".

Made it for a Metroid-esque series of shooty guns. Also, if anyone could direct me to a better program to use than MS Paint for spriting, it would be much appreciated.

What are you trying to make there?

Sketch a design out first on paper so you have a more solid idea of what you want to do. I usually start like that, then I move onto the outline, then I color it in, then I do the shading / detail / etc.

Here's something of mine you can look at for a reference, it's kinda futuristic.

Damn, that be a mighty purty sprite thar. I know what I WANT to make, but I've no clue how I'd go about doing it. I merged a shotgun stock and rifle barrel with some SMG bits and creative editing to come up with the monstrosity above. Fill it in black to see what I had for an outline...

What I have in mind is - Grayscale body with blue/orange vents, shade from dark to light, left to right. Add metal prong thingies and a makeshift scope/sight. Done.

Take some time looking at CC sprites, they are made differently than most 2D sprites style wise. Another thing to do would be to work with a few resprites, as in, taking some of the default sprites and practicing shading / details / and such on an already existing sprite.

If I make a new sprite weapon soon I'll post how I start then move up through the processes that go into finishing it.
---
The sprite I'm posting with this is one of my new sprites, took me all day to make because its 10 frames long.

I'm lovin' the big lazor. Thanks though, I'll see what I can do with the AK or maybe the shotgun.

The sprite is too bright. It's almost white. That's what sucks on the sprite.

It looks like a prettier, less über version of my shitty 'MegaBlaster', the dead mod.

Here we go. This be better, methinks.



NEW:



I think this is the best I'm going to get with MS Paint's crippled limited selection of tools and colors.
Alternatively I could just spend my whole damn life looking for the right shade, but I got other stuff to do. Might end up buying Photoshop after all.

Don't make the outline so thick, and work on the detail and design of the gun.
Also, I made a new gun sprite but I forgot to record the beginning process, so I'll start something new to show you.



Take a look at the outline of this gun.

Wanna fight?



Revolver sprited by me, bring to life thanks to areku, still want to
make the biggest revolver on cc?

(I've designed it to mechs and very armored troops, but areku has nuts and sacrifice the arms
of this poor astronaut to finish a crobotech guy)

Anyway, yours its very nice!

Try Gimp, its free

Keep using MSPaint.
Make sure to Zoom in.
Use the pencil tool.
Make the outline lighter than black. (still dark though)
On the color swatch, double click a color to open up an editing screen. You use this to shade and use unique colors.

haha, thats very epic.
I'm not so great at coding / lua yet but I'm confident in my spriting abilities ;P

Hey, don't bother, you can allways think even being a novice, you're better that naXx at coding
and I recomend Photoshop for reliability, almost infinite options and easy 8-bit translate.

I use the gimp, but I also have photoshop and flash. For sprite work, I'd recommend the gimp because of its simplified form and for its 'free'-ness.

again, the current version has no outline, you need to figure out a design and draw that up, the outline is important in CC sprites.

edit:
I take that back, it does have an outline, its just very very subtle. I suggest darkening that up in spots underneath the gun and lightening or keeping the same shade on top