NSS Artemis Spriting Thread

[UrsulaMejor]

Hey Everybody!

If you're reading this, make sure you've read the main thread here:
https://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=13222

Sprite Submission Guidelines:

1: Map-scale sprites for landing sites don't necessarily have to be to scale to the ship

• The flight map is not meant to be a literal representation of the objects, so feel free to take some artistic license
  

2: Ship-scale sprites for landing sites should feel Big but Far Away

• The plasma giant and background space station sprites that're currently in game make for a good reference, here.
  

3: Sizing

• Map Sprite: 32x32
  Ship View Sprite: 528x528
  

Obviously, the intent is for most of these to represent places you can actually go to, so be sure to head over to the mapping thread for ideas!

Need help? Try visiting the #imspriter channel on the goonstation discord

[Sundance]

Hi!

2: Ship-scale sprites for landing sites should feel Big but Far Away

• The plasma giant and background space station sprites that're currently in game make for a good reference, here.
  

I reckon I can assist here.
The plasma giant sprite FYI is enormous. My estimates put it at 15x15 tiles, so 480x480 pixels, but it could be even larger again. 

I've done a mock-up of a planet, if you like I can make more. Desert/mars like planets, lush forests, cityscapes, stars.. etc. 
Below is a watery planet mock-up. Would be good for Oshan/Manta themed landing points, if mappers feel inclined. 

Also:

1: Map-scale sprites for landing sites don't necessarily have to be to scale to the ship

• The flight map is not meant to be a literal representation of the objects, so feel free to take some artistic license
  

In terms of sizing, the map-scale sprites would be 32x32 pixel or thereabouts? I'm assuming that it's based off the map in the video? 

[UrsulaMejor]

Sundance to the rescue

yeah, the map sprites should be around 32x32, but I think it would be okay to go as high as 48x48 without seeming unreasonable.

the map scaling is technically 1 pixel on the map ~ 1 tile on the ship view, if you care to make something seem proper to scale, but as I said, the map sprites are more a marker than a literal representation. being to scale would make most sprites on the map 16x16, which feels to small to get across a reasonable representation of the object.

also, wow, can I use that sprite as a tester/showcase object??? that's amazing!

and if you sprite planets, I'm 100% certain someone will map a landing site for it. or multiple landing sites. that would be baller.

[Sundance]

Edit:

also, wow, can I use that sprite as a tester/showcase object??? that's amazing!

Yup!

Rust Belt / Junk / Iron heavy planet planet. 

Lush Forest/Earth like Planet

Futuristic Planet / Cityscape

[UrsulaMejor]

how do you make these so quickly!? is there like a guide or something you can link?

[Sundance]

I follow mainly this topic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCSLXRpLm3I

Note: Requires photoshop and some knowhow on layers. 

I go a few steps further than in the video by adding clouds or by directly manipulating the texture (such as adding in lakes to the otherwise plain green planet, or making certain colors pop out, such as the magma planet below). But for those who want to make stuff like moons, etc that tutorial will be all you need!

Edit: If people want, I could possibly upload an template planet .PSD file? Might make things a little clearer?

Magma Planet!

[Sundance]

A groovy black hole. Best seen from a distance. 

THE SUN. (Note: This could be easily colorshifted to be any sort of color)

[Sundance]

Hi Urs,

Just revisiting this thread, as i'd like to get into the nitty gritty details about the map sprites.

The map scaling is technically 1 pixel on the map ~ 1 tile on the ship view, if you care to make something seem proper to scale, but as I said, the map sprites are more a marker than a literal representation. being to scale would make most sprites on the map 16x16, which feels to small to get across a reasonable representation of the object.

What's "1 tile of the ship view" in terms of size? Tis a bit unclear.

I'm going a long winded way of describing this.. but if it's more of a marker than representative, then the map is going to start to look like the classic Super Mario world map (which is not a bad thing), with points of interest being clearly enlarged, the Player Character (In our case, the NSS Artemis) being huge in comparison to the surroundings. Not pictured is Mario, who's the size of a fucking castle when roaming:




So, this is what I might suggest, because while I can take some artistic liberty on the various backdrops above, I don't have that luxury when it comes to 32px sprites. These are purely suggestions...plucked from thin air, so feel free to shoot down or suggest alternatives..

1. NSS Artemis is 20px, give or take. This again is representative, you don't want to look at a map and go "Ok, but where are we?" If it does, then I'd bump up that sprite to be 32px. What you think?


2. In terms of how the NSS Artemis sprites looks like, I'm assuming your not using the pod in the video and want something that emulates the actual ship. 
...what does the actual map of the ship look like, in a rough sense? 

3. For points of interest, it'd be good to keep them at moons/stations/asteroids/other ships at 20px(give or take), 32px for planets, 40px for gas giants and 48px for Stars. That sound reasonable?

4. This is more of mumble than a suggestion, but I could potentially do a galaxy as a backdrop for the map, (dimensions..depends on the map size?) so it ends up looking a bit like the Mass Effect map, albeit with the proportions of above. The galaxy wouldn't be visible as a point to land (although, a destination to the heart may lead to a black hole) but might make the map a lot more prettier rather than just various objects laying around?

[UrsulaMejor]

to clarify the scale thing, the NSS Artemis is 31x31 (needs to be odd numbered for the rotating/panning stars to look right) tiles big in the playable ship view, and I'm planning for it to be a 32x32 pixel sprite in the pilots' map view, which would make it a ~1 tile per pixel scale between what you want your ship sprite and map sprite to be for the same object, if you are concerned with keeping those two things to scale

[Sundance]

I understand in terms of the ship. Still a little unclear with everything else, sorry!

Let's say your ship is 32x32 tiles (I know it's 31x31, but let's say it's a 1:32 translation for the sake of math).

That's 1024x1024 px.

Now take the planet backdrops above (which I'm assuming is a pretty thing to look out at when you reach orbit and just stays as a background similar to how the gas giant does), which is 15x15 tiles or 480x480 px.

If I was to keep things to scale from ship --> map, then those planet backdrop would be less than half the size of the ship in the map mode... 14x14 px. Which won't look good imo.

So i'll need to upscale them, to:

moons/stations/asteroids/other ships at 20px(give or take), 32px for planets, 40px for gas giants and 48px for Stars.

So my main point wasn't keeping things to scale in the mapmode... actually the opposite. Perhaps my idea of how the map will function is totally off base, do let me know!

I'll be working on some more of the above planets later today (hope to have some dank ringed planets & asteroids) but as soon as I have a clear idea on the scaling, it'd be pretty easy to make much smaller versions!

[LizzyDamska]

Here's Planet 90s (actual name TBD)! Complete with forever-hurricane and unrelenting rain! I think Sundance's suggestions for map-sprite sizes is pretty reasonable. I'm gonna be working on mapping this place over the next couple months, so stay tuned for that!

[Sundance]

That looks great Lizzy. I particularly like the clouds breaching the planet border. It's cartoony done well, getting Adventure Time vibes.

I reckon I can muster up a 480px backdrop for this that looks similar to this, forever-hurricane included, although the backdrop would be restrained to be within the border, to keep it uniform with the previous designs.

[LizzyDamska]

That'd be great, Sundance, especially since I've been having trouble doin' the big ones myself. I took a huge amount of inspiration from Schwick, he's doing some great planet sprites!

[LizzyDamska]

Sprites for the NSS Artemis herself, as well as her syndicate counterpart, the Arjuna. Complete with animations for turning, braking, and moving forward.

[LizzyDamska]

Oh boy, it's time for some way-too-ambitious planet ideas with way-too-many frames! This fella's named Eyesenhower, and he wasn't expecting visitors, so please excuse the mess. The moon would usually be overlaid on top of the planet sprite, but combining gifs outside of byond is a pain so I opted to post them separately here. The idea is that he's gonna be a big space NPC with dialogue and stuff. I'm not sure how I'm going to go about making a big sprite for him, and whether it'll be animated or not, but that's a problem for future me to solve.