Over the years I've spent traveling the internet, I have seen some really good custom sprite jobs. And what I mean by custom I mean they're made to look like they belong in a certain game. Most of you might have heard of the Jump Star Hero series, (I think that's what it's called, I haven't played it, but from I can tell, people are nuts about this series.) and have made some really good custom sprites for it. An example would be this sprite,

Not a bad custom job I say, a real good artist. Well, anyway, I'm also sure you have heard of Castlevania Symphony of the Night, and know its sprite style, for those who don't know, another quick link.
http://spriters-resource.com/psx_ps2/cvsotn/index.html
Another good custom sprite would be one based of the Symphony of the Night style, which is the style of custom sprite I'm going to request in a moment.
http://castlevania.classicgaming.gamespy.com/forums/index.php?topic=627.0
I have been wanting a custom sprite for Nei from Phantasy Star 2 for a fan game I want to make, here is what she looks like for those who don't know.

I tried to make my own custom sprite job for her, but it came out HORRIBLE! So I was wondering if someone else could help me? I'm going to try and cut some of the guess work for you, and to help a little bit more, here is a sprite you could use as a base.

Here are the things that should be in the sheet for those who are going to help me. I would recommend making her skin color lighter, you can use the image of Nei to do that, as well as to alter the color of her clothes and hair. a minor alteration would be to lower the boots a little, to below the knee. I know in the image I have posted the boots are above the knee, but I'm going for the Phantasy Star 2 look. The animations that should be in the sheet, would be standing frames, like just standing around without her weapons equipped, and when she does have them equipped in a battle stance. Perhaps make a few frames where she is doing certain motions and emotions, like low health, surprised like she had just been told something shocking or something just jumped out of nowhere, and maybe bending down to pick something up.
Running frames. (walking is optional, but would be nice.) Crouching down with and without weapons equipped, with weapons equipped she is still in a battle stance of some kind. With out weapons she is in a more relaxed position, resting one hand on her knee, she sort of looks like she is getting down to talk with someone short, like a kid or someone from Sonic's world. (An optional animation would be where she is sitting in a chair. If you feel up to doing this, you can go to my first link and look in at the Outer wall or Orlox's quarters sheets to get at look at chair size to get an idea how low she should sit.)
Jumping, now both with and without weapons share the same frames, but just the difference that she doesn't have them out. When she jumps she looks up a bit, her arms when she first jumps she has them pointed downward behind her at an angle, and has the leg closest to the screen pointed down while the other one is raised a bit and has that foot pointing the same direction as her arms. When she starts to fall, she raises her arms upwards as she falls, as if trying to slow her fall. For her double jump, she curls up into a forward somersault for one spin, when done she then enters her falling animation.
Landing, now there will be two landings, one is just a light landing where she just bends down a little bit. The other landing is for when she falls from a greater height and ends up in the crouching animation with a little different beginning animation, where she lands on one foot, and falls on one knee and hunches over and stops herself from falling over completely by stopping herself with her hands, then enters the proper crouching animation. Some animations I just thought of on the fly, climbing ladders and overhangs.
Attacking, her weapons are claw gauntlets, so both standing and crouching attacks are the same three slashes. The first slash is a left slash, then a right slash, the the third is done with both arms starting from the top going down into an X shape, and (I'm not sure how to word this but...) for each swing, a form of energy like slash waves form where the claws swipe at and flow out a bit before dissipating, an example of what I'm talking about is in this sheet.

Getting injured, for just getting hit by a light attack would just cause her to lean back a little bit, so this particular animation is the only one that can be animated for crouching, climbing ladders and overhangs too, and one last note for the light injury, she leans forward when struck from behind only when standing. The second injury is the slightly heavy one, which sends her into the air a little bit, so just a few frames are needed, getting hit from the front makes her hunch forward, getting hit from the back makes her lean back. The third injury is one that doesn't matter where she gets hit, as it sends her spinning like a corkscrew at an angle. The final injury is where she gets hit by the element of electricity, this one just requires one pose, but it needs to be animated to show that electricity is going through her. (You might be wondering about the other elements, but I can at least make those from the existing injured frames.)
Spell casting, these here are all done standing up, and can only be done standing, to heal she stands up straight and has her arms pointed diagonally down on either side of her and her hair flows upward, (I'll take care of the effects of the spells.)
Second is where she casts a fireball, and third is where she holds up one hand, which can do a whole bunch of things.
Captured, now by this I mean she is either in the grasp of an enemy, or she has been caught by a booby trap of some kind. There are a few animations to go over, and I'll go into them with the best detail I can give. First three involve being held by an enemy, (You just worry about drawing her whole, I'll worry about removing what needs to be removed, as certain enemies aren't the same size and shape.) all of them involve her being dangled, so her legs will kick in all, the first one is where she is being held by the neck, so she is trying to loosen the grip, so her hands will be very close to her face, like right at the neck, as that is where she is being held.
The breaking free of this hold is that she brings her legs up to her chest, and does a swift kick forward, and after that is done, she spreads her arm out and enters her falling animation.
Second is where she is being held by something huge, and has hold of her arms, (Like I said before, animate her whole, I'll alter what needs to be altered.)her legs will still be free, but they wont kick as frantic as when she was held at the neck, as she isn't close enough to try and hit the person holding her, so she is just trying to loosen the grip while doing, while her main focus will be trying to get her arms free, by leaning back and forth while raising her arms as best she can.
The getting free animation for this one is she scrunches up a little, then springs into a back-flip which goes into her falling animation.
The other one is where she is held by something at the waist, and the object will be fairly thin, but still animate her whole. She is being held at the waist, she her hands will be around there trying to push herself out, she will be kicking her legs a little bit, but not real frantic as she tries to push herself up.
The getting free for this one is that makes her legs straight, then hoists herself up backwards into a handstand, then into a back-flip which goes into her fall. The booby traps, I have a few traps in mind, but certain animations can work for a few of them, I'll just tell you the motions to make.
The first kind of traps are leg traps, so one can be where just one or both legs are caught, the only thing to do is to make a few frames to show she is switching to try and lift the other leg when both are caught. The only real difference that you need to do is show her lift out one leg when one it caught by lifting it, or by slashing what is holding it, so when both are held, she either manages to jump free, or slashes at both.
This one capture involves both her legs getting forced together and she then flips and hangs upside down, and the only way to get free is by attack a few times so make some frames where her first attack didn't break it on contact, but when it does break, it breaks on contact and she goes into her fall.
The last capture is one that she is already in at the start of the stage, she is hanging upside down except this time her hands are tied at the back, you don't need to show what her hands are tied with, she first looks around before looking at her legs, and tries to move them a little bit. She then looks down towards the ground. She manages to break her hands free, (I'll take care of what breaks.) and she then slashes similar to when she was caught upside down before.
Dying, now there are two kinds of dying, one is where she has gotten hit by a weak attack, so she falls to her knees, before falling on her face, (I'm not to particular how you animate her arms on this one, so long as it works.) and the second is where she has gotten hit by a hard attack, (Doesn't matter which one.) and when she lands either on her back or on her front, (Either way the legs are the last thing to hit the ground.)
That's pretty much it. Sounds like a lot I know, but I couldn't even animate good running sprites, so if someone would like to help, I would mean a lot, as I said before, I have a fan game I would like to make. If you think of a few more animations, that I didn't think of, that would be nice also.

MAGNIFICENT WORK!Take this Power Star as a gift of AWESOMENESS!Also I've been looking for the most perfect Link sprites!