The Battle for Wesnoth Wiki - User contributions [en]

Choosing your palette

2023-05-15T17:17:20Z

Vyncyn:

== Introduction ==
When choosing colours for your sprite art it is usually best to use already existing (mainline or UMC) palettes. But what can you do when you want to create your own, individual units?

I'll try to give you a short lesson -and hopefully some insights- into colour theory.

== Analysing existing art ==
Some of the newer mainline sprites use a lot of shades you (at first) wouldn't expect. Before creating your own images it is good to look at and analyse them.
Good examples are the Firedragon(green and purple shadows) and Elvish Outrider(yellow highlights on metall)

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$monsters$fire-dragon.png

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$elves-wood$outrider$outrider.png

Those colours, sparingly used, can create contrast in the picture without breaking the whole image.

== Choosing number of colours ==
Any material (which doesn't lie completely in shadows) should have at least 4 shades. Bigger surfaces should have up to 6, while the most dominant can have around 8 shades, but try to keep the number low.
The shades you need are:

1. White: for shiny or bright surfaces

2. Highlighting colour (optional)

3. Base-colour of the material in normal light

4. Blackish outline (Don't use black; The outline can be the same colour for the whole unit)

5.-8. About 2-4 Darker shades of the base-colour (can be replaced with other colours; more of that later)

== Shading depending on material ==
Metal is usually shiny and therefore should be white where light hits best. It reflects its surroundings, so many different colours could be used. Metal surfaces usually use more shades than other materials

Skin and leather aren't (very) reflective. Oily skin is very shiny (-> high contrast), while dry or dirty skin has a lower difference between shades.

Textile isn't shiny or reflective at all. As result white can only be used for bright fabric. It also creates folds on its own, so light shades and shadows often alternate.

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75043.png

== Reusing shades ==
I'd generally advise '''against''' using the same shades in the same image on different surfaces as it can make later edits more difficult and look confusing, but sharing the palette between different units can be useful to indicate unity (eg. units from the same faction).

Nevertheless here are three units, who use only 12 shades of brown, to show you how to reduce colour count

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75046.png

These units create different materials and colours by using variating shading method (see above) and quantity of a colour.

The fist one has a lot of orange in his trousers to distinguish it from his skintone. His weapon uses browntones with a hint of purple and green to create the illusion of a natural wooden branch and beige for dry leaves. The golden ornaments are mostly yellow with white as higlights and orange/brown in the shadows.

Nr.2 has a darker but shiny skin, so the contrast is higher (white highlights to brown skin)

The last one has a lighter skin with mostly beige shades. On his shoulders are bronze plates with a lot more orange than the gold ornaments of Nr.1. His skirt and breastplate have nearly the same shades as the skin, but a lot more white (skirt) and brown (armor) to distinguish.

Most of the time the shape of an object can be decisive for the apperance of the material.

== Shadows ==
Darker shades can be replaced with different colours to create a higher contrast or to give the material an undertone.

The default shadow for wesnoth is purple. It works best on orange or brown shades, but can be used for almost every colour with good results.

Non-reflective surfaces (e.g. normal clothes) should have just darker shades of the base colour, grey, or the default purple in the shadows. Metall and other reflective materials can use a larger variety.

Complementary colours (e.g dark green shadow for orange materials) let the surface shine a little brighter.

To create the illusion of reflection green (grass,forest) and blue (sky) shades on metall work best.

Other colours can be used to characterize a faction/unit (e.g. blue shadows for units with a water theme, red for a fire theme...)

Additionaly the number of shades you replace can have a large effect:

Replace only one shade for a hardly noticeable undertone. It's an easy effect with little efford.

Replace multiple shades with different colours to create properties for the material (e.g rusty surface, magical aura, unique (magical) metalls like mythril). It has to be carefully crafted, otherwise it will look very strange.

Replacing multiple shades with the same colour will change the colour of the material. It is only good when desired.

As general rules:

1.Replacing brighter shades will most of the time be more noticeable than replacing dark ones.

2.Replacement-shades should have (roughly) the same brightness as the original shade.

3.Replacement-shades will be less noticeable if they have a low saturation or a similar saturation as the original shade. Can be desired or not.

== Highlights ==

Highlights are bright shades with a different colour than the material. They will mostly be used for metalls, but can also give textile a shining ability (-> silk).

If you don't want to change the whole colour of the material, they should only be used very sparely (single pixels). Only use them as replacement for the brightest shades, otherwise use shadows (see above).

Theoretically you could use any colour (with high brightness) to highlight, but bright green and yellow works best most of the time.
Similar to shadows, a hue with higher saturation will be more invading than a grey colour.

== Results ==
https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75000.png

From far away the colours haven't changed too much.
The material is still clearly recognizeable as metal or fabric, but thanks to the colors in the highlight/shadows, it has given it a special kind of glow.

Instead of a dull grey/black the units have a unique color scheme that gives more character to the faction.

Choosing your palette

2017-04-22T16:28:35Z

Vyncyn: /* Highlights */

Choosing your palette

2017-04-22T16:25:13Z

Vyncyn: /* Shadows */

== Introduction ==
When choosing colours for your sprite art it is usually best to use already existing (mainline or UMC) palettes. But what can you do when you want to create your own, individual units?

I'll try to give you a short lesson -and hopefully some insights- into colour theory.

== Analysing existing art ==
Some of the newer mainline sprites use a lot of shades you (at first) wouldn't expect. Before creating your own images it is good to look at and analyse them.
Good examples are the Firedragon(green and purple shadows) and Elvish Outrider(yellow highlights on metall)

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$monsters$fire-dragon.png

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$elves-wood$outrider$outrider.png

Those colours, sparingly used, can create contrast in the picture without breaking the whole image.

== Choosing number of colours ==
Any material (which doesn't lie completely in shadows) should have at least 4 shades. Bigger surfaces should have up to 6, while the most dominant can have around 8 shades, but try to keep the number low.
The shades you need are:

1. White: for shiny or bright surfaces

2. Highlighting colour (optional)

3. Base-colour of the material in normal light

4. Blackish outline (Don't use black; The outline can be the same colour for the whole unit)

5.-8. About 2-4 Darker shades of the base-colour (can be replaced with other colours; more of that later)

== Shading depending on material ==
Metal is usually shiny and therefore should be white where light hits best. It reflects its surroundings, so many different colours could be used. Metal surfaces usually use more shades than other materials

Skin and leather aren't (very) reflective. Oily skin is very shiny (-> high contrast), while dry or dirty skin has a lower difference between shades.

Textile isn't shiny or reflective at all. As result white can only be used for bright fabric. It also creates folds on its own, so light shades and shadows often alternate.

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75043.png

== Reusing shades ==
I'd generally advise '''against''' using the same shades in the same image on different surfaces as it can make later edits more difficult and look confusing, but sharing the palette between different units can be useful to indicate unity (eg. units from the same faction).

Nevertheless here are three units, who use only 12 shades of brown, to show you how to reduce colour count

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75046.png

These units create different materials and colours by using variating shading method (see above) and quantity of a colour.

The fist one has a lot of orange in his trousers to distinguish it from his skintone. His weapon uses browntones with a hint of purple and green to create the illusion of a natural wooden branch and beige for dry leaves. The golden ornaments are mostly yellow with white as higlights and orange/brown in the shadows.

Nr.2 has a darker but shiny skin, so the contrast is higher (white highlights to brown skin)

The last one has a lighter skin with mostly beige shades. On his shoulders are bronze plates with a lot more orange than the gold ornaments of Nr.1. His skirt and breastplate have nearly the same shades as the skin, but a lot more white (skirt) and brown (armor) to distinguish.

Most of the time the shape of an object can be decisive for the apperance of the material.

== Shadows ==
Darker shades can be replaced with different colours to create a higher contrast or to give the material an undertone.

The default shadow for wesnoth is purple. It works best on orange or brown shades, but can be used for almost every colour with good results.

Non-reflective surfaces (e.g. normal clothes) should have just darker shades of the base colour, grey, or the default purple in the shadows. Metall and other reflective materials can use a larger variety.

Complementary colours (e.g dark green shadow for orange materials) let the surface shine a little brighter.

To create the illusion of reflection green (grass,forest) and blue (sky) shades on metall work best.

Other colours can be used to characterize a faction/unit (e.g. blue shadows for units with a water theme, red for a fire theme...)

Additionaly the number of shades you replace can have a large effect:

Replace only one shade for a hardly noticeable undertone. It's an easy effect with little efford.

Replace multiple shades with different colours to create properties for the material (e.g rusty surface, magical aura, unique (magical) metalls like mythril). It has to be carefully crafted, otherwise it will look very strange.

Replacing multiple shades with the same colour will change the colour of the material. It is only good when desired.

As general rules:

1.Replacing brighter shades will most of the time be more noticeable than replacing dark ones.

2.Replacement-shades should have (roughly) the same brightness as the original shade.

3.Replacement-shades will be less noticeable if they have a low saturation or a similar saturation as the original shade. Can be desired or not.

== Highlights ==

Highlights are bright shades with a different colour than the material. They will mostly be used for metalls, but can also give textile a shining ability (-> silk).

If you don't want to change the whole colour of the material, they should only be used very sparely (single pixels). Only use them as replacement for the brightest shades, otherwise use shadows (see above).

Theoretically you could use any colour (with high brightness) to highlight, but bright green and yellow work best most of the time.
Like shadows, a hue with higher saturation will be more invading than a grey colour.

Choosing your palette

2017-04-22T15:38:06Z

Vyncyn: /* Shadows */

== Introduction ==
When choosing colours for your sprite art it is usually best to use already existing (mainline or UMC) palettes. But what can you do when you want to create your own, individual units?

I'll try to give you a short lesson -and hopefully some insights- into colour theory.

== Analysing existing art ==
Some of the newer mainline sprites use a lot of shades you (at first) wouldn't expect. Before creating your own images it is good to look at and analyse them.
Good examples are the Firedragon(green and purple shadows) and Elvish Outrider(yellow highlights on metall)

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$monsters$fire-dragon.png

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$elves-wood$outrider$outrider.png

Those colours, sparingly used, can create contrast in the picture without breaking the whole image.

== Choosing number of colours ==
Any material (which doesn't lie completely in shadows) should have at least 4 shades. Bigger surfaces should have up to 6, while the most dominant can have around 8 shades, but try to keep the number low.
The shades you need are:

1. White: for shiny or bright surfaces

2. Highlighting colour (optional)

3. Base-colour of the material in normal light

4. Blackish outline (Don't use black; The outline can be the same colour for the whole unit)

5.-8. About 2-4 Darker shades of the base-colour (can be replaced with other colours; more of that later)

== Shading depending on material ==
Metal is usually shiny and therefore should be white where light hits best. It reflects its surroundings, so many different colours could be used. Metal surfaces usually use more shades than other materials

Skin and leather aren't (very) reflective. Oily skin is very shiny (-> high contrast), while dry or dirty skin has a lower difference between shades.

Textile isn't shiny or reflective at all. As result white can only be used for bright fabric. It also creates folds on its own, so light shades and shadows often alternate.

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75043.png

== Reusing shades ==
I'd generally advise '''against''' using the same shades in the same image on different surfaces as it can make later edits more difficult and look confusing, but sharing the palette between different units can be useful to indicate unity (eg. units from the same faction).

Nevertheless here are three units, who use only 12 shades of brown, to show you how to reduce colour count

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75046.png

These units create different materials and colours by using variating shading method (see above) and quantity of a colour.

The fist one has a lot of orange in his trousers to distinguish it from his skintone. His weapon uses browntones with a hint of purple and green to create the illusion of a natural wooden branch and beige for dry leaves. The golden ornaments are mostly yellow with white as higlights and orange/brown in the shadows.

Nr.2 has a darker but shiny skin, so the contrast is higher (white highlights to brown skin)

The last one has a lighter skin with mostly beige shades. On his shoulders are bronze plates with a lot more orange than the gold ornaments of Nr.1. His skirt and breastplate have nearly the same shades as the skin, but a lot more white (skirt) and brown (armor) to distinguish.

Most of the time the shape of an object can be decisive for the apperance of the material.

== Shadows ==
Darker shades can be replaced with different colours to create a higher contrast or to give the material an undertone.

The default shadow for wesnoth is purple. It works best on orange or brown shades, but can be used for almost every colour with good results.

Non-reflective surfaces (e.g. normal clothes) should have just darker shades of the base colour, grey or the default purple in the shadows. Metall and other reflective materials can use a larger variety.

Complementary colours (e.g dark green shadow for orange materials) let the surface shine a little brighter.

To create the illusion of reflection green (grass,forest) and blue (sky) shades on metall work best.

Other colours can be used to characterize a faction/unit (e.g. blue shadows for units with a water theme, red for a fire theme...)

Additionaly the number of shades you replace can have a large effect:

Replace only one shade for a hardly noticeable undertone. It's an easy effect with little efford.

Replace multiple shades with different colours to create properties for the material (e.g rusty surface, magical aura, unique (magical) metalls like mythril). It has to be carefully crafted, otherwise it will look very strange.

Replacing multiple shades with the same colour will change the colour of the material. It is only good when desired.

As general rules:

1.Replacing brighter shades will most of the time be more noticeable than replacing dark ones.

2.Replacement-shades should have (roughly) the same brightness as the original shade.

3.Replacement-shades for non-grey colours should have will be less noticeable if they have (roughly) the same saturation. Can be desired or not.

== Highlights ==

Highlights are bright shades with a different colour than the material. They will mostly be used for metalls, but can also give textile a shining ability (-> silk).

If you don't want to change the whole colour of the material, they should only be used very sparely (single pixels). Only use them as replacement for the brightest shades, otherwise use shadows (see above).

Theoretically you could use any colour (with high brightness) to highlight, but bright green and yellow work best most of the time.
Like shadows, a hue with higher saturation will be more invading than a grey colour.

Choosing your palette

2017-04-22T15:37:41Z

Vyncyn: /* Highlights */

== Introduction ==
When choosing colours for your sprite art it is usually best to use already existing (mainline or UMC) palettes. But what can you do when you want to create your own, individual units?

I'll try to give you a short lesson -and hopefully some insights- into colour theory.

== Analysing existing art ==
Some of the newer mainline sprites use a lot of shades you (at first) wouldn't expect. Before creating your own images it is good to look at and analyse them.
Good examples are the Firedragon(green and purple shadows) and Elvish Outrider(yellow highlights on metall)

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$monsters$fire-dragon.png

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$elves-wood$outrider$outrider.png

Those colours, sparingly used, can create contrast in the picture without breaking the whole image.

== Choosing number of colours ==
Any material (which doesn't lie completely in shadows) should have at least 4 shades. Bigger surfaces should have up to 6, while the most dominant can have around 8 shades, but try to keep the number low.
The shades you need are:

1. White: for shiny or bright surfaces

2. Highlighting colour (optional)

3. Base-colour of the material in normal light

4. Blackish outline (Don't use black; The outline can be the same colour for the whole unit)

5.-8. About 2-4 Darker shades of the base-colour (can be replaced with other colours; more of that later)

== Shading depending on material ==
Metal is usually shiny and therefore should be white where light hits best. It reflects its surroundings, so many different colours could be used. Metal surfaces usually use more shades than other materials

Skin and leather aren't (very) reflective. Oily skin is very shiny (-> high contrast), while dry or dirty skin has a lower difference between shades.

Textile isn't shiny or reflective at all. As result white can only be used for bright fabric. It also creates folds on its own, so light shades and shadows often alternate.

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75043.png

== Reusing shades ==
I'd generally advise '''against''' using the same shades in the same image on different surfaces as it can make later edits more difficult and look confusing, but sharing the palette between different units can be useful to indicate unity (eg. units from the same faction).

Nevertheless here are three units, who use only 12 shades of brown, to show you how to reduce colour count

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75046.png

These units create different materials and colours by using variating shading method (see above) and quantity of a colour.

The fist one has a lot of orange in his trousers to distinguish it from his skintone. His weapon uses browntones with a hint of purple and green to create the illusion of a natural wooden branch and beige for dry leaves. The golden ornaments are mostly yellow with white as higlights and orange/brown in the shadows.

Nr.2 has a darker but shiny skin, so the contrast is higher (white highlights to brown skin)

The last one has a lighter skin with mostly beige shades. On his shoulders are bronze plates with a lot more orange than the gold ornaments of Nr.1. His skirt and breastplate have nearly the same shades as the skin, but a lot more white (skirt) and brown (armor) to distinguish.

Most of the time the shape of an object can be decisive for the apperance of the material.

== Shadows ==
Darker shades can be replaced with different colours to create a higher contrast or to give the material an undertone.

The default shadow for wesnoth is purple. It works best on orange or brown shades, but can be used for almost every colour with good results.

Non-reflective surfaces (e.g. normal clothes) should have just darker shades of the base colour, grey or the default purple in the shadows. Metall and other reflective materials can use a larger variety.

Complementary colours (e.g dark green shadow for orange materials) let the surface shine a little brighter.

To create the illusion of reflection green (grass,forest) and blue (sky) shades on metall work best.

Other colours can be used to characterize a faction/unit (e.g. blue shadows for units with a water theme, red for a fire theme...)

Additionaly the number of shades you replace can have a large effect:

Replace only one shade for a hardly noticeable undertone. It's an easy effect with little efford.

Replace multiple shades with different colours to create properties for the material (e.g rusty surface, magical aura, unique (magical) metalls like mythril). It has to be carefully crafted, otherwise it will look very strange.

Replacing multiple shades with the same colour will change the colour of the material. It is only good when desired.

As general rules:

1.Replacing brighter shades will most of the time be more noticeable than replacing dark ones.

2.Replacement-shades should have (roughly) the same brightness as the original shade.

3.Replacement-shades for non-grey colours should have will be less noticeable if they have (roughly) the same saturation (greyness). Can be desired or not.

== Highlights ==

Highlights are bright shades with a different colour than the material. They will mostly be used for metalls, but can also give textile a shining ability (-> silk).

If you don't want to change the whole colour of the material, they should only be used very sparely (single pixels). Only use them as replacement for the brightest shades, otherwise use shadows (see above).

Theoretically you could use any colour (with high brightness) to highlight, but bright green and yellow work best most of the time.
Like shadows, a hue with higher saturation will be more invading than a grey colour.

Choosing your palette

2017-04-22T15:25:17Z

Vyncyn: /* Shadows */

== Introduction ==
When choosing colours for your sprite art it is usually best to use already existing (mainline or UMC) palettes. But what can you do when you want to create your own, individual units?

I'll try to give you a short lesson -and hopefully some insights- into colour theory.

== Analysing existing art ==
Some of the newer mainline sprites use a lot of shades you (at first) wouldn't expect. Before creating your own images it is good to look at and analyse them.
Good examples are the Firedragon(green and purple shadows) and Elvish Outrider(yellow highlights on metall)

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$monsters$fire-dragon.png

http://units.wesnoth.org/1.12/pics/core$images$units$elves-wood$outrider$outrider.png

Those colours, sparingly used, can create contrast in the picture without breaking the whole image.

== Choosing number of colours ==
Any material (which doesn't lie completely in shadows) should have at least 4 shades. Bigger surfaces should have up to 6, while the most dominant can have around 8 shades, but try to keep the number low.
The shades you need are:

1. White: for shiny or bright surfaces

2. Highlighting colour (optional)

3. Base-colour of the material in normal light

4. Blackish outline (Don't use black; The outline can be the same colour for the whole unit)

5.-8. About 2-4 Darker shades of the base-colour (can be replaced with other colours; more of that later)

== Shading depending on material ==
Metal is usually shiny and therefore should be white where light hits best. It reflects its surroundings, so many different colours could be used. Metal surfaces usually use more shades than other materials

Skin and leather aren't (very) reflective. Oily skin is very shiny (-> high contrast), while dry or dirty skin has a lower difference between shades.

Textile isn't shiny or reflective at all. As result white can only be used for bright fabric. It also creates folds on its own, so light shades and shadows often alternate.

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75043.png

== Reusing shades ==
I'd generally advise '''against''' using the same shades in the same image on different surfaces as it can make later edits more difficult and look confusing, but sharing the palette between different units can be useful to indicate unity (eg. units from the same faction).

Nevertheless here are three units, who use only 12 shades of brown, to show you how to reduce colour count

https://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=75046.png

These units create different materials and colours by using variating shading method (see above) and quantity of a colour.

The fist one has a lot of orange in his trousers to distinguish it from his skintone. His weapon uses browntones with a hint of purple and green to create the illusion of a natural wooden branch and beige for dry leaves. The golden ornaments are mostly yellow with white as higlights and orange/brown in the shadows.

Nr.2 has a darker but shiny skin, so the contrast is higher (white highlights to brown skin)

The last one has a lighter skin with mostly beige shades. On his shoulders are bronze plates with a lot more orange than the gold ornaments of Nr.1. His skirt and breastplate have nearly the same shades as the skin, but a lot more white (skirt) and brown (armor) to distinguish.

Most of the time the shape of an object can be decisive for the apperance of the material.

== Shadows ==
Darker shades can be replaced with different colours to create a higher contrast or to give the material an undertone.

The default shadow for wesnoth is purple. It works best on orange or brown shades, but can be used for almost every colour with good results.

Non-reflective surfaces (e.g. normal clothes) should have just darker shades of the base colour, grey or the default purple in the shadows. Metall and other reflective materials can use a larger variety.

Complementary colours (e.g dark green shadow for orange materials) let the surface shine a little brighter.

To create the illusion of reflection green (grass,forest) and blue (sky) shades on metall work best.

Other colours can be used to characterize a faction/unit (e.g. blue shadows for units with a water theme, red for a fire theme...)

Additionaly the number of shades you replace can have a large effect:

Replace only one shade for a hardly noticeable undertone. It's an easy effect with little efford.

Replace multiple shades with different colours to create properties for the material (e.g rusty surface, magical aura, unique (magical) metalls like mythril). It has to be carefully crafted, otherwise it will look very strange.

Replacing multiple shades with the same colour will change the colour of the material. It is only good when desired.

As general rules:

1.Replacing brighter shades will most of the time be more noticeable than replacing dark ones.

2.Replacement-shades should have (roughly) the same brightness as the original shade.

3.Replacement-shades for non-grey colours should have will be less noticeable if they have (roughly) the same saturation (greyness). Can be desired or not.

== Highlights ==

Choosing your palette

2017-04-18T16:10:12Z

Vyncyn: /* Reusing shades */

Choosing your palette

2017-04-18T15:51:07Z

Vyncyn: /* Same colours for different surfaces */

Choosing your palette

2017-04-18T14:17:24Z

Vyncyn:

Create Art

2017-04-17T11:22:04Z

Vyncyn: /* Sprite Art */

{| style="float:right; margin-left:1em;"
|__TOC__
|}

Graphic artists working on artwork intended for mainline Wesnoth usually meet on the [http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewforum.php?f=9 Art Contributions forum] or on the [http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewforum.php?f=18 restricted Art Development forum] ("restricted" meaning that only those users with special permissions - such as art contributors and developers - can post there). The former is a great place to post and discuss new and current mainline Wesnoth art and graphics, and the latter to see what the art development team is working on. Artists working on graphics for [[Glossary|UMC]] add-ons meet in the [http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewforum.php?f=23 Art Workshop forum].

Unit and terrain art is stored in the lossless ''Portable Network Graphics'' (PNG) format. Each frame of a unit animation, and each variation of a terrain is stored as a separate .png file in ''data/core/images'' under the [[EditingWesnoth#Where_is_my_game_data_directory.3F|main data directory]] of the game, and generally these files will be 72 x 72 pixels (the size of Wesnoth's basic hexagonal tile) with an alpha channel (a part of the file that indicates how transparent each pixel is). When creating your own images, you can test them without overwriting any game data by putting them in your [[EditingWesnoth#Where_is_my_user_data_directory.3F|user data directory]]. The game also supports JPEG images, although these are better suited for story art.

To edit these graphics, you'll need some program capable of creating PNG's - some of the programs in the following list are free, open-source software, and will do the job nicely: [[Art Programs]]

If you need some inspiration, we have a (no longer maintained) [[GraphicLibrary|Graphics Library]] which collects art posted on the forum. You can use this for ideas, and as a scrap heap for different parts of unit images (a technique described [[Give Your Hero A Personality|here]]).

== Art Tutorials ==

These are a work-in-progress, and describe both how to make art fit into Wesnoth's style, as well as giving some considerable tips on drawing in general. Especially useful is the [[External Tutorials]] page which lists a large number of art tutorials available on the web.

=== General Art and Computer Graphics ===
* [[Using the Levels Adjustment]] - How to make scanned pencil drawings ''not'' look washed out.
* [[Extending dynamic range]] - The Grooviest (so far) tutorial about extending the dynamic range of images and how this technique can be used to make better scans of pencil drawings.
* [[Scanning with camera]] - How to transfer real-life art to computer using a digital camera instead of a scanner.
* [[Art Supplies]] - What physical items you need to do larger cell-shaded art like that of Jetrel/Jormungadr/et al.
* [[Inking With Pencils|Computer Inking a Sketch]] - Info from Jason Lutes on his portrait workflow.
* [[Scaling Digital Images]] - How to properly resize an image on a computer.
* [[How to Shade]] - An attempt at tackling a very complicated topic.
* [[Cartography for Wesnoth|How to make Wesnoth-style Maps ]] - Kestenvarn's tricks of the trade.
* [[Designing weapons and armour]] - Advice from zookeeper on designing realistic weapons for your characters.
* [[Portrait Tutorial]] - A guide on how to draw unit/character portraits by Kitty.
* [[Armour Tutorial]] A tutorial on how to shade metallic armour by LordBob.
====Vector Art====
Sgt. Groovy's vector workshop - Tips and tricks for drawing with Inkscape.
:* [[Z-order tricks]] - A few methods for faking overlapping shapes.
:* [[Variable-width strokes]] - How to make the strokes vary in width, like being drawn with a flat-tipped pen — no tablet needed!
:* [[Shaped gradients with Gaussian blur]] - How to make gradients in other shapes than linear or radial.
:* [[Smooth shading in vector]] - The basic vector techniques for smooth shading, employing Gaussian blur and clipping/masking.
:* [[Vector Inking]] - Vector techniques, including mouse-only, for inking your sketches.
:* [[Making portrait art in vector]] - A complete tutorial for making Wesnoth unit portraits in vector graphics.

=== [[Terrain|Terrain Graphics]] ===

The following is information specific to drawing terrain for Wesnoth. Read Frame's "Tiles Tutorial" for a good overview of how terrain graphics work.

* [[Mesilliac's Essay on Terrain Perspective]] - The geometry behind the perspective used for terrain tiles in Wesnoth.
* [[Tiles Tutorial]] - Frame's tutorial describing the process of making terrain tiles in Wesnoth, and how they interact with adjacent tiles.
* [[How To Make Seamless Tiles]] - The tutorial is aimed at Photoshop users, but the technique is similar with GIMP.
* [[Seamless Tiles Using Inkscape]] - This tutorial teaches a method for making seamless hex tiles in vector craphics (to be rendered in raster).
* [[Turning Square Tiles into Hex]] - Nifty tricks for transforming square (or any rectangle) shaped seamless tiles into hexagon seamless tiles.
* [[CastleTutorial|Castle Tutorial]] - A description of how Wesnoth's castle tiles work (needs updating, but useful nonetheless).
* [[MultiHexTutorial|Multi-Hex Tiling Tutorial]] - A description of how multi-hex tiles work.
* [[Editing Castles]] - Instructions for how to make/edit castles (and other corner-based terrains) using yobbo's GIMP script.
* [[How to create textures]] - This tutorial proposes a process to create custom terrain textures from photo reference.

These describe the system used to specify how terrains behave in game:
* [[TerrainCodesWML]] - A list of the letters used to represent terrain types.
* [[TerrainGraphicsWML]] - If you really need to get technical, start here.
* [http://www.anathas.org/ayin/wesnoth/doc/terrain_graphics_wml Ayin's Terrain Graphics document] - If you really, ''really'' need to get technical, this describes the terrain graphics WML system in depth.

=== Sprite Art ===
The following are different tutorials about sprite work compiled by various Wesnoth sprite artists. These will give you the most specific-to-Wesnoth information about making sprites, and are well worth a read.

* [[Creating Unit Art]] - A list of specifications you will need to match.
* [[Give Your Hero A Personality]] - Tricks for editing existing images, including some clip art.
* [[Team Color Shifting]] - How to create art that uses our new team color system.
* [[TeamColoring]] - How to automatically team-color sprites to see what they look like in various colors.
* [[Creating Shadows Under Units]] - How we create the shadows for the units in-game.
* [[How to Anti-Alias Sprite Art]] - A means of removing the jagged edges on pixel lines.
* [[Rotate Pixel Art Without Blurring]]
* [http://forums.wesnoth.org/download/file.php?id=56284 Zerovirus's Spriting Workflow] - Wesnoth artist Zerovirus explains step-by-step his methodology for creating Wesnoth sprites from scratch (.png file).
* [[Creating a scratch built sprite]] - An attempt to show some ways creating a sprite from scratch.
* [[FrankenPacks]] - A quick and dirty way to create sprites for [[Glossary|UMC]].
* [[Choosing your palette]] - Make shadows look interesting.

====Animation====
:* [[Basic Animation Tutorial]] - Or "How to Animate Sprites for Dummies," covering the basic theory, and all of the mistakes to avoid.
:* [[From Base Frame To Full Animation]] - A solid method of moving baseframes forward towards full animation.
:* [[How to create motion blurs]] - A simple explanation on how to create attack animation weapon blurs.
:* [[Making Bow Animations]] - The current standard for how we want bow animations to work.
:* [[Fire Animation]] - A great guide to creating fire FX by rhyging5.

=== External Tutorials ===
The following page contains dozens of links to tutorials covering all manner of artwork, including sprite art. These were not made by Wesnoth artists, but should prove very useful for general instruction.

* [[External Tutorials]]

== See Also ==
* [[Create]]
* [[EditingWesnoth]]
* [[GraphicLibrary]] - Old library of user contributed graphics (most should be GPL'ed)
* [[Project]]

[[Category:Art Tutorials]]

Choosing your palette

2017-04-17T11:17:53Z

Vyncyn: Created page with "== Introduction == When choosing colours for your sprite art it is usually best to use already existing (mainline or UMC) palettes. But what can you do when you want to create..."