Loyalist Crossbowman Possibility

[melinath]

If this north-facing swordsman project is being considered for mainline, (is it?) perhaps it should be spliced off to contrib?

In terms of the idle animation: looks nice, but the part where his arm is behind his back looks awkward - like it's getting dislocated.

[thespaceinvader]

As I mentioned, you need to fix up the feet, which look flat and paper-thin (and a couple of other issues) before you animate him. And if you really want to do something useful, something like, for instance, improving the Swordsman's defence animation to two frames rather than one would be a good start - and making an idle for the north frame is much less of a priority than making an attack animation.

I commend your enthusiasm, but you maybe would have benefited from spending some more time lurking and seeing how things worked before you started

In order to make the idle work, you really need to think about the motion yourself - get out something that looks roughly like a sword, stand up, and practice to see how it works - you'll find the sword doesn't swing parallel to your body, but perpendicular to it - as in the current animation. You'll have to redraw the sword to foreshorten it in order to make the animation work. And work out how the wrists and elbows bend.

[Major]

Melinath: This thread was origionally in the contrib section but was moved.

thespaceinvader: Thanks. I will see what I can do to make his feet less flat and start working on an attack animation. Since I only have paint at the moment, is there a free GIF editing program I could download and use to animate the stuff I make?

[beetlenaut]

A lot of people around here, myself included, use GIMP. It can do almost anything that Photoshop can do, but it's free. The interface takes some getting used to, but try it for a while. A few things immediately useful for sprites are: Choose View->New View to create two views of the same sprite, and zoom in on one of them. Check "Hard Edge" in the eraser configurations below the toolbox. Use the pencil for drawing. Control click with the pencil to choose a color off the sprite.

To make an animated gif with GIMP, load each of your png images into a separate layer. (You do know BfW requires pngs with transparent backgrounds, right?) Save the combined picture as a gif, then choose "Save as animation", and hit "Export". In the next screen, use "replace" as the frame disposal method, then save. There is more you can do, but that should get you started.

[Major]

Thanks! GIMP sounds like exactly what I need. I shall download it and try to figure out how it works.

[Major]

How do you make the backround colour on GIMP white at 100% transparency?

[thespaceinvader]

You mean 100% opacity?

And do you mean the alpha background?

[fmunoz]

??????
No idea about what you are trying to ask.
Let's try a few tips (Keep in mind that my GIMP version is not in English so the menu names could be slightly different than my translation):

To have transparency in a single layer you need to have the alpha channel enabled in the layer (right click on the image, Layer, Transparency, Add alpha layer)

To make white stuff transparent select it and hit delete (or right click, Selection, Delete selection DEL)

To select all white pixels you select by colour (Selection, By colour, SHIFT + O)

To select a block of white pixels, use the magic wand on the tool pallete or SHIFT + U

If you have transparency and want to preserve it but put show white colour under it, add a new white layer under your image.

EXTRA TIP: Create the shadows add a transaprent layer under the image paint the shawod with the pencil in said layer. Then change its opacity to 60%.

[beetlenaut]

I think I know what you want. Choose Edit->Preferences->Display. The "Transparency" section is at the top right. In the "Check Style" drop down menu, choose white only.

[Major]

Thanks all of you I think I'm busy getting the hang of this.

EDIT : I made a WIP swordsman idle animation.

Swordsman North Idle Anim.gif (3.31 KiB) Viewed 2682 times

[thespaceinvader]

As previously mentioned, arms just don't bend that way. However, it's good to see you're getting the hang of putting anims together.

[Zerovirus]

Why does the sword go behind him? Looks like he'd break his wrist. The anim is good for a front view, but it looks very different irl if you view it from the back.

[Major]

I'll fix the sword and arm and mabe add a little head/torso animation.

EDIT : And here it is. I know its not perfect and the initial piece is weird and the legs look jerky but this it the improved version. Critique welcome.

Swordsman North Idle Anim 2.gif (8.44 KiB) Viewed 2650 times

EDIT 2 : Here is an improved version. I have improved the legs, fixrd the problem with the sword going backwards and given it a shadow.

Swordsman North Idle Anim 3.gif (9.93 KiB) Viewed 2642 times

[jdsampayo]

Whoa Major!

Your animation has become very cool in very little time!

I highly encourage you to work in south facing animations, cause north facing sprites/animations will not be used until all or much of the set is done.

Good work!

[Major]

Thanks.
I think I am adicted to this swordsman and I want to finish the north animations.
I'll do the attack and defense anims now.

EDIT : Here is the defense anim.

Swordsman North Defense Anim 3.gif (6.86 KiB) Viewed 2629 times