CHRs

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Chronicles News"><U> home</U></A></FONT></div> <div> <A HREF="id33.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="ChocoboMonkeys Art"><U>ChocoboMonkey's Art</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id34.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="ChocoboMonkeys Tile Creation"><U>ChocoboMonkey's Tile Creation</U></A>   |   <B>CHRs</B>   |   <A HREF="id36.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="CR2s"><U>CR2's</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id37.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="CHRs 2"><U>CHRs 2</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id38.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Learning to Draw"><U>Learning to Draw</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id39.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Thesis on Tile Art"><U>Thesis on Tile Art</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id40.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Tile Making with Photoshop 5"><U>Tile Making with Photoshop 5</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id41.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="V2 Tutorial"><U>V2 Tutorial</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id42.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Collision Detection"><U>Collision Detection</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id43.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="DMA"><U>DMA</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id44.htm" 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Multidimentional Arrays</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id67.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="V2.7 B10 Python Commands"><U>V2.7 B10 Python Commands</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id80.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Overkills Tutorial 1"><U>Overkill's Tutorial 1</U></A>   |   <A HREF="id81.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Overkills Tutorial 2"><U>Overkill's Tutorial 2</U></A></div> <div> CHRs</div> <div> Before I start with this thing, let me clarify that I'll be serious, and nothing in this tutorial will be a joke. People often think I'm joking when I talk about my experiences and techniques to make CHRs. People often think I say that just because I want to get their attention, or because I want them to think I'm a dandy or something. I'm not joking when I say "Look at naked people's movement", I'm not joking when I say "Find a sexy girl and look how she moves her butt", those are <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#FF0000" FACE="Arial" ><U>NOT</U></FONT> jokes!</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> The Living Beings of the Game</div> <div> Yes, CHRs are living beings; have it always in mind. I am Sheng Long Gradilla, the Dragon God and giver of life along with Sasha, the Tiger Goddess. Love is needed to create life better. All living beings need love. Have your girlfriend with you, or at least her photo. If you don't have a girlfriend, have a photo of someone you love, like your mother, your pet, etc. You need some love too, don't forget that! And don't mistake Love with Sex, they're totally different things, but they both together can create life. Making CHRs with love gives a better performance. Well, lets start this tutorial. BTW, sorry for my grammatik, English is not my native language.</div> <div> Index</div> <div>      1. <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>Things you should do before making a CHR</U></FONT></div> <div>           1.1 <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>The Character's Origin</U></FONT></div> <div>           1.2 <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>The Character's Soul</U></FONT></div> <div>           1.3 <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>The Character's Appearance</U></FONT></div> <div>      2. <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>Molding the Body</U></FONT></div> <div>      3. <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>The Ancient Art of Giving Life</U></FONT></div> <div>           3.1 <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>Walking</U></FONT></div> <div>           3.2 <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>Weapons and Combat</U></FONT></div> <div>           3.3 <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>Super Deformated</U></FONT></div> <div>      4. <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>The way Evolution works</U></FONT></div> <div>      5. <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>Final Tips and my Best Wishes</U></FONT></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> 1. Things you should do before making a CHR</div> <div> "What should I do?" You asked. First, you must create it in your mind. I have talked to stupid people who want to draw a CHR and don't even have the idea of how it will act, look, etc. The following are the first elements you should concentrate on.</div> <div> <B>1.1 The Character's Origin</B></div> <div> A person's origin, his country, the year, the circumstances he lived on, etc. That's what defines how the characters will look. Think on a medieval knight in the Computer Era, it has no sense! The character must fit in the place and time the story takes place, unless you want to make another Tangled Tales® game. What? You have never heard about Tangled Tales®? Your game characters are a medieval knight, an elf from a Shakespeare story, and a surfer from California. Now you know why such game title. Think as if you were the character and ask the following questions to yourself:</div> <div> a) Where do I live? </div> <div> b) What year is now? </div> <div> c) What are the most common characteristics of my country's people?</div> <div> <B>Example of answerings:</B> </div> <div> a) Japan. </div> <div> b) The katana and shuriken era :P </div> <div> c) Small eyes, yellowish skin, beardless.</div> <div> Those questions and answers will help you create an appropriate character for your game. People often create inappropriate characters because they just make the characters and don't stop to think if it'll really be suitable for the game.</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>1.2 The Character's Soul</B></div> <div> Our soul, our personality and our will. What makes the Character to cause more impact? It's the personality. A character with no true personality is like a robot. He does what he is programmed for and nothing else. The personality defines the character's habits and favorite clothes. Think on your character's personality and try to assume it, then answer the following questions.</div> <div> a) How do I want to look like? </div> <div> b) Things I like? </div> <div> c) What makes me happy? </div> <div> d) What makes me anger? </div> <div> e) How violent/bloodthirsty am I? </div> <div> f) What's my hobby and occupation?</div> <div> <B>Example of answerings:</B> </div> <bR> <div> a) Tough, scary, fearsome, long hair. </div> <div> b) I like to throw Shuriken. </div> <div> c) Money, and to be feared. </div> <div> d) When my clients don't pay me. </div> <div> e) I'm damn bloodthirsty. </div> <div> f) I enjoy killing people and ripping their lungs; I kill people for money. I'm a Ninja Mercenary.</div> <div> With those questions answered, your character will start taking form in your mind. You'll have a better idea of the character than before, you could even feel as if you knew him; this is a sign that you are really doing fine.</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>1.3 The Character's Appearance</B></div> <div> Now that you have the character's origin and personality, define his physical form. Try to draw it in paper. It doesn't have to look great, it's just to remind you of the character's clothing, appearance, etc. This will make the CHR creation easier, since you'll have a drawing from where to copy and will prevent you from spending a long time thinking "How was it? I think I forgot something.", "This doesn't look as I wanted it to be, why?", and similar.</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> 2. Molding the Body</div> <div> To mold the body, just look at your drawing. Also look at yourself in a mirror and be observant; look where the clothes fall, your body's proportions, etc. and draw the CHR, taking care of the proportions and everything. You can look at another person's CHRs, but don't use them as templates! Using templates will not help you learn, and you'll have difficulty when you don't have them. Take note of the eyes' height, the arm and leg's length, everything. You can copy from another image, but not with the copy/paste features!! Have the other image by your side and reproduce the characteristics you want. The face is something very important. I have an image that will help you with the character's faces, click <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" ><U>here!</U></FONT></div> <div> 3. The Ancient Art of Giving Life</div> <div> Now, your CHR has a body and a soul, all he needs now is Life! I'll reveal the secret of life to you so that you can add a nice movement to your CHRs. Ahhhh, the beauty of movement, that's an art. My most effective techniques are here.</div> <div> <B>3.1 Walking</B></div> <div> First of all, stop copying the animation from other CHRs without studying a real person's movement first; I know you'd like the easy way but, what will you do if there's no CHR with an animation that fits your character? Creating your own is the best way. There are lots of people that could help you. In school, look at all those sexy babes and take note of the movements that you find most common in their walking (the way their hip moves, etc). Also look at those handsome lads, and take note of their movements too (the way they move the shoulders, etc.). For better results you can talk to them about your need of a model, but don't make them feel forced to be studied naked, or they wont help you even if dressed. Believe it or not, the people that most commonly let you study them naked are girls. A man will hardly show his naked body, specially when the other person is male too. The girls feel less embarrassed, have more vanity than we men, and they love the idea that "Her beauty being used to help an artist". You can also use yourself as a model for CHRs of your same gender, but having another person as model works best.</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>3.2 Weapons and Combat</B></div> <div> If you want to make an animation of someone using a weapon, use your imagination! You can use a stick instead of sword, or even better, get a staff, preferably 1.2 mts., and tie a 10 cm. stick to it to simulate the shape of the hilt, now you have a sword! The stick will help you follow the rotation angle of the sword while swinging. Get a 30 cm. staff, tie a chain in one end, and tie a ball at the end of the chain and you have a Morning Star! Now that you have the weapons, your models can use them, and you can capture their movement with a camera. For the hand-to-hand combat animations, I recommend you to get some help from real martial artists or view some movies. Playing fighting games may also help. I recommend Capcom's latest games (X-Men vs SF, MSH vs SF, Capcom vs MSH, etc.), and all Neo Geo's Fighting games, they rule, specially The King of Fighters Series.</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>3.3 Super Deformated</B></div> <div> If your character is in "Super Deformated" style (Final Fantasy 3US/6Jap, Breath of Fire, etc.), the animations are a bit different, but a real person can help too. You just have to consider that movements are exagerated a bit, the arms and legs from the horizontal walking have twice longer range of movement than a real person, and the legs from the vertical walking raise more.</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> 4. The way Evolution works</div> <div> Evolution, the changes through time; changes to make things better. Life started in a very simple and primitive form, and evolved into a better and more complex form of life, with a better body structure and more perfect movement. Evolution is achieved by optimization and the correction of mistakes. Do not fear to start again the same CHR, you could do it better than before. Keep your old CHRs so that you can compare them with your new ones later. As your skill improves, you can correct more things from your old CHRs and try not to do them again.</div> <div> You can send your CHRs to other artists to get their opinion. Ask them for their CHRs and compare them with yours. Looking at other people's CHRs can help you get a lot better. McGrue's Onam CHR helped me with my Super Deformated style Male CHRs, it first moves one leg forward, and then raises the other leg in the next frame; I didn't notice that timing on the real people until analyzing the Onam CHR. Also, many other CHRs have helped me to get better too.</div> <div> Every artist will have a totally different opinion of your CHRs so listen to them. They'll tell you what's wrong with your CHRs and/or how you could make them look better. They can tell you a lot of things and personal experiences that will help you improve too. Afterglow has given me some tips for the character's appearence, and I gave him in return some tips for the animations. That's the way things work.</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> 5. Final Tips and my Best Wishes</div> <div> <B>Final Tips</B> </div> <div> - Never send your art to someone you don't know. He may be looking for artwork he could use in his game. </div> <div> - Listen to all comments about your art, being good or bad; most of them have a reason to be. </div> <div> - Always accept other people's artwork no matter how busy you are at the moment. Help him and help yourself. </div> <div> - Delete the art that is completely crap, you'll free a lot of disk space!</div> <div> <B>My Best Wishes</B> </div> <div> - I wish you get better than me with CHRs! I'm tired that nobody teaches me anything new, I already know everything they try to tell me. </div> <div> - I wish you that nobody ever steals your artwork and then use it on his game, claiming that he made them. </div> <div> - I wish you a long, happy and healthy life.</div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>