Block out a base skull to build your head. The lighter region represents skin real estate, the slightly darker shade represents a base hairline.

• First, look at the proportions of this beautifully drawn model of mine, (not as beautiful as me of course) Isnt it most spectacular? In any case, notice how the face usually plots about 12 or so pixels tall, give or take a pixel here and there for the hairline variations. Above that, you can count another 6 pixels just for the base of the head. Of course there are some outrageous do's that blow this 6 pixel count away, but its a nice number to guestimate where the scalp will end and where the hair should begin.

Block in your facial features to ensure you have the proper anatomy illustrated.

• Next we can measure out what features fall where with some simple horizontal rules. As youre drawing your face chances are youre not going to throw these white lines down, theyre used merely as a visual guide. Notice how the top of the ear lines up with the brow, the eye falls in the center of the ear (in horizontal terms), the bottom of the ear and bottom nose line up nicely, and the mouth splits the area between the bottom of the nose and the chin in half... which is almost always 2 pixels in a normally shaped face.

Block out how youd like to style your character's hair. Remember, this has a huge influence on your characters personality, it should be a step that is carefully planned.

• Awesome, Green hair! mine looks waaay better, -_-... In any case, the hair can be a bit frustrating for many pixellers, so why not just throw it all in as 1 color? The shape of the hair is very important and is one of the most defining features of the face. Also in this step, I took the liberty to flesh in the nose a bit. This was done by taking slightly darker skin tone colors and shading in the areas between the bridge of the nose and the actual eyes. Notice that no nose structure has been actually drawn or outlined, but rather suggested. Might as well lighten that mouthline while we are at it.

Begin forming your hair volume and face with some shadows. Your previous base tones will then serve as highlights to form the high points of your faces terrain. If there is not enough contrast in your shades, such as in this present example, simply adjust your tones along the way.

• Now lets start some basic shading. First with the hair. It is customary for alot of street fighter/SNK style fighters to have only 2 or 3 shades of color in their hair at maximum. The highlights are often very saturated with color and are seldom outlined in those areas. To try to mimic that style slightly, we will follow suit and not outline the areas where the highlights meet the background. Now lets start to form the face. Shadows are often cast down over a character with either the second or third lightest skin tone, depending on the drastic hairstyle, down to the bottom of the eye sockets, where the cheeks are then highlighted down to the chin. The facial structure of your character is as varied as your imagination, but know that most arcade sprites simulate this method of shading. Theres no one to stop you from making the eye sockets an even darker shade to make the eyes look set into the head, or highlight the forehead above the browline. This is where your artistic creativity will play a major role in the facial structure of your character. Also, if you didnt notice, the ear is no longer a half of a heart shaped blob. Its been formed so that the inner most part of the ear, touching the face, has been darkened to create the illusion of a hole, so that the rest of the ear bevels around that shadow that you have created, ultimately giving you ear ridges. Make sure to pull the hairline just a tad, at a minimum, so that you can remove that dark line separating the ear from the rest of the face.

If you so desire, add a higlight color to your hair to give it a bit more depth. Make sure that if you make strands or clumps in your hair, to keep the contrast to a minimum to keep a smooth appearance. Begin to antialais facial features to gradually suggest them. There are no outlines within the perimiter to define any single facial feature. The only exception to this may be your brow, depending on how dark you wish the brows/pupils to appear.

• Okay, now its time to get dirty. Lets blow up that head just a little larger to see whats going on here. Basically, from here on out its a game of Anti-Alaising. Notice in the hair I've added another highlight color to make the top of the hair pop nicely in contrast to the hair behind the ears. Also, more individualized strands have been suggested to give it more body and style, adding to the depth of the hair visually, and the personality of your character. Note that you get best results if the lines dividing your hair is only one shade darker than the highlight color you are trying to separate. Anything darker and the change would be too dramatic, in most circumstances. Ive darkened the skin tones a bit to make the shades a bit more visible (and hence, brightening the relative appearance of the highlights), and started to Anti-alais where the skin meets the perimiter outline. The browline has also been softened with a similar effect, and the pupil was also lightened slightly. Notice how the whites of the eye is merely the lightest skin tone, NOT pure white.

Add on whatever details suit your character. If youve got any last changes to make with your palettes, this is a good time to do so. Any additional structures at this stage should only be cosmetic, and shouldn't affect the overall bone structure or hairstyle significantly.

• Finally, weve come to the last step of finalization. This is where you tweak the face and add whatever accessories, features, scars, extra shadow castings, etc. I added a slightly darker shadow under the eye to give him a meaner, mysterious look. He was looking pretty wussy before if i may say so myself. Add a little warpaint on his face, E. Honda style, and voila! we have ourselves a real badass! For those of you wondering what that little jagged edge is to his left, thats the size of... eh.. hehehe you know how the old saying goes... Actually, its just to demonstrate what kindof smoothing effect can result from just a touch of Anti-Alaising, and a slight demonstration of how its done. Of course I cant be buggered to show you how to do "AA", thats surely the job of another professor! This lesson is over, now get out.