one I'm linking the most right now.

Most of the other ones are just too monotone and seriously lack color saturation.

of this lil contest, Ghost-Silver wins, sorry everyone else. But I'm not quite satisfied with the look yet. i might make a color scheme based on all the aspects i liked.

Such as the dual colored skin that Ghost-Silver did and the colors for the clothing a lot too, am seriously considering the stripes Bitten did, I might use blue in her color scheme like Zach did, but mixed with another color like i mentioned before, might go with might lighter and colorful colors like Undies did, and am really gonna try the glowy eyes that jimmy did.

Thanks for all of your guys that took a shot at this, i got a ton of ideas for Kiwi now that i had never considered before.

WUT

The Unfinished Swan - Tech Demo 9/2008 from Ian Dallas on Vimeo.



This is an interesting idea that has no real good application yet, and as you can tell by the date, I am completely behind on everything videogame related.

"Top 10 Least-Played D&D Classes"

This is a rather hilarious 4 page article on IGN that Jimmy found a few days ago.


And yea, i think the necrophiliac is fucking win, just cause of the picture they used for him.

ENDOSCOPY ARE F***KING HORRIBLE!

MOST! PAINFUL! MEDICAL! EXAM! I'VE! EVER! BEEN! THROUGH!

it lasted 2 mins, and during that time, i was only able to breathe 5 secs! it was terrible, suffocating is so stressing... good lord... who the hell came up with this procedure!?

so yea, am alive... thank god...

Random update

I think the portuguese is whoring the blog a bit... so C-c-c-combo breaker!. How do you make a sickly Albino who happens to be a sorcerer, prince, and swordsman? I still do not know that answer, but this is my attempt.

Kiwi contest: update

So far I'm pretty pleased with the lil contest I'm having for kiwi's color scheme. I've had 4 entries so far and all of them look very distinct from each other.

Remember guys, I'm taking 2 entries per person. As for those who haven't tried, here's a lil research i did:

Pretty much any color that one can think of may be used by a reptile, some are plain, some have really weird and interesting patterns. dual colors seem to make them seem more intresting though.


Remember that reptiles have the particularity of standing out a lot in the wild when they're dangerous, the vibrant color being a warning for other creatures to keep away from them. with that said, don't go overkill on the vibrant part.

As for picking a color scheme for Kiwi, I'll do so based on a couple of factors, such as it has to look good (most important factor) and reflect her personality (antisocial and dangerous warrior chick with deep rooted hate for men). Also, there's 3 plans (2 Backups) to pick her color scheme:

• Plan A - There is a color scheme that fits and looks cool, and so that is that one i use, yay!
• Plan B - There bits of several color schemes that i like and i make one based on those, not a good plan.
• Plan C - I take all the submissions, and merge all of them into a single picture using soft type blending. (it's actually looking pretty cool so far.)

Preferably, i wanna go with plan A though.

Intresting Warcraft 3 variation

As some may know, i play (unofficial) Warcraft 3, i worked for the longest time on a map for it, and was getting pretty damn good at making what i wanted with it due to the engine being extremely versatile. So i like to keep my eye on the new stuff people still make for it.

I heard and seen footage of a cool project some time ago, it's not a map per say, but an engine mod that lets u play WC3 as a FPS. Back when i saw it, i was pretty good, but that was over a year ago, currently, it's fucking amazing.



That's a demo of their newest project, I'm especially impressed by it because it has the concept of floors and stairs working in it, something u couldn't really do in the game. The changes to the engine sure are extensive.

Bellow is a more traditional FPS like demo of the mod, it even supports melee combat.


This could lead to great and interesting stuff, mostly because the Warcraft 3 world editor is incredibly easy to use and very cool and interesting things could b created with this. i wouldn't think too much towards multiplayer shooting, although it does seem to have been implemented, but people making their own FPS/RPG games with their own stories and plots. Could Lead to cool Co-op games on LANs, etc...

You may want to check the other videos that youtube user has uploaded, features more of that mod and some of it is pretty cool.

7 days...

Maybe less now.

There's now 1 week til Kiwi's Bday. The "contest" still stands, u can use either of the pics i posted for it.

I'd just like to mention a couple of things about what I'd like to avoid in her color scheme:

• Complete green (either as a single color or as double tone), it's just too cliche. Green coupled with another color(s) is ok though.
  
• Complex/silly patterns. (patterns are ok, it might b cool, but nothing like zebra stripes)

That's about it.

a couple of u guys showed interest in trying out for this which is awesome. others just really don't want to try at all because of lack of confidence, you guys had nothing to lose or win, but i understand. The point of this is just to help me decided on colors for the character.

Late Bday sprite for Jimmy

Jimmy's Bday was last weekend, I'm still not even sure on which day, but i missed it. Although Jimmy doesn't mind when people forget and doesn't even care to celebrate the day, he's my oldest internet friend and prolly one of the reasons i'm still spriting and still love sprites nowdays.

I admit it's a simple and crude gift, but i wanted to do something.

Aw crap, i just realized i'll have to update his age on the side profile pic now... XD

Made with what now?

If you're an old fart like me, you saw sites that bragged about being fully made in notepad, that was back in 98 i think, there was a weird period of time where people, being leetist, posted lil buttons on their site about how they made it all in notepad.

Here's an update on those:

Sure sites nowadays can still b made that way, but why would u do it unless you have a job like mine where u have to code in the html with aspx?

Don't get me wrong, i do often use a text editor to make anything web based, but to brag about it is just fucking lame.

Kiwi's bday: Color contest.

My least known character, Kiwi, has her anniversary on the 28th, It'll be 3 years ago that Zach created her concept for me.

Kiwi's a warrior, a lieutenant to be precise, and Tof's greatest rival. She's an anthropomorphic snake lizard (snake lizards do actually exist btw). She comes from a country of warriors and was trained to be one from a very young age, so she has abysmal social skills.


That's her "Civilian" attire, in battle she would wear some armor over that. But that's besides the point right now, the point of this post it: Kiwi has never been colored, she doesn't have any color scheme yet.

So here's the thing, if anyone wants to help, get that picture i posted here and come up with a nice color scheme for Kiwi, the color of the clothes i don't care as much and there's no need to even shade it, i mostly need her "skin" color.

Once you've made a nice color theme for her, you can send it to me through aim (if u know my screen name), or mail it to me at tof.org@gmail.com. But please, at most, 2 pics per person.

There is no prize really though, but since a lot of people like to give their 2 cents when it comes to character designs and some of you people are really good at it, i thought I'd ask.

Crazy mugen project

So there's this very talented spriter I've seen on DA called Orkimides who has an account on YouTube where he displayed a trailer of the most awesome project i've seen like, ever.

This project it seems, involves Orkimides himself and Abysswolf (possibly aka Ahruon) who are making a mega mugen game with an incredible amount of character they seem to b spriting themselves. The characters come from TONS of games, way too many to list.

I believe this is the project's site, if u scrool down u can see a "playable characters?" section where u see some confirmed ones and possible ones. Also if u like their work check the cards section, there's SO many charaacters there.

So this project looks good, but it seem to play nice too, there's a couple of videos out, such as a Etna vs Crono gameplay video:


And u can always see a trailer with some of the other characters that will b in this:


This is a pretty amazing project and am really hoping to get to play this sometime. You can check for updates on the cards and their project here. If anyone is gonna keep on eye on it please let me know once they release new stuff.

Also, there's a really neat video here that's shows how Ahruon sprites, it's pretty informative!

Udon hates sprites or something - Darkstalkers

I would like to welcome all those coming from DeviantArt to our little blog, and now into the meat we go!

Darkstalkers:

Originally when I decided to add Mr. I-am-too-hot for you Vampire, I was going to have him be chased by all the midnight bliss female characters. Instead, for whatever reason I was thinking at the time, I opted for a naked version of him thinking it would be funny.



I like Bulleta (B.B. Hood). She's one of the more interesting character Capcom managed to create. She's so crazy I just love her, and the fact that she ejects landmines from underneath her dress equates to funtimes.




Lin Lin (Mei-Ling) is one of my favorite minor characters, and as such I have always wanted to sprite her. Being the paper portion to Lei Lei (Hsien-Ko) she often times gets overlooked. Being my first choice for the collab I wanted to get her sprite correct and dynamic. The first one that I had thought up was a flying one, but it was to difficult to see what is going on so I went back to square one. After some critiques and revisions, it is the final product you see.


Anita was originally suppose to have a shatter effect with some pixels falling out of place, but I felt it did not worked correctly enough with the glowing Donovan sprite, so instead a photoshopped glow (added in by Kiwi) was placed in for the final piece to complete cohesion of the piece.



It is very difficult to actually do anything remotely funny with Jedah. He's just too damn serious and as such I had to resort to a very cartoony sprite to make it match with the Capcom humor going on with the rest of the pieces. One thing you find early on about spriting is that you have to get pretty clever with pixels to achieve emotions and so it is pretty common for me to adust it from the original sketch!





Thinking I had done enough a very last second sprite was requested by the original spriter due to problems with the their internet. I really did not want to make the entire Phobos (Huitzil) and instead wanted to make him into a copter thing, because in one of his intros he comes in as a car for that homeless kid...yea.


It's a bird, it's a plane, oh wait it's just Pyron. He was a backup just in case the other person could not finish. His sprite was perhaps the easiest of the bunch seeing as he is just a burning fireball entering the atmosphere.

DeviantArt links:
Demitri
Anita
Bulleta
Phobos
Jedah
Lin Lin
Pyron

Neat Pixels.

Got linked to this guy on pixel joint, the cool thing is that this dude made a demo of his game. The sprite style of it is pretty damn awesome.

Clicky pic to get to his site

Seems to b a WIP, but the gameplay isn't bad, this could become a really good game.

Boredom + Anxiety + Nervousness.

I'm a literal wreck.

I went to the doctor last Thursday and he says i need to perform a bunch of medical exams because what's wrong with my health isn't normal, i have a possible ulcer or worse. So I've been doing blood and urine exams, and on the 25th i have to do an endoscopy, which quite frankly, scares the shit out of me.

If you're not familiar with the procedure, there's 2 kinds, the upper and lower kind, I'm doing the upper one which involves a doctor sticking in a tube with a camera at the end of it down my throat and into my stomach. They spray your mouth with an anesthetic so u don't feel too much, but it still sparks the gag reflex on most people and i hear people do vomit like 85% of the time.

It's a very unpleasant medical exam, but that's not the worse part, the worse part is that my internship ends in less than a month. I'll have to finish the modules I've been given to develop, the report for the internship (which will easily take a week) and do the presentation.

All of this stuff will happen within the next 30 days, so, I'm nervous, and scared really. I don't see how the hell i'm gonna get everything done in time. But to be honest, my health worries me more than the internship right now.

Well, anyway, i made these earlier. Might tweak them eventually:

Name tags 2: the vengeance.

Jimmy inspired me to give it a shot.

They are kinda fun to make, but damn, it's hard to come up with the concept.

I am not dead.

Hi everyone I am just popping in to announced that I am still alive; I have something in store for everyone (K-T0F already knows what is coming) that should be a . . . surprise for those of you who do not know me.

Flash nonsense!

Clicky pic:


And from pure boredom it was born. You may need to refresh to get it to sync up.

sketches by Zach.

The way of the shameless pizza.

Fellow artist and friend PizzaCat has opened his own blog on Blogspot.

Click for yummi proxy pics

Thought I'd give him a tiny bit of advertising, his blog will prolly b used to post art and stuff related to his character proxy, so it's prolly a good idea to keep an eye on it.

Mr. Bastard: Hell's Army 2

When I thought about the Rook, I knew I wanted it to be defensively oriented. The first few versions I ever did were essentially meant to be "tanks". They were mostly composed of stone bricks to get that castle feel. I eventually strayed from it and layered their arms with literal castle walls, a sort of idea I had previously where a character with large shields on his arms would slam them together to defend themselves. Originally the Rook was just pictured doing this to protect itself and just stall for time. I eventually pulled the barrier technique I mention at the posts at the art websites I frequent out of my ass.

The lock that adorns the Rook's collar was inspired by something I saw in my head one day. I think it was after playing lots of Metal Slug. Anyways, I stuck this lock on them, and it was destroyed, and in a delayed, but quick smoky display, the Rook's defenses fell off of it into a crumbled heap around it's feet. It then proceeded to actually notice and react to it's plight in a comical way, where it grasps it's now naked body and fears for it's life. It had the nice side effect of providing the weakness it needed, and I really, really liked how it worked without making the tone too serious. It's something I like to avoid.

100th post!

Quite surprisingly, i noticed this blog already had 99 posts in it's short "life". Sure we don't post every single day, and yea it's not always ubber interesting, but we 3 combined actually managed to do some decent bloggin.

Although we all hoped people would bother commenting and lettin us know what they think right here on the blog, and they haven't, it's been ok.

So enjoy Zach and myself punching each other.


As a tiny note, i found this site that u can use to make icons using 1 picture, u can even make multiple formats of it and preserves transparency if u got any. I found it to be really handy and practical.