Alright 2nd last Spotpass character Aversa. We’ll see if I get time before Christmas ends to attempt Walhart (would be fitting as a Christmas sprite being you know all white and red), but we’ll see. If I don’t post again before Christmas, I wish everyone a happy holidays then.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Aversa)
FE Awakening - Aversa
The 2nd last Spotpass character (recruitable order too) Aversa. It took me a while to settle on a pose for this one because her default pose wouldn’t fit her feather collar well, so I went to look at different arts. I also realised during my research that she has actually quite a lot of colours in her design (skin tone, body markings, black feather collar and head cap thing, red eyes, gold armlets). I eventually settled on a pose based on some artwork by Koyorin (@koyoriin on X and koyorin on deviantart). The way the pose they drew Aversa in, while more happy looking than her regular Awakening pose angled the feather collar in a way that it fits nicely in the hackbox. I drew her originally without the hand because I wasn’t sure if I could fit the amount of colours required. I managed to get far enough with 2 colours to spare (using the darkest purple hair shade for the body markings and different skin tones for her eyes) so I could do the gold armlet on her wrist. I did an alt without the hand anyway because I feel like sometimes hands add a bit of clutter to the portraits.
P.S Here is the image I referenced for Aversa’s pose
By @Koyoriin on twitter
Whew, on Christmas eve I managed to submit one more. With this the Spotpass characters are all done. This man in red and white is not quite as jolly as the holiday one but cool nonetheless. I wish you all a happy holidays again. Maybe I’ll fit one sprite or two before the New Year, but then I’ll probably be infrequent due to my first quarter of the year being busy.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Walhart)
FE Awakening - Walhart
The last Spotpass character is done. Walhart was hard, even though his colour scheme is simple, being black, white and red I still ran short on the amount of colours I would of liked to have. I would of preferred to have a 4th red tone to shade the armour a bit better. I also decided to base his pose on his injured Heroes pose because it looked intimidating and cool. That and I could add the horns in a capacity to his portrait (even if they are tiny). If the hackboxes and portraits were maybe a pixel or two wider his left shoulder pad could look a little neater, but this was the best looking I could work it in. IS actually also doesn’t fit some sprites into their own hackboxes (noticeable with Hawkeye if you look at his left arm it is missing border colour on it). Otherwise I’m pretty happy with what I was able to pull off, he even looks pretty cool without his armour and headgear (maybe I should do a Summer Walhart :p)
You could try using extended hackbox for Walhart. Not many people know this, but you can use those extra tiles ON TOP, so you could use that to extend his horns upwards.
I considered that, I actually tried a test with Aversa to try the patch, but I couldn’t get the tile to appear above the hackbox, only in the bits above the shoulders (not normally in the hackbox), so I decided not to do a variant with longer horns.
I’ve also managed to sneak in one last sprite update before Christmas proper. I’ve gone back and redone the clothing completely for Priam and slightly changed his hair and body. Both the new version and the original will remain if you want to use that one.
Now all the Spotpass characters are up to scratch. Next on the Awakening list are the kids. I think the next hardest sprite out of the 2nd generation is probably Laurent and trying to fit his hat into the hackbox.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Priam)
EDIT: I’ve gone back and redone Priam, mainly his clothing although his body and hair have been slightly altered to give me two more pixels of space in regards to the hackbox. His clothing was completely redone, (the whites was re coloured and I sacrificed one of the red tones after adding his his other shoulder pad) mainly adding his shoulder pad and resizing his collar guard so it looks better. Both versions will remain available.
Maybe when I’ve done all/most of the Awakening portraits I might go back and do a longer horn variant. I’ve tended to try and on purposely confine myself to hackboxes even when it would clearly benefit me not to (GunXSword - Van, Miriel, Mustafa, any of the Armour Knights, etc). I find restriction most times a source of creativity, that and I like the idea of my sprites being as compatible as possible for ease of use.
Now if you’ve followed my work over the past two years, you would have noticed that I’ve actually already started the 2nd Gen with Kjelle being the first Awakening armour knight I did and Lucina being done as part of the main cast. However now we’re starting the 2nd gen proper.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E - Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Cynthia)
FE Awakening - Cynthia
Alright starting the 2nd gen characters, this is the 3rd child I’ve done since I’ve already done the other 2 Ylissian warrior girls (Lucina and Kjelle) might as well finish the trio of Ylissian warrior children with Cynthia. I used the hair and skin tones from my Sumia for her. I considered making all the children use 3 tone hair, but Sumia’s hair looks a bit flat with just 3 tone. That and some of the parents have 4 tone hairs as well, so I think for the 2nd gen at least I’ll go with their FEH hair colours (most of the time its their guaranteed parent’s hair except for Inigo and Kjelle) to avoid canonicity issues. One thing I’ve noticed doing young looking characters, is due to the increased size of their eyes (this is also prevalent in IS’s sprites too) that their head and face overall look bigger usually than other characters.
Here is a double special today. Currently just under half of Gen 2 completed with these two. Due to Brady’s head angle I had to be a bit creative with the way the frames are set up, so they are on purposely set with the background colour in there to avoid overlap with the eyes and mouth.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entries under F2E - Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Nah and Brady)
FE Awakening - Nah
Your 2nd gen Manakate, Nah. Unfortunate naming aside, she is characterised by trying to be more grown up, which when she ironically makes her come off as young and immature in a way. Another character whose FEH hair colour is not either of her parents (Nowi being blonde) and is instead Divine Dragon Green. Which interestingly enough if I recall correctly she takes over as the Divine Dragon Oracle in the bad future once Tiki ascends to become the new divine dragon god after Naga dies in Future Past. Overall pretty happy with this one, I think if I were to revisit, I would go over her hair and maybe add some more detail. It is kinda bland, but her haircut was also amongst the most flat in Awakening as well.
FE Awakening - Brady
Your gen 2 healer, the foul mouthed thug faced cleric. Who is actually a physical wimp. He has an interesting pose which caused for a challenge when trying to recreate it. It wasn’t until I finished that I remembered Astolfo has a similar head position for reference. His eyes and head shape were probably the hardest parts, once that was done the rest was pretty straight forward. I’ve used Mariabelle’s hair tones for his hair. Overall pretty happy with it.
I’ve updated the mini, although it is a bit tight to fit in the lock of hair. In other news, here is the next Awakening sprite, this one was cool although I don’t like working with a lot of black on black colouring because it becomes hard to make layers of clothing differentiate sometimes.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E - Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Gerome)
FE Awakening - Gerome
Heres your cool 2nd gen wyvern rider. I find it interesting that everyone else in his gen thinks he is perfect and the best at everything. However he has a pretty nihilistic view, and didn’t believe the kids could change fate despite being the most capable according to the others. I wish I had more colours to work with so I can differentiate the tones of black for his cloth and armour, but the colour limitation is pretty strict with him. I have done an alt without his mask as well, as seen in some of his supports.
Man I’m so close to the 100 sprites done this year mark. I’ll see if I can crunch out two more in before the new year hits. I’m really happy with how this one turned out.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E - Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Severa)
FE Awakening - Severa
Here is first of the Awakening trio I’ve done Severa. Your classic tsundere character looks and all with the twin tails. I actually think I used her hair colours much better on her than I did on her mother Cordelia. I’m really happy with this one, when I was starting the colouring I wasn’t sure but I worked out. I did have an alt take on her eyes, but they ended up looking too happy for her. I am kind of sad that her shoulder plate covers up most of her left hair tail, because I think that turned out pretty well as well. Maybe I’ll do an alt of her in another outfit down the line.
Its 11pm here in Australia and its done, I successfully managed to get 100 sprites done this year. I wish you all a happy new year. This was a crunch, but I like how these 2 turned out.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entries under F2E - Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Noire and Inigo)
FE Awakening - Noire
Your 2nd gen archer, Noire. She surprisingly has a lot of colours you need to take in to consideration, which is why her shoulder guard is a darker grey than Virion’s. I wish I could utilize one more tone so I could make a nicer transition, but its what I had to work with. Otherwise She turned out really well. If I had to re do something else of hers besides using an extra colour tone, it would be to re do her circlet because it just never sat quite right to me. Her alternative persona was also fun to draw.
FE Awakening - Inigo
The next of the Awakening trio Inigo. After finding out I could, I always married off Olivia to Chrom, because I liked the idea of Inigo being his son and in that blood line. It kind of felt fitting for him and made some of his other supports kind of funny, like the one with Noire where it comes off as asking his son to be baby sat to keep him out of trouble. Still his “canon” Inigo/Laslow hair colour is decent too. Apparently if Inigo is also Chrom’s son he also has the mark of the exalt in the opposing eye to Lucina. Overall I’m pretty happy with how this one turned out. Again wish I could use some more colours, but I managed to get a lot of mileage of just 3 tones of blue.
Thanks for the compliment, I enjoy drawing and I figure if people can use these ones then they can.
So for the first sprite of the new year, I have done Laurent. This leaves me with only 4 gen 2 characters left if I recall correctly (Owain, Yarne and the Morgans). Its been a journey going through the Awakening cast but this mini project is definitely getting towards the end now.
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E - Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Laurent)
FE Awakening - Laurent
The oldest Gen 2 character (due to time warp shenanigans. Technically Lucina is older but Laurent warped back in time 2 years before the rest of the team and thus aged 2 years before reuniting with the others). He was probably going to be the hardest to sprite next to Kjelle. Due to his height and face angle his hat is squashed a fair bit more by the hack box than Ricken and Miriel. However I think I got the essence of Laurent down pat in this sprite anyway. I wish I had maybe one more colour tone to make the rings and the yellow trimming on his shirt, more yellow and less skin colour esque, but due to requiring the white grey tone for his hat and shirt it limited the colour variation I could use.
I do sleep, I have a day job and a fair few extracurricular activities I do, plus exercise, so sleep is quite valued to me. The rate at which I can draw a sprite like all things are affected by many factors.
Things that can make the process go faster;
I have a clear idea what and how I want to draw it.
I’ve prepped some good foundations for it
The sprite is smaller or less complex
I’m on a roll or highly motivated at the time
If I have more free time to commit (ie holiday/weekend)
Things that can make it go slower;
The sprite is large or more complex
Suffering artists’ block or can’t work out how to start the sprite easily
No or little motivation to draw
Other activities taking priority and leaving me with less time to draw.
I have in the past done a sprite a day before, but the last time I recall doing something that solid was during Covid when I had access to my PC with less work to do pretty much 24/7 for a good year. (I did a sprite a day for that October, and that was really draining, but I also had done a lot of prep work for it too).
I don’t know if my work process for drawing is any faster than anyone elses, but I have found over the years. The more experienced I got the faster it was to do things that are common across the board, like skin shading. I find most time gets put into hair colouring/shading and anything with significant decals and doing pre lineart for everything. Armour/Clothing colouring becomes more straightforward and repetitive and so does skin colouring over time.
I gotta tell ya man, it’s hella impressive, especially if you also have a day job and other stuff. as a gym bro would say “I’m tryin to be like you man”
Alright so life is getting pretty busy right now, so I expect the sprite drawing to slow down and eventually stop for a while leading up to and during and probably post Lunar New Year (I do a lot of extra curricular stuff in celebration for this), but I should get the Gen 2 definitely done before then and then I’m still deciding if I should do the shared/generic bosses for Awakening. If I do them (at least the named bosses not the risen skirmish classes, I’m not sure I’d be willing to go do Awakening generics because that is a lotta classes), then they’re probably next. Then I’m probably gonna finish my Awakening project with maybe something special for the Robin(s).
I’ve updated the main post with the below entry under F2E - Fire Emblem (FE Ylisse Saga - FE Awakening - Morgan(s))
FE Awakening - Morgan(s)
So here we are. The Morgans, their character trait is that they inherited their amnesia from Robin. To be honest as far as characters go, the Morgans are not high on my favored Awakening characters, but they’re serviceable as Robin’s kid I guess. I suppose in hindsight they’re kind of tragic in that they probably know what they’re doing is bad, but all they know is that they love Robin and would do anything to stay close to them even post Grima-fication, you know kinda like any child that is clingy to their parents. Interesting that their most common depiction has them have inherit black hair, so I guess it implies that the preferrable parents art wise must be of Say’ri or Tharja for Male Robin and Lon’qu or Basilio for Female Robin (interesting combos). Overall I find their design pretty straight forward, but they tend to have drooped shoulders which exaggerate the length of their necks, so that part felt a little weird drawing their proportions. Another thing I ran into was there was no easy way to fit all of F Morgan’s eyes into their frame box, so I had to get creative with the frames.
