Wezzy's Everyone Can Sprite! (For Aurora)

[wowzewow]

 

So. You want to contribute sprites to Aurora. But you think you have absolutely no talent. Well, contrary to popular belief, the beautiful part of spriting is that you absolutely do not need any skill in traditional art at all to succeed it in it! It's an entirely different ballpark! I'll be going through each way to contribute, each with their own diffuculty level.

1. Porting (Beginner)

At this tier, you don't even need to make a sprite, let alone *touch* an art program at all. So long as you know how to commit and push a PR, you'll do well. If you don't, there's a very useful guide here too.

Although you may be asking to yourself, where should I port from?

Priority on replacing sprites are as follows, and are subject to change.

1. Age (i.e. has not been modified in a long time)

2. Obscurity (Something people don't typically see.)

3. Looks (Based on discretion. Codersprites and placeholders for example.)

2. Tweaking/Modification (Novice)

Now, let's say you've found a few good sprites to port, and you're just about to finish your PR until you realize you sorely lack a sprite you need. Don't fret! With a few minor modifications, it can easily be filled out.

Here's some examples.

Sometimes, it doesn't hurt to trawl around and repurpose some sprites, and sometimes you'll need to do it anyway to keep it consistent. But don't be afraid to experiment!

3. Spritebashing (Intermediate)

Now, lets say the sprites you're porting, or making, both look out of place. What do? You make children, of course. (Wait, not like that.)

You take two sprites that are along the lines of what you're aiming for, and take the best features of both. Something like your biology class.

For example, for our recently updated first aid kits, I've taken the handle and overall shape of /tg/ while incorporating the design of Bay.

What's come out is a completely unique Aurora sprite! It's much better and faster than starting off from scratch, and I highly recommend anyone that wants to dip their toes in spriting for real.

It's recommended to do this method rather than make sprites completely from scratch. It saves a lot of time and headache, and allows you to borrow consistency.

4. Inspired Spriting (Advanced)

This is definitely a step up, and a point where the training wheels *really* come off.

However, techniques from spritebashing still apply here, albeit with a bit more of your own discretion.

5. From Scratch (Experienced)

If I were to be honest with you, doing this is not recommended unless you *absolutely* cannot find any other reference on another codebase or on the server.

However, if you really do want to do this, be sure to keep consistent with at least something else. For example, if you want to make a new, say, bag, be sure to re-use the color palette of already existing ones.

Here's a good guide on spriting, which I highly recommend for further reading : https://hackmd.io/@Partheo/spriting