Aight, if you’ve been on chat recently, you might have seen complaining about “evil blurs.” The blurs in question are rotation blurs. Why are they evil? They cause the amount of colors in a sprite to skyrocket. This is a massive issue for alternate colors, which are currently confirmed for 0.9. Now, I notice some people want to help with spriting work. This is probably the easiest way you can ease yourself into spriting. Anybody can fix these blurs; it’s just a matter of recoloring or removing frames. I’m going to start with the later, because it’s easier. Sometimes, the blured frames in question are unneeded additions to an animation.
METHOD 1: DELETING THE FRAME
For this tutorial, I’ll be using Wario’s back air.
OK, so the first step is to know a blury frame if you see one.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example1.png
That is a blury frame. See all of the colors? Now, this frame pretty much has no reason to be in the animation, so you can fix this issue by removing the frame. Next, you keep looking through the animation to see if there are any more blury frames.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example2.png
This frame also serves no purpose, and can be removed by being deleted. However, once this frame is removed, the animation seems more choppy. What can you do to fix this? You can take the non-blured frame (in this example, frame 11) and copy paste it into paint.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example%203.png
Since the end of this animation is just a simple roll, the rotation does not need to be very precise. For more precise rotations, download a program that is designed for high quality sprite rotations, such as rotsprite. But for this animation, you would use the select tool and select Wario as precisely as possible. Once selected, you go to the rotate option, and select “Rotate Left 90 Degrees” Because in this animation, Wario is rotating to the left. In other animations, the character may rotate to the right.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example4.png
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example5.png
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example6.png
Once rotated, you select the whole image, and copy paste that back into your animation software. (If you are using iaza.com, save the frame, and add it to the animation)
And there you have it.
METHOD 2: RECOLORING FRAMES
This is what is going to have to be done 90% of the time, as most of the time, the blured frame is a key frame in the animation, such as an attacking frame. For this tutorial, I’ll be using Captain Falcon’s up smash.
In preparation, and for the purposes of getting the correct colors, I’ve made a blank paint document, then pasted Captain Falcon’s idle into it.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example7.png
The idle frames should ALWAYS have the correct colors. In this animation, the blury frames are the frames where he kicks.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/133045400/TUT/example8.png
To fix this frame, you would use the eyedropper tool to collect the correct colors from the idle frame, then use the pencil tool to recolor the kicking sprite into the same colors as the idle. Once that is complete, you copy the new frame into the animator, and save.
Please provide feedback, I don’t think I did the best I could have on this.
NOTE: CHARACTERS WITH SKIN TONES SUCH AS SAKI OR CAPTAIN FALCON ARE HIGHEST PRIORITY AS FAKE ALTERNATE COLORS LOOK BAD WITH THESE CHARACTERS. NON-HUMAN CHARACTERS ARE BEARABLEMaster List of Blured Animations: *Note that this is sorted by file names for your convinience.
- Spoiler:
TOON LINK
edgeclimb
edgeattack
FALCO
bthrow
dthrow
fair
nair
uair
get up attack
CAPTAIN FALCON
broken (fading to red)
finalsmash2
sidebair
sidebair2
sidebground
FOX
broken (fading to red)
roll
usmash
GOKU
broken (fading to red, insert Kai-O-Ken Joke here)
fair (fades to yellow)
KNUCKLES
broken (red)
KRYSTAL
broken (red)
midjump
LINK
broken (red)
LUCARIO
broken (red)
LUCAS
broken (red)
edge climb
edge roll
uthrow
MACH RIDER
broken (no dur)
dair
downbair (first frame has atered colors)
edge
edgeclimb
fall (blurs and color changes)
sidebwheelie
uair
usmash
META KNIGHT
broken
dashattack
fthrow
jump
nair
MEWTWO
broken
midjump
uair
NESS
bair
fair
roll
uair
PEACH
broken
PIKACHU
broken
bthrow
dair
dthrow
nair
roll
uair
usmash
PORKY
airdodge
bair
bthrow
dtilt
dthrow
flinch
uspecial
JIGGLYPUFF
broken
edge
jump