Okay so I've been working on a race of moth people for a few weeks now and I have a design that looks... well... not bad, exactly, but I feel like it could be better. If you don't mind could you share your thoughts on how this could be improved? So far I've got three hairstyles and all the male idle poses, so if nothing else you can muck around in the character creator for a while. Other than that this uses the default human colors and clothes because I've not gotten around to changing them out with anything interesting... Also ideas for clothes would be appreciated. Wings are definitely going to be a thing eventually but aside from that I don't really have many plans. Things I'm aware of: -the fluff on the neck layers weirdly with arms, sleeves in particular. -some of the hair styles (which in this case are antennae) are just other styles in a slightly different position. See I changed the eyes thanks to a suggestion from Nemasys, which placed them under the locations of my antennae in a way that I kind of actually like, so both of them are there for your perusal. -There's a slider that just flat out doesn't do anything. Is there a way I can remove it if I can't think of anything cool to use it for? I mean, the Novakids don't have it... Alternatively if you have a suggestion as to what to use it for that works too (also this is using the skittles race template, in case it's important) Also feel free to tell me if I'm doing anything wrong
You're off to a good start. Here are a few things I noticed: I like the segmentation on the bodies. Many of the standing poses have extra pixels sticking out past the shoes. That should be trimmed to stay inside the boundaries of armor sprites to avoid the stray pixel effect. That options that doesn't do anything might be useful for different beard styles or eye color. (My vote would be beard styles if that's even plausible lore-wise for this race.) Some of the Antennae styles cover parts of the eye. Minor adjustments might be beneficial there. This one might be my OCD talking, but I would suggest rearranging your antennae styles so that similar ones are together. The part of the body that I suppose is the abdomen is kind of hard to read. Not sure how to address that... The following suggestions might very well be on your to-do list already, but... Changing the "Hair style" label to "Antennae style" would be a good idea. I would suggest trying out different skin colors. Other minor suggestions come to mind, but they might just be things you haven't gotten to yet. Like working on the female sprites, more antennae options and things like that. I certainly know how much of a process a race mod can be. Keep at it though. It can be pretty fun coming up with your own stuff like this.
Ooh thanks! Noted, I'll clean those up. unfortunately the beard styles are on the same slider as the body sub color one and I'm not sure how to change it. Eye color though is a good idea! Pretty sure there's another race that uses it that I can reverse-engineer. Looking at Glitch I should be able to make that happen! Yeah I noticed. thing is when I looked at it earlier I thought it made for kind of a cool effect? YMMV though Makes sense. Think I can tweak that. (missed your comment on the abdomen earlier) yeah I'm not entirely sure what to do about that either... I'll look into it. yep definitely todo. In fact the first one is now done. Thanks for your feedback!
The character themselves are very well drawn, you really captured a good moth-like appearance. There is plenty of room for fun customization features that make the race very unique. The eyes are well done, it can be difficult to get the eyes of something just right. I myself am looking forward to any ships or armors your race has; such things make your race truly unique and special. Two quick suggestions that may help: If you are looking for colors for the race I would suggest looking at the feather colors of Avians for the moth fluff and perhaps the skin colors of Florans for the moth skin. If you wanted to you could make the wings you were planning to add a customization option, With how diverse moths are you could easily add a wide variety options.
Thank you! The wings were planned to be back items to prevent them from interfering with other back items. I do have one or two ideas for armor, so hopefully that turns out well. The colors sound like a good idea, I'll look into that. Thanks!
The best way to design armor is to first think about the way of life of your race. The medieval Glitch look like robotic knights, the Feudal Japan inspired Hylotl have samurai armors, and so forth. This helps to keep the appearance of your armors fairly consistent and create a feeling of immersion that makes your race special; it makes your race feel like a part Starbound rather than something that is simply there. Such concepts and ideas are also reflected in the race's ships, buildings, furniture, the upcoming mechs, weaponry, and things that the NPCs say.
Ok thanks for the advice! Granted I don't have a lot of concrete lore yet and what I do have is... unusual... but I think I might be able to come up with something cool.