How do you shade units?

[Flameslash]

Honestly, I can't work it out. I know the light comes from the southeast, but I can't get my shading to look anywhere near how it should. Any advice?

[Vyncyn]

I did a quick redraw with the basics for better analization

icantshade.png (999 Bytes) Viewed 3260 times

-Light comes mostly from upper right corner, though you can choose a different lightsource (The next points are based on a north-east lightsource)
-A darker outline often helps. It shouldn't be completely black and can be brighter where light shines on.
-The shape is very important for shading. For example the arms are round and the light shines from north east -> right arm is brighter on the top right, left arm is directed "away" from the lightsource so the light spreads more evenly. The surface of the armor facing south (or south east) so its brighter in the middle and a bit to the left
-Darker lines can help to indicate knee and elbow or the structures (muscles) on the breastplate (as you already did).

[taptap]

Why does the light come from the southeast? The sun/sky should be above the unit, so E, NE, N, NW, W could be eligible, but since you flip unit directions in Wesnoth I would avoid too pronounced light from the side as well, leaving NE, N, NW directions, NE seems to be by far the most common choice.

[Wussel]

Sun is allway in the south;)

We would have light on the units. Looking into the light sucks.

They do not like pillow shading. Which means light straight from the south. I never understood the reason for this, since they flip the units.

Basically by applying se you get sw for flipped units. Nobody ever noticed that one the screen. Kind of silly?

How to do it? Parts not facing the light should be darker. Highlights as reflection should be small.

[beetlenaut]

Sun is allway in the south;)

Only if you are north of the Tropic of Cancer! In the game, sunlight comes in from the top of the screen, and south is at the bottom, so, no.

They do not like pillow shading. Which means light straight from the south.

No, pillow shading is making the center of objects bright, and the edges dark. They don't like it because it's impossible under normal circumstances; you could only see that if your eyes were the light source.

Basically by applying se you get sw for flipped units. Nobody ever noticed that one the screen.

That's why you should avoid strong right or left light sources, but you're right that it's not really noticeable in the game.

Highlights as reflection should be small.

That's true if you are talking about shiny metal. (Specular reflection.) Reflected highlights should be large for other materials.

[doofus-01]

No, pillow shading is making the center of objects bright, and the edges dark. They don't like it because it's impossible under normal circumstances; you could only see that if your eyes were the light source.

I can't find the link now, I just seem to find a lot of garbage when I search, but I think the "pillow-shading" explanations that float around are either wrong or unclear. The term "pillow-shading" would be strange choice of words, if it were describing lighting that resembled light coming from the viewer (and what would be so wrong with that anyway, aside from being boring). It makes more sense if you consider it as making things light in the center and dark near the borders, even the internal borders, so that it looks like a bunch of pillows shoved together, or like something stitched into a puffy quilt. This is a quick (and admittedly sloppy) example, pillow on the right.

pillow.jpg (6.32 KiB) Viewed 3104 times

The "shading" does nothing to make a cylinder that the pattern of the border wasn't already doing, if anything, makes it less of a cylinder.