Greetings I am in the beginning stages of building a game with a programmer friend of mine. I have questions about the creation of the graphics. I workin photo shop and flash..but would like to know if their are better graphics platforms for this type of projects. When importing images into the programming environment, what kinds of files are used? ( png, jpeg ect) I am a total newbie with this and any feedback would be greatfully appreciated.
You should really be asking your programmer friend this question. The file format is not a limitation of the iphone platform ... it's based on what your friend decides to use in his engine. Anyway, quick answer - both png and jpeg are fine
Photoshop is a good platform for developing iPhone graphics. I use Illustrator because I am more experienced in using vectors. It is down to what software you feel comfortable using. png and jpeg are good options. I find I get the best results using png. I get small files sizes and no degradation in quality.
PNG format is recommended by Apple (for bitmaps), especially if app size is irrelevant. For bigger images without alpha channel I prefer JPG (to get smaller file sizes), especially if I want to get below 20MB limit. All boards backgrounds in my Quadratus HD are JPG files. I use Photoshop too.
Much thanks to everyone with your feedback, It has been helpfull..really. I am experienced in photoshop but I think I am going to work this in illustrator as I am more interested in the possibilities of vectors
I should add to my earlier post that I use Illustrator for iPhone graphics, but I use it to create png images, not for exporting vectors.
One more thing. If you'll work with vectors, you'll be save whenever Apple decides to release Retina Display for the iPad for example Screen resolution will be no problem here, you'll just export to new png's with correct size. The vectors could give you also this "cartoonish/comics" look, much appreciated on the AppStore as I can see.
Demarka..again thanks for your time. I am going for more of a cartoon look as my game idea falls in that realm. It's good to now that I am in the right direct..I see where vectors would support my line work as opposed to the pixels in photoshop. So now its off to Illustrator tutorial land so i can get this project in forward motion.
The visual style is wonderfully retroviral, with extremely simple 3D models on top of a sky without end.
Flash(the program, not the player) is absolutely fantastic for working with graphics, especially for games. I'd recommend it over Illustrator in a heartbeat. Flash handles symbols, sub-symbols, objects with frames(movieclips), vector and raster graphics, bitmap effects, motion tweens, vector shape tweens, and a whole ton of other stuff. It's built for exactly this sort of task, and you can export single pngs and png sequences from it.
I'd definitely recommend Photoshop over Flash for a cartoon look... unless you're seriously talented all Flash illustrations end up looking alike, and it's far from a traditional cartoon style.
Nahhh. A talented artist can make anything look fantastic in any program. When people make things in Photoshop they just look gross 90% of the time because they go over-the-top with layer effects, glows, and drop shadows. If you're doing hardcore illustration you might want to use illustrator do the initial drawings, but using Flash to do the animation is still the best way to go IMHO. Just look at games like RocketBirds to see what can be done in the Flash IDE: http://www.rocketbirds.com/revolution.php As a matter of fact, check out stuff on Kongregate, most of the good games are pretty unique looking. There's definitely an "amateur flash" style that you're talking about in the average games, but if someone isn't good at what they're doing, it'll look amateur no matter what program they use.
I really enjoy Archibald's Adventures, it's more of a puzzle platformer but it's my second favourite platformer in the app store only behind to Soosiz.I'd definitely recommend Photoshop over Flash for a cartoon look unless you're seriously talented all Flash illustrations end up looking alike, and it's far from a traditional cartoon style.
I guess I'll chime in a few things since I do both the graphic and the programming for my games (and I happen to have some design experience). Personally I use both Illustrator and Photoshop heavily. I find Illustrator a little easier for throwing together a basic design with vector graphics, but then I'll pull the results into Photoshop for some effects, color touch ups and slicing. I output everything to PNG. JPEG is worthless since it is lossy and introduces visible artifacts into the graphics. PNG keeps things crisp and offers fairly good compression for a lossless format. It also has an alpha channel which pretty important for games. I've seen some people use TGA as it also has an alpha channel and the format is pretty simple to decode, but that's a bit of a blast from the past from before PNG was around. Another thing to keep in mind... try to work in a size much higher than you need for your game. That way if you ever need to resize (for say the retina display or iPad) then it's a simple resize and export away. I've worked a little in Flash, but not enough to comment there. I would imagine it's nice for animation work.
I love game and apple iphone. Rolando is a combination of plat-forming and puzzle solving game for iPhone. I love its graphics and game look.
