making swords
 

Does anyone have any tips on making swords more interesting? Because all i can come up with is a basic sword like this, and maybe a bit more interesting outlines, but how to make the shading and detail more interesting? because my shading and detail usually looks bad.

Whenever I make swords or any other design (Car designs, any moving opject)
I'm thinking of the purpose...but whatever you make, the thing that matters is that it looks organic and aerodynamic, speed matters, and power matters so something inbetween.
If you're saying that your shading looks bad, then you should do shading studies and lightsource studies first before making an actual orbject :)
Interesting outlines is just a secondary fact.

thanks for the advice!

so is this any better?

looks nice

No.

You know why.
Try to come up with an own aerodynamic concept.

wuts aerodynamic

If I used that shape for a Frisbee, would it fly?

You want a sword's edge(s) to be as simple and smooth as possible. A serrated edge is one thing, but jutting corners and lots of curves isn't going to do much aside from slow down the swing speed and make awkward to handle.

Also, points on the flat side, which I'm assuming isn't a (functional) blade due to the sheer stupidness of it +lack of hand guard, are completely useless, and do nothing but add more weight, making it even more awkward to use.

anything "flies" if you throw it hard enough, working on a more original design elk.

refer to edit

yeah i agree with you on everything you state there, but this is a game, so it doesn't have to be realistic,( yeah it would be nice if it might also be a bit realistic, but we also have magic and lazers and stuff on some servers), and people,(atleast i do) also want some eye candy, so fancy stuff, so a fancy sword, that wouldn't make any sense but does look areadynamic would also be nice i guess.

Aerodynamicness is an eyecandy as you get confronted with it in real life all the time.

I agree with this, an awkward and illogical sword isn't as appealing as something that could actually exist and be used with ease.

It's actual a sociocultural factor that does this effect. If you were born in a game, then I understand your point of view!

something like this maybe, not very interesting and awesome perhaps but... still! xD

Galdor wins this thread

omg did you edit that out of my sword? Awesome!

Thanks, i think i see what i've been doing wrong, i wanted stuff to look too complicated, which made it harder so shade, and which also didn't really look better. So i should just focus more on my shading techniques.

edit:
Just made this one. Is this an improvement?

I'm sure Cloud's buster sword is totally aerodynamic.

that's got alot of weight + sharp edges, and if you have massive strenght like cloud you can cut through almost anything. Because a sword also needs some weight to hit something fiercely

edit: man diagonals can be a pain. Not really satisfied with them yet.

Your diagonals look fine tho, maybe just re-do the bottom golden ball yourself, doesn't quite look round ^^

It might be smoother to portray shapes in the sword like so:
Attachment 49093
However, I don't think this is a widely used method, so it might be hit or miss. I prefer it, however, as even though it doesn't do such a good job at strongly showing the shape of the blade, it does so smoothly. However, since Graal supports 24bit PNG's, you could always AA with alpha blending nowadays :)

Well im not very good at AA and it's a bit blurry right now, but you would mean like this, but then on transparent background so it will blend with any background?
right ones are the originals

I'm sure his hair is too

XD

http://home.graffiti.net/chrischi4u/libswordbla.png

Angelu, it looks sick, except where you made the top of that sword seeing all the little pixels forming the top of the sword makes the outline look strange.

bored+need practice.

Yeah, looks better without the black outline fo sho'

i dont like weapons without black lines in graal because the player has an outline too

if someone knows a better blade shape ;)

http://home.graffiti.net/chrischi4u/libswordtemp.png