Hey guys,

So I'm working on an original game and I'm making some custom sprites. Some look pretty good while others could be better. Anyways I was wondering if anyone who's good with making sprites can gives some tips on how to make sprites/sprite sheets. Here's a picture of one of my better sprites to give you an idea on what I'm doing:



Anyways if you have any spriting tips you could give, I would appreciate that. Thanks

Well honestly it depends on the scale of the game, how large the sprites will be when in the game and so on, your best bet would be to start with more basic shapes to serve as a net for a monster / protagonist / antagonist and such. Also, a thing to keep in mind is that things in the foreground of the sprite should be lighter than things that would be further back such as the leg that isn't on the front of the sprite if you know what I mean, this would be more shaded, also I will note that overhead sprites are much much easier to create since they tend to be less detailed. I good thing to do is to separate each part of the body and make sure they look in proper proportion to each bit of the body. Feet shouldn't be as big as the head for example. You can take some artistic liberties with that though. Shading is another important part of spriting, usually the lower area of the sprite will be darker than the top, this will just add some depth into it making it look much better.
 
Ooh and by the way, the gun is some-what floppy in the image, your should make sure each item represents what it should look like well.
I mean I just did a quick edit in paint, and for me personally it looks a lot better than the floppy gun.

Of course you may be going for a specific style.
Anyway I can't say to much on the subject, I tend to just do small sprites more than larger sprites.

Well first off, it would be good if your sprite didn't look like the sprite off of the game "Metal Slug"

http://bbsimg.ngfiles.com/1/24151000/ngbbs5026f73739014.jpg

And 2nd, I would suggest adding probably eyes or outlines of other parts of the body such as muscles, eyes, ect...

Guitarguy472 : You need to put a : right after the name for the summon to work.
SacraRain : He failed to summon you so read the above post,


Taking inspiration from another game is okay as long as it doesn't look like a carbon copy.
I think take examples from professionally done sprites is a best thing to do when starting,
I mean it is the same for most things even reviews, it's recommended to do something like
that to make sure it is up to a decent standard. Real life images are another good thing to
too use for a comparison from sprite to image.