New Dire-Wolf image?

[Creative Mechanism]

Hi,

I'm still learning quite a bit about creating unit images. I'm not learning enough about how to make animated GIFs (so that the images retain their transparency etc).

Here are the images I've come up with so far for the various required animations.

(I know the goblin seems small, but given the size of the wolf [larger than a horse] and the size of a goblin, I opted to draw it pretty small. I'm not at all sure I like it. Please let me know what you think.)

[Creative Mechanism]

Here are the clawing attacks

[Creative Mechanism]

Here are the images for the biting attacks

I'm trying to make it look like the goblin is sliding forward. Not very convincing yet, I know. Just keep it simple?

[Creative Mechanism]

defenses for melee, ranged and, eventually, death.

I mean the wolf to duck and look back up in the ranged defense. Right now the wolf looks like it's turning into a porpoise. Porpoise transformation, it turns out, is not such a great defense.

[Creative Mechanism]

I apologize if this is redundant.

[Creative Mechanism]

And finally, I'm only going to give you three of my running animations right now. I suppose it's a choice between running and walking, and I'm inclined toward the walking animations. Please let me know what you think, though. I haven't placed the goblin or shadow on these yet because I'm not sure if I like them.

[Creative Mechanism]

I almost forgot: I'm very concerned about the eventual style of the graphics. It's easy enough to add outlines or paint them up in GIMP, but when I do that I lose a lot of detail (especially around the ears). Even when I do that, they may not match the Wesnoth style quite enough. If I had to I could redraw these images based on the pictures already existing in the game. This would take a lot more time...but it might be worth it and even necessary.

Please let me know what you think. I'm only going to post one of the outlined drawings I've done to give you an idea of the detail lost and how close outlining gets the wolves to the Wesnoth style. If I'm posting too much stuff or would be more helpful working on something else, let me know. I'm very excited about the game and being able to do something for it.

Thanks,
Matt

[Eleazar]

The movement is very fluid.
We haven't so far used 3D graphics in Wesnoth, and we're certainly not going for a 3D look. However a problem with graphics created in 2D is that complex motions are difficult.
If you could model in a more exagerated style (bigger feet, head, eyes ears) and do some toon rendering, we might have something. We need graphics that are more consistant with the rest of what's been completed, maybe with the right toon rendering and a little post-rendering touchup it would work...

[Creative Mechanism]

I absolutely understand and agree. I didn't mean to suggest using these images, but that I would use them as a base for more Wesnoth consistant images. My last post (with outlines) isn't very well done, but is an example of what I'm thinking. Based on it, could you suggest what changes I should make in the style?

[Jetrel]

Wow, someone knows their 3d... If you're willing to work at this, this could be a very useful contribution right here...


Make the goblin just a bit bigger, and try and see if you can more clearly define the outlines relative to the interior. In fact, make the wolf a good deal bigger as well - probably about 20-30%. Another change to make would be to spread the ears of the wolf apart much more than they are now.

Post the results of that, for the last animation you had posted, and we'll work from there.

[Darth Fool]

Make the goblin just a bit bigger, and try and see if you can more clearly define the outlines relative to the interior. In fact, make the wolf a good deal bigger as well - probably about 20-30%.

Goblin bigger, perhaps, as that would fit the wesnoth goblin size, but I don't think that the wolf needs to be bigger. FCB!

[entropomorphic]

What program are you using for the 3D animation? If it's something free like Blender, perhaps someone can put together a tutorial for rendering wesnoth-style sprites with it and maybe Gimp for touch-up... It could certainly make the art and animations a great deal more maintainable...

[Creative Mechanism]

Here is an example of the wolf with the suggestions.

I've made the wolf as big as I can for the walking image. At this size, though, some of the other animations will have to be changed in order to keep the wolf completely within the frame.

Thanks again for all of your help, and let me know how I should progress. I am eager to do the rest of them.

Also: yes, I'm using blender and, unfortunately, flash to put these animations together. You could probably do the whole thing in blender and GIMP. Depending on whether or not this works and if there are other people who are interested in using this technique, I'd be happy to help other people use the program.

[Creative Mechanism]

just as a warning: I think a tutorial on how to make Wesnoth style images from blender would be do-able. The modeling and animation that goes into creating a model in blender, I think, would be a little too much for a Wesnoth tutorial. The skeleton creation and rigging alone would take pages and pages of text.

That being said, it would be unusual if I was not surprised and proven wrong by the creativity and skill of the open source community.

[Darth Fool]

This technique showes a lot of promise. Here are a few critiques:

-The wolf is much too long.
-The goblin should be riding higher.
-The snout of the wolf looks more like a pug or a hound than a wolf.
-The shadow of the head is too thin.

I think that a tutorial on how to make wesnoth-compatible graphics from a blender model would be a great thing to have. Even though I don't think we have many blender modeler's currently here, it might encourage a whole new set of 3d artists to join.