Samurai

[mpolo]

I'm working on a "visit to the East" campaign, and so am needing a lot of graphics.... Here is my first attempt at creating a 1st level Samurai character. Note that the look is almost completely stolen from a post on "Pixelation" by "Element man", but every pixel is my own. (That is, I followed his look and feel, but drew it myself. This is particularly obvious in the "action" shots.)

What do you think?

[Elvish_Pillager]

That guy is huge! Make him a bit smaller.

[freim]

The images looks far to large, but when I looked at image properties it said 72x72.

[Neoriceisgood]

Images can be to large but still fit inside 72 x 72, the problem is that the image is out of scale compared to other units; this guy while human competes in size with the biggest of drakes, trolls and the yeti. the best thing to do is have an unit of the same race next to the unit you want to make as example of the size it should be.

[mpolo]

Here's take two (or three if you count the one I was too embarassed to show...) What do you think? (Update: he loses a lot of weight when he picks up that bow... I'll have to add a pixel or two there at least.)

Level two will add some armor and a boring helmet and level three will have a cool samurai helmet -- I think there's already one somewhere in contributions that I can snag...

[Roel]

the one with the bow looks a bit odd, like his arm is to short or something, the others look fine

[charlieg]

Heads are too small. Make sure to get the proportions right.

[Aleksi]

'looks like the tribe that shrink heads and dries them...

[Neoriceisgood]

http://spellsandwhistles.net/archive.php?cid=000024

Or he's the minion of an evil overlord!

[torangan]

The defense position doesn't make any sense. I don't know what position you did intend, but it looks like no position one would use to defend with a katana.
Most likely positions would be above the head, tip lower then handle or an angled cut designed to deflect the blow of the enemy.
The attack position is better although the sword should be centered in the middle of the body or you should change the angle of the sword (keep the cutting edge where it is and move the backside to the left of the samurai).
About the bow: IIRC it should be held with one third of it below the hand and the string is drawn back much more for sure. If need be, I can ask people who train with the traditional bow of the Samurai tomorrow.

PS: I do train with a katana myself.

[mpolo]

Here are "bigger head" versions. I was actually trying to get the bow gripped on the low 1/3 end, but apparently not enough. I'll probably leave this "beginner" defending in his silly way and use better positions for the more advanced units.

[torangan]

It's been some time since I've seen the last demonstration of Kyudo, but I'd say that he's got to grip the bow still lower. On the other hand, it's too short anyway. If it's meant to be a japanese longbow, it must be ~2 meters tall.
For the sword positions - you can keep the attack position as a beginner move (although it's hard to cut anything that way) but the defense position is really silly. Anyone trying to defend in this way is probably no risk at all because he'll cut himself on attacking.

[turin]

instead of creating new images, i've found it is probably better to do an edit of a human unit like the spearman to get what you want. it will look much more 'wesnothish' that anything you can do on your own, at least until you get the hang of it.