Art Desbreko's Banner Works

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]If you hadn't guessed, this is a thread for displaying banners that I've made. I don't make as many as I used to, but I also think the quality of the ones I have made has risen quite a bit in the last year. I only picked out my best when selecting which ones to put into this thread, and as you can see, only a few are from before 2004.

But a problem I've faced is that I don't really get much feedback on them. Sure, I like them ... but do other people? Most of the time I have no idea. Obviously I don't need others' praises to justify my work (come on people, I'm not [i]that[/i] shallow), but I find constructive criticism helps me improve my work. So that's what I'm looking for in this thread. (Just don't knock me for lack of originality. I enjoy editting more than original creation when it comes to graphics, and I like character-based banners, so that's what I do.) I may not make a lot of banners anymore, but if I'm going to make them at all, I want to make them good.

Also, people can use any of these banners -- with the exception of the one I'm currently using in my signature -- so long as I'm cited.[/color]

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

[b]Hero of Winds[/b] - Zelda: The Wind Waker [size=1][April 19, 2003][/size]
[img]http://img225.echo.cx/img225/8919/heroofwinds0jw.jpg[/img]

[b]Hunter or Hunted?[/b] - Metroid Fusion [size=1][May 30, 2003][/size]
[img]http://img227.echo.cx/img227/8899/hunterorhunted7on.jpg[/img]

[b]Desbreko Spell[/b] - Final Fantasy IV [size=1][July 11, 2003][/size]
[img]http://img225.echo.cx/img225/1807/desbrekospell5jh.gif[/img]

[b]Metroid: Zero Mission[/b] - Metroid: Zero Mission [size=1][February 21, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img225.echo.cx/img225/7973/metroidzeromission4gh.jpg[/img]

[b]Four Swords Adventures[/b] - Zelda: Four Swords Adventures [size=1][March 25, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img8.imageshack.us/img8/5741/ZeldaFourSwordsAdventures.jpg[/img]

[b]Femme Fatale[/b] - Final Fantasy Tactics Advance [size=1][May 8, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img226.echo.cx/img226/3974/femmefatale4yk.jpg[/img]

[b]The Legend Returns[/b] - Zelda for GCN [size=1][May 12, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img8.imageshack.us/img8/5808/TheLegendReturns.jpg[/img]

[b]Get Down Tonight[/b] - Final Fantasy X [size=1][June 8, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/6216/GetDownTonight.jpg[/img]

[b]It's the Subtlety[/b] - F-Zero GX [size=1][July 6, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img55.imageshack.us/img55/7178/ItsTheSubtlety.jpg[/img]

[b]Oh My Goddess![/b] - Ah! My Goddess [size=1][August 21, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img24.exs.cx/img24/4535/OhMyGoddess2.jpg[/img]

[b]Because It's Cute[/b] - Chobits [size=1][September 16, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img26.exs.cx/img26/593/BecauseItsCute.jpg[/img]

[b]Ranma ½[/b] - Ranma ½ [size=1][December 24, 2004][/size]
[img]http://img145.exs.cx/img145/9248/ranma7pr.jpg[/img]

[b]Sasami-chan[/b] - Tenchi Muyo! [size=1][April 29, 2005][/size]
[img]http://img11.echo.cx/img11/2363/sasamichan1fo.jpg[/img]

[b]Harder Than a Rock[/b] - The Slayers [size=1][May 14, 2005][/size]
[img]http://img155.echo.cx/img155/7216/harderthanarock6kx.jpg[/img]

[Stuart]

[SIZE=1]Ah yes I remember some of these and you know what, I liked them then also.

[B]Desbreko Spell :[/B] What can I say? It's a pixel banner, It's funny and somewhat... orginal, lol. There isn't much that could go wrong with this one. The text perhaps could of been different but it looks fine the way it is.

[B]Metroid: Zero Mission : [/B] Oh this is one I remembered right off. I really think this one came out well. Nothing to me seems wrong with it, except for the picture of the "mother brain" (I think that's what you call it) Looks a bit blurry. Perhaps you tried enlarging the orginal picture or the picture was already a tad on the blurry/fuzzy side. Nicely done though.

[B]Four Swords Adventures :[/B] My favorite of the bunch. I love everything about this banner. The color, the texture the fitting of the pictures, They were all done very well. The text on the logo is unreadable, but I don't think that's to important.

[B]Hero of Winds :[/B] Nice picture. The banner is plain compaired to the last two and doesn't have any texture. The text takes up a majority of the space and it just doesn't quite appeal to me.

[B]Femme Fatale :[/B] Cropping is smooth and the background image goes great. The text covers up her eyes and is right in the center. Once again, you used the text as a filler. I suggest not doing that, but to instead add some absract graphics or another image.

[B]The Legend Returns :[/B] Hmm... The picture of Link is good quality but the background picture doesn't seem to go with it. The drawing with the game graphics just doesn't seem to fit when I look at it. The quote is cool but maybe if it was more [I]mysterious[/I] and not so big I would get a cool feeling from it.

[B]Get Down Tonight :[/B] Ha Auron you drunk. Funny indeed but the background, eh. I can see that's it's Auron but it's darkened and just doesn't go along with the quote.

[B]It's the Subtlety : [/B] Getting a little more creative with this one. The green striped background seems a bit plain and looks like it was done in MSpaint. Yet again the text is a little on the BIG side. (hehe sorry I know I'm picky)

[B]Oh My Goddess :[/B] Oh my goodness, lol. Much better job with the texting. I assuming you did text that yourself >_>

[B]Because It's Cute :[/B] Ah! Not so cute. They look evil and poor quality! The text... It's pink... *shudders* (Sorry not much to say about this one xD)

[B]Ranma ½ : [/B] These last banners have pretty much been just one picture cropped out to fit a banner it seems. A perfect explain would be this one. It could use some other Ranma related pictures with it.

[B]Sasami-chan : [/B] This one is the only one out of them with the large text in the center that I find to be cooly-o (Yes, I did just use a nonexistent word right there) The light red shadow around the text is a nice touch and the picture is good quality. The background image is also a plus. Well done.

Phew... Sorry I couldn't say to much about some of the banners, but atleast I posted and I hope this helps you out with future banners. *out of breath. falls out of chair* ^_^;;

Hope to see more fom you.[/SIZE]

[Desbreko]

[quote name='Hack Helba][SIZE=1][B]Get Down Tonight :[/B'] Ha Auron you drunk. Funny indeed but the background, eh. I can see that's it's Auron but it's darkened and just doesn't go along with the quote.[/SIZE][/quote][color=#4B0082]This is one that I need to explain, I guess, as few people seem to fully get it on their own: Look closer at the background and you'll see how it relates to the rest. It's aligned so that the jug of sake that Auron carries is in view. Now, what do you think when you see Auron with his shirt open, a jug of sake, and the text "Get Down Tonight"?

Also, the background was darkened to make the text easily readable; there wasn't nearly enough contrast with the background image at its original brightness. It's the same technique that I used in the Femme Fatale and Sasami-chan banners, only going darker instead of lighter. ... Though maybe I should've kept the jug at its normal brightness while darkening the rest, to make it stand out more.

Oh, and I slipped another banner in at the top of the list. I [i]knew[/i] I was forgetting something when I first posted the thread.[/color]

[DeadSeraphim]

[COLOR=Indigo][SIZE=1][FONT=Arial][quote name='Hack Helba][SIZE=1][B]It's the Subtlety : [/B'] Getting a little more creative with this one. The green striped background seems a bit plain and looks like it was done in MSpaint. Yet again the text is a little on the BIG side. (hehe sorry I know I'm picky)[/SIZE][/quote]
The backstory behind that one is priceless, lol. I think it was like, 3, 4am in the morning (for him) and he's come on and thrown me a link and the lyrics to a song from one of the F-Zero games. I've clicked, read the lyrics... at one point in this song (McCloud theme) it's just gone 'It's the subtletyyyyyy' and I cracked up, and he was too. :p

Also, the Ritz one above it once inspired him to change his entire online gender. Yeah, it was 3am again. XD

In conclusion, Des' banners are awesome.[/FONT][/SIZE][/COLOR]

[Stuart]

[QUOTE=Desbreko][color=#4B0082]This is one that I need to explain, I guess, as few people seem to fully get it on their own: Look closer at the background and you'll see how it relates to the rest. It's aligned so that the jug of sake that Auron carries is in view. Now, what do you think when you see Auron with his shirt open, a jug of sake, and the text "Get Down Tonight"?[/color]

[color=#4B0082]
Though maybe I should've kept the jug at its normal brightness while darkening the rest, to make it stand out more.
.[/color][/QUOTE]

[SIZE=1]Yes, I did see that when looking at it the first time. Maybe if you choose a light background and dark font color it would of stood out also. Yeah, I was just going to say that cropping out the jug and brightening it would appear better, before I read your post throughly. There are a lot of different ways you could of made the jug stand out better. Try playing around with that next time, See what you get.[/size]

[SIZE=1]As for the new Metriod one, I was wondering where that when was when I looked through the banners the first time. This one, like the other Metriod banner is pretty cool, I can't really critize anything about it. Job well done[/SIZE]

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]New banner! I'm watching The Slayers right now, so of course it features my favorite character from the series, Zelgadis. He's a great character; he's calm and cool, always going for what he wants, never liking to waste time, and yes, harder than a rock. (Gotta love AC/DC, by the way; great song.) And plus, he's a badass swordsman [i]and[/i] sorcerer. There's just tons of reasons to love Zel, heh.

Anyway, about the banner itself, it was rather slow in the making. First off, it was hard just finding a decent quality image of Zel with the right sort of look that I wanted for the banner. The background came surprisingly quick after I grabbed an image of -- what else? -- some rocks off Google Image Search and monkeyed with it, using various effects until it looked how I wanted. But the text was the real pain.

In my banners of late, I've grown to like the format of having a single character image combined with text and a background. It makes for a clean, uncluttered look, I think. But the problem I run into a lot is how to make the text stand out from the background nicely without taking too much focus off the character. Ideally, I think the main focus of the banner should be the character, with the text being secondary, and the background being just that -- a background, and hence meant to draw the least attention.

So of course I ran into this problem with Harder Than a Rock. Right off the bat, I knew which font and colors I wanted to use, and the look I was going for (rock-like, obviously). And I achieved that with some success after a while, but the text stood out way more than the image of Zel did. Eventually I ended up playing with the brightness/contrast levels of the text and character image, as well as making the text 15% transparent, to finally get things ending up as they are now.

What do people think, then? I think it turned out pretty good, but I'm not about to rule out the posibility that it could be made better. (I've already gone back and added another effect to the text since first putting the banner in my signature.) Anyone see anything that you think could use tweaking?[/color]

[Pumpkin]

[QUOTE=Desbreko][color=#4B0082]New banner! I'm watching The Slayers right now, so of course it features my favorite character from the series, Zelgadis. He's a great character; he's calm and cool, always going for what he wants, never liking to waste time, and yes, harder than a rock. (Gotta love AC/DC, by the way; great song.) And plus, he's a badass swordsman [i]and[/i] sorcerer. There's just tons of reasons to love Zel, heh.

Anyway, about the banner itself, it was rather slow in the making. First off, it was hard just finding a decent quality image of Zel with the right sort of look that I wanted for the banner. The background came surprisingly quick after I grabbed an image of -- what else? -- some rocks off Google Image Search and monkeyed with it, using various effects until it looked how I wanted. But the text was the real pain.

In my banners of late, I've grown to like the format of having a single character image combined with text and a background. It makes for a clean, uncluttered look, I think. But the problem I run into a lot is how to make the text stand out from the background nicely without taking too much focus off the character. Ideally, I think the main focus of the banner should be the character, with the text being secondary, and the background being just that -- a background, and hence meant to draw the least attention.

So of course I ran into this problem with Harder Than a Rock. Right off the bat, I knew which font and colors I wanted to use, and the look I was going for (rock-like, obviously). And I achieved that with some success after a while, but the text stood out way more than the image of Zel did. Eventually I ended up playing with the brightness/contrast levels of the text and character image, as well as making the text 15% transparent, to finally get things ending up as they are now.

What do people think, then? I think it turned out pretty good, but I'm not about to rule out the posibility that it could be made better. (I've already gone back and added another effect to the text since first putting the banner in my signature.) Anyone see anything that you think could use tweaking?[/color][/QUOTE]

Alright just got to say one thing, I love that picture. He's got that bad *** attitude that makes it seem like he's challenging you to oppose. Very nice since it goes with your saying "Hard as a rock". Also I love Zelgadis too, so I have to say the background matches him perfectly. This is coming from a die-hard slayers fan. The only thing I could ever pick out from this banner that could be possibly wrong is the text. It's pretty dark but then again you said you wanted people to look at the picture which works since, when I first looked at it thats where my eyes first drifted off too. The texture you made that makes it appear rock-like and the font itself is perfect, thats the only thing that I could really pick apart about it. But its not even that big of a deal, to me, its practically perfect.