The VG Resource

Yeah, you raise a good point about my inactivity. Besides the fact that this topic didn't update for about a month, most of my replies for this year have been in this thread alone. Even though I have my reasons for leaving most of the VG Resource behind, I actually miss interacting with this forum like I used to. It's just that I had a very rough year in 2015 for a variety of reasons and leaving this site was my means of damage control. Hopefully, once things are a bit more stable on my end, I'll make my grand return to the site.

By the way, dude, why not catch me on Skype? Since I'm very active on there, I was hoping we'd become Skype-migos (please forgive that cringeworthy word I made up on the spot).

Anyway, with all this talk about replies, I got something new ready. Applying some feedback from Neweegee, I adjusted the highlights on the beaks. The only exception is the back angle one because he said that it didn't look too bad and I couldn't find anything wrong with it myself. Since I did it at the same time as expanding the shading to fit the new heads, it was a good time to apply those changes.

Well, I talked to Neweegee about the changes and he said that I did good! He also suggested that I use red feet for the Goomba since they had those in the first three games. While that is the easiest thing in the world compared to other changes, I want to see if you guys think it's a good idea to provide that as an alternate palette.

Speaking of which…



By the way, should the lump to the side stay or go?

Probably wouldn't hurt to remove that.

On the MFGG forum, two other members mentioned that the lump should stay; however, one of those two members also added this to the decision.

"The one with the lump seems a bit angrier, but the one with no lump looks cuter, though."

The only reason why I'd even consider removing it is due to how it looks a little distracting to me. I might just leave the lump in anyway if more people want it on there, but a part of me wants to remove it for the sake of a more appealing design. Still, if anyone has a suggestion on how to make the lump look better (an illustration is helpful), then I'm open to it.


Now then, let's move onto the new progress, shall we?



Those red parts of the feet are the soles. I only made them red to highlight them. If the shapes of the soles need any correction, I'll see what I can do about that.

By the way, since I don't intend to have the Big Lantern Ghost appear in a lot of scenes throughout this project, I'm not exactly up for making a back pose of him. I might consider it if there's either a bigger role for him to play or there's a demand for those parts; however, as far as I'm concerned, I'm done making new parts for him and all that's left is to shade him.


Of course, that's not all I have in store today. I also mapped out the shading for some Koopa parts.



Now, I don't want this to sound like I'm being lazy, but I'm questioning if these shading maps are actually all that practical. Since I didn't get any thanks, comments, or critiques on the last shading map I created, I have no means to judge how successful that technique is. Since I feel like that these shading maps are good representations of how I shade things normally and nobody has mentioned anything about these maps, I feel like I'm wasting time that may as well been used to actually shade these parts instead. I might make one more shading map after this one to see if I'll get feedback then, but I'm leaning towards the option of discontinuing this practice.

[spoiler='Speaking of shading, though, I'm also bringing up this previous bit of work on the Koopas. I want to make sure that the rest of these parts have at least decent shading before I can fully move on with working with the Koopas. As far as Neweegee and I are concerned, the beaks are good now and everything else seems to be in order. Still, if something looks off, just let me know and possibly give me a suggestion on how to correct that. Please refrain from just saying that the lighting looks weird everywhere because that honestly tells me nothing.']


[/spoiler]

Yeah, there's the word I was looking for.

The lump can be distracting

it looks more like a pimple to me, tbh

I would say more, but I need to sleep like NOW

Well, in that case, I'm leaning towards removing that lump. Unless someone says otherwise (or even gives me a good suggestion on how to make it look better), then I'll get rid of it the next time I'll work on my Goomba.

Speaking of which, since I didn't get anymore feedback on the current shaded parts, I'm planning on shading more of those parts tomorrow.

By the way, before I head off to bed, I've got one more surprise I wanna show you guys. Forgive me if the image quality might not be the best, but I had to upload it on Photobucket since Imgur was acting nuts.



In regards to Kent C. Koopa's hand, I altered the shading of the pinky a bit since I found it a little distracting. What do you think?

Ugh… How did I forget to make Kent C Koopa's shell? Luckily, I managed to sketch it out, but I hope you guys don't mind that I lumped it in with the Goomba update.



As you would expect, everything circled are the new parts.

Here's a quick, little update for today. It's nothing big, but it is another shading map.



Depending on the replies for this (provided if I get any replies at all), this might end up being the last shading map I create before I discontinue this idea.

There we go! I just finished my new batch of Goomba sketches. From what I can see, I don't think there are anymore parts I need to create for them With that said, the next time I ink anymore Goomba parts will be the last time (until I need to make more Goomba characters/additional parts for certain scenes). How did I do?



So, what I'm planning on tackling next is inking Kent C. Koopa's parts or shading some regular Koopa parts. I'll only do either of those if I'm clear to move on with them and there are no flaws I need to iron out.

Sorry this might be vividly off-topic E-Man, but I remember you used to stream doing this. I heard you were looking for an alternative means to stream and not get any flak for it, and uh...well, a few months ago Twitch launched their offshoot Twitch Creative, which encourages art streams!! I feel like I mentioned it when it was still new - but just droppin by to remind you again ;P

so if you're looking for a new alternative to Livestream I think that might be your cookie meal ticket!!!

Since you brought it up, Kosheh, I did have thoughts of setting up another livestream. One of the reasons why I didn't do one in a long time is due to SmithyGCN switching his internet service provider. Due to the fact that it's extremely difficult to get anyone on my streams, having reoccurring guests on the stream makes it a lot more bearable to me. Otherwise, I'll be less inclined to start a stream that no one will watch and left without any good feedback.

Still, a new livestream is sorely overdue to the point where I miss that activity. With that in mind, I'll look into starting a Twitch account today.

There! All the parts for Kent C. Koopa are finally inked! If there are any that look off, please let me know and I'll see what I can do.



By the way, even though Virt might probably hate this idea, but I think it's best that I just commence with shading the Koopa parts without his feedback. It's nothing personal, but since I'm running out of other things to work on as I wait, I can't exactly afford to wait around for feedback for too long. In short, I need to get shading the Koopa parts sometime soon.

Ironically, even though I say all that, I'll actually ink my final Goomba sketches next. That way, I'll have all the outlines for the puppets used in this short out of the way.


By the way, before I go, I just salvaged this off of a disk of my old data. With possibly a few touchups, I plan to make this the logo of my series. Any thoughts (such as a possible name change)?

This might get me into a bit of trouble for saying this, but I sometimes wonder if the other users on this web site (particularly the more talented artists) still acknowledge the existence of this thread and myself anymore.

Anyway, here's another update after leaving you guys in the dark for a bit. Unless I get anymore feedback, I'd say I'm done with all the outlines for the rest of this short!



By the way, I also made updated versions of my logo (one of them even has a cardborad texture).





It's amazing what you can do with the rescale tool and colors that hue shift better.

Firstly, looking good.
I'm not sure which logo style to go with, though.
Are there any other cardboard textures you can use? (or other stuff you can adjust?)
What I am seeing in the cardboard one is that the texture is barely visible, and in a lot of places where it is prominent, it just looks like noise or obstructions.
The normal one looks nice and clean, but maybe with some adjustments, I'd buy-into the cardboard version.

as for your off-topic thing, I can relate. In fact, I feel completely ignored here in general. I could get myself into a bit of trouble for saying this, but it feels to me like when i post a comment, most of the time, it is ignored. Usually any feedback i get from what i type is rather negative. i'll leave it at that.

Again, I absolutely love what I see here!

In regards to the logo, it's hard for me to make a good compromise between keeping the colors bright and not making the texture look ugly. If I'm going to use that version of the logo, I'll at least consider trying agin with making it look better.

Now then, since you mentioned your problem, I can see where you're getting at. From what I can see, a lot of people have a problem with the way you type replies. While the way you write does not bother me all that much, I think it's at least worth it to consider the feedback you have received (negative or otherwise) to improve your writing style. Also, if you can't seem to nail those improvements just right, then I don't see why you can't ask another user for help.


Anyway, before I sign off for the night, here's something I'd like to show you guys.



Zadaben suggested the new green. Even though I'm willing to change it and I agree that it looks somewhat better (although a little distracting), I was wondering if it's worth it to recolor all the green parts I made up to this point for both my Koopas and Luigi. I'm not trying to sound like I'm being lazy here, but I'm trying to budget my time for this project, so I wouldn't have to start animating deep in April or later than that. I'll consider recoloring these (along with possibly improving other parts) later down the line, but can I save it for once I get additional assistants on this project?

Also, how are the eyelids? I'm just afraid that the eyelids that close from the top and bottom look a little wonky against the outline for the eyes. If it's not a big problem, then I'll just focus my energy on other parts of this project.