mrgilder In reply to WhiteAngel771 [2019-04-05 00:55:47 +0000 UTC]

Of course. I love how crisp and clean your work is. Super professional.  

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mrgilder In reply to kit-kit-kit [2014-04-09 00:59:54 +0000 UTC]

Anytime. Your style is wonderful.

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mrgilder In reply to Omegachaino [2014-03-27 12:30:35 +0000 UTC]

Anytime. Your style is so unique. I can't wait to see more.

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Omegachaino In reply to mrgilder [2014-03-27 14:45:59 +0000 UTC]

really thanks...work on that, I have little time, real work, friends, beer and women, you know... XD, Life gets interesting sometimes,  success for you friend

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mrgilder In reply to Omegachaino [2014-03-27 15:14:04 +0000 UTC]

Thank you for the kind wishes. I work hard to juggle my job, hobbies, and family life with my drawing too, so I understand where you are coming from.

And thank you for the watch!  

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Omegachaino In reply to mrgilder [2014-03-27 17:21:37 +0000 UTC]

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mrgilder In reply to Quanyails [2014-01-17 21:13:12 +0000 UTC]

Anytime. What a cool piece!

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mrgilder In reply to sindelsioux [2013-11-30 22:25:02 +0000 UTC]

I've retired from pixel painting. But I'd be happy to share any knowledge I have with you. Is there anything specifically that you were curious about, or are having trouble with?

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sindelsioux In reply to mrgilder [2013-12-01 12:54:13 +0000 UTC]

Yes! How do you plan out where you're going to paint, a huge grid that covers the whole canvas or just the main outline and separate colour groups?
How do you get the glossy effect?
What method do you use to get the linework so straight and tidy- is it down to a steady hand or the paintbrush? Thank you so much

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mrgilder In reply to sindelsioux [2013-12-01 15:05:39 +0000 UTC]

Okay. I'll see if I can help. I'll just sort of outline my process, and maybe you can get some useful tips out of that.

Prep

I usually don't grid the entire canvas. Before I do anything I start by figuring out the size of the sprite. I do this by importing the sprite that I want to paint into the free image manipulation program Gimp, which you can get here:

www.gimp.org/

Gimp lets you zoom infinitely onto the sprite without losing image quality. Then you can set your grid in the program to be 1x1 pixel, and make it visible. Then I use "cntrl+print screen" on my keyboard to take a snapshot of the zoomed spite with the grid (this is necessary because the grid is only hypothetical - it won't show up if you print directly). You then paste that screenshot into another session of Gimp, or a session of MS paint, save it and print it out. Now you have a nice zoomed version of your sprite with a grid imposed over top. You can write on this printout, count off your grid spaces (I usually use letters for the vertical axis, and numbers for the horizontal), etc. Now you also know the size of your sprite. I generally buy or stretch my canvas after I know how big the sprite will be. So let's  say that the sprite is 12x16. I paint in1/2" pixels, so that sprite will be 6"x8". I would buy a 10"x10" or 10"x8" canvas for that sprite. I like to keep the canvas tight to the sprite to avoid alot of dead space around the edges - otherwise you also have to paint a background.

Once I have my canvas primed, I'll use a light gray colored pencil to draw a 12x16 grid so that it's centered in the canvas. You want to avoid gridding off the space that you won't use - erasing is messy and you don't want to create additional work for yourself by needing extra coats of paint to cover your grid lines.

Once you have our grid drawn and numbered, take you ruler and a blue colored pencil, and draw your actual sprite on the grid. I like to make a little scribble inside any block that will be black (or the darkest color the sprite has). If I'm feeling really ambitious, or the sprite that I'm working with has alot of colors, I'll use colored pencils to color-code scribbles in each block to make an easy guide for myself. Once this is done, take a good smudge-free art eraser, and get rid of as much of your grid as you can - it'll never fully erase, but you can lighten the lines quite a bit.

Painting:

The first thing that you want to do is take your white paint, and paint over the unused grid lines that you just erased. You want to put a coat of paint over them in case you use a light color for the background. This will limit the number of coats that you'll need in order to cover up those lines properly.

The most important tip when it comes the actual act of pixel painting is that you need to be using a flat-edged (sometimes called a squared) chisel-tipped brush , not a traditional pointed paintbrush. Choose one that is smaller than the actual size of the pixels you're painting. So if you're doing 1/2" pixels as I do, you want to go with a 1/4" or at most 3/8" tip. This small brush is for doing the edges of your color-blocks. you can totally use a bigger brush to fill in the spaces once you've used the smaller brush to get nice straight edges and clean corners. Obviously a certain amount of steady-handedness is important, but the straight-edge of the chisel brush should be doing most of the work here. If you're right handed, start in the top-left corner and work toward bottom-right (if you're left-handed, start top-right).

Another tip I can provide when edging your straight lines is that if you're right handed like me, it's easiest to work on left edges and pull paint toward your right, and top edges while pulling paint down. I like to do all of my left edges and tops in one color, then step away from the painting for 15 minutes so it can dry. Then I flip the painting upside-down so that the former right and bottom edges become the new left and tops. If you're left-handed, the same process should be helpful - you'll just want to start with right edges and tops.

When I start painting, I do one coat of the darkest color first (usually black). Then proceed to paint the rest. Two coats minimum for all colors. Often more coats will be necessary for your lighters yellows, etc. You want a nice opaque, smooth application - no streaks - no canvas visible. Finally I finish everything off by returning to the first dark color I painted (usually the black), and apply the last coat to that. This cleans up the edges.

Finishing:

The "glossy effect" on my painting is because all of my paintings are varnished. If you want to sell your paintings to others, you should always varnish them to protect them from light and the elements. I assume you're using acrylic paints like I do, because they're easiest to work with - but they also have poor longevity unless your varnish them. A varnished piece can be dusted, or cleaned with a damp cloth without damaging the painting. I use a medium-gloss acrylic varnish. You'll want to buy the pasty type that you mix with water and apply with a brush. Avoid spray varnish for a canvas painting because you can't control the thickness and quality of your coats. I won't spend the time to tell you how to varnish - you can find loads of good tutorials online. My recommendation is that it's better to do alot of thin coats (as least 4-5) as opposed to afew thicker ones.

I hope that this is helpful for you. I'll add you as a friend so that we can keep in touch easily if you need any more help.

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sindelsioux In reply to mrgilder [2013-12-01 17:36:25 +0000 UTC]

Wow, thank you so much for the in depth reply, this helps so so much! I already use a flat ended brush, I guess I just need more practice to get them even straighter
And using the gimp template too, I'll definitely utilise this.

Again thank you so much, this has helped massively.

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mrgilder In reply to sindelsioux [2013-12-01 18:47:40 +0000 UTC]

Glad to hear it. Good luck on future pieces!

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mrgilder In reply to kcspaghetti [2013-11-14 15:14:14 +0000 UTC]

No problem!

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mrgilder In reply to ice-cream-skies [2013-11-03 22:42:48 +0000 UTC]

Of course. You've favorited a bunch of my pieces, and your work is so cute. It would be rude not to add you as a friend.
Thank you for watching me as well!

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mrgilder In reply to Charjake08 [2013-10-08 22:29:42 +0000 UTC]

Anytime.

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Charjake08 In reply to mrgilder [2013-10-08 22:37:51 +0000 UTC]

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mrgilder In reply to ice-cream-skies [2013-10-08 22:29:26 +0000 UTC]

You're very welcome.

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mrgilder In reply to Crowsrock [2013-10-05 17:28:11 +0000 UTC]

No problem!

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mrgilder In reply to ai-eye [2013-09-09 17:30:38 +0000 UTC]

No problem.

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mrgilder In reply to ClaudiaSutton [2013-09-09 17:30:58 +0000 UTC]

You're super welcome.

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ClaudiaSutton In reply to mrgilder [2013-09-30 00:08:39 +0000 UTC]

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mrgilder In reply to Mecha-Zone [2013-01-30 14:15:16 +0000 UTC]

You're very welcome. Your work is unreal.

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mrgilder In reply to CocoaMoo-Vamp [2006-04-25 03:22:59 +0000 UTC]

I is lonely cause my girlfriend, whom I loved quite dearly (and wrote that poem you commented on earlier for) dumped me about a month ago.

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CocoaMoo-Vamp In reply to mrgilder [2006-04-25 03:41:44 +0000 UTC]

Aww, man! That stinks... Hope you can find happiness, again, soon! (Not to sound like a match-maker, or anything, especially 'cuz I don't know your life, but if you love her that much, I hope it works out..well, I hope anything/everything works out, no matter what it's for..! So, keep your head up *looks through your cool gallery, some more*)

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mrgilder In reply to CocoaMoo-Vamp [2006-04-25 03:48:45 +0000 UTC]

Thanks alot. It's nice to be greated by someone so friendly. I'm glad to hear you're enjoying my gallery. I'm a huge Gundam fan, so it's nice that you've picked up on that. I should be adding some new stuff soon. I've got about 5 years worth of sketchbooks laying around that I can load up, so stay tuned.

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CocoaMoo-Vamp In reply to mrgilder [2006-04-25 04:09:21 +0000 UTC]

You're welcome! (^^ I love making ppl happy, so I'm glad that you're feeling welcome!)
Yep, I am. Haven't seen too much for Gundam, but I definetly know what the series' are! (My sister/stickynotelover is a big G.Gundam fan )
Yay! New stuffs! Can't wait to see it! (Yeah, I know what you mean...*has four or five years worth of sketch books and odd pieces of paper, all over, too, to load...*). Yesh, I will do that, stay tuned... . (^^' I'm a little spazzy, at the moment..well, maybe just hyper -lol-).

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