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Artist's commentary
Freedom Planet 2 Main Characters Design Explained
HD Arts Version 1
In late 2015, the first version of the new character sprites are ready. I then created some HD arts based on the sprites. We had ideas of assigning elemental powers to the main characters, which is reflected in the picture above.
As mention before, 2012 – 2022 was my low period as an artist. But 2015 was probably when I hit the rock bottom. The team was also inexperienced, as they wanted the HD arts to have exactly the same colors, proportions and details as the pixel art version, and they didn’t want any eyebrows. These requirements would later be proved to be unsuitable for the type of art I was creating.
I intensely disliked the outcome of the Version 1 HD arts. They were the manifestation of every bad art trait that I tried to avoid in later years. I still see the above pictures as the lowest point of my career, and I rather not show them to others without context.
On the bright side, I learned from them what I don’t want in my art. So it was a valuable lesson, nontheless.