WIP Ebae's Character Portraits

Just as general suggestions for people interested in getting into pixel art, the current best programs for it right now are, IMHO:

Graphics Gale (free)
Pyxel Edit ($9), free older beta.
Aseprite ($15), free trial of current version (can't save files), free older beta version.

I currently use Aseprite. Pyxel Edit is also fantastic but buggy since it's an early beta. In the long term, Pyxel Edit is better for game dev, like sprite sheet management and tile sheet production, where Aseprite is better for animating and still images. Aseprite is also more actively developed, since Pyxel Edit is made by a single guy who's also a full time student, he doesn't have as much time to dedicate to it.

 

What program did you originally make these in?

I'd recommend paint tool sai if you haven't already heard of it... It's sort of like a watered down version of photoshop in that it has layers, but is much less complex, not to mention it's free... It also supports transparent backgrounds and has a pixel/binary brush so making pixel art using it is fairly painless.
If you have heard of it already, my apologies ^.^;; Just figured I'd share since it's what I normally use for my pixel art~

 

You're very talented at getting the different face shapes right. Really looking forward to this!

 

These are great! Cant wait to see how the rest turn out!

 

These drawings are amazing O.O Simply beautiful. I can definitely see the character personalities in these. Sebastian looks like a recluse-gaming, moody teen who lives in his parent's basement. But he also looks like he could be in a band with Sam. With is so perfect. I'm really looking forward to seeing Harvey and Elliot.

I honestly think that when these are all done, they will be the best portraits I have seen so far. If not the best ones ever. Will you be making new sprites to match them?

 

Amazing! We need more of it!

 

Marvelous art work,i want these in my game aswell..

 

These look absolutely fantastic thus far, and there is no sameface at all!
Your spiriting is pretty amazing too, I cant wait to see more!

 

Wow, really amazing and great artstyle!

 

Looking at his sebastian, something tells me he/she is not actually making handdrawn pixelart, but just shrinking the colored handrawn art he/she has made into 64x64, thats why some people like a lot his/her type of "pixelart" while others will feel the image has lost quality because the prefer defined pixel art.
The art for the game looks like when studios like square did the same for their PSX games, shrinking high resolution art into a small resolution for the character portraits, and makes it look like washed out pixelart.
Or maybe Im wrong, I know some people who actually draw pixel art that way, so both things are possible.

 

Whoaa, I love Haley and Maru, and Abigail looks adorable in your style! I hope you finish these; I'm really excited for them!!

 

These are beautiful, Ebae! May I make a small request? My OTP is with Haley (she's not one of the more popular, sadly) and I really like her hair curlier. If you're still in the rough-draft stage, I'd like to request a curlier look for her hair. ^.^

 

You're so perceptive! The truth is a little bit of both. It's true, I shrink down a higher resolution image as a base, but I manually refine certain areas to sharpen important features like the face and silhouette. It's unorthodox I'll admit, but I figure these are just for fun so oh well.

Also thank you to everyone for the great feedback! I'll definitely consider Haleys hair style.

 

Awesome! I can't wait for these portraits, they are beyond amazing!

 

Can we mod the game to support higher resolution portrait instead of just pixel art???

 

It's only me or Penny really looks so sad.

 

Cool! I really like how they look in the end, so i have no problem you are doing them like that, and then you even go and retouch them to be even better. In fact I really like how they feel and I want to use a similar technique to do my next idea for portraits. Im better at drawing than classic pixelart, so I think it will work better for me.

 

great style of art, although Abigail looks too American native, Penny seems too young and sad and Caroline is a bit too old.
But I'll use them regardless. Waiting eagerly.

Thanks for your hard work.

 

Maru with "natural" hair is so great

 

So I tried using the xmb glumi provided, but I'm still getting white. Same with this new portrait of Elliott, though a lot less. Despite the fact that I haven't gotten the xmb to work, I thought I might as well post the png at least. Enjoy!