Path Looking for some path advice!

[Shydragon]

I'm looking for some advice on how to improve my paths!

Main path:

I'm pretty satisfied with how the stone bricks look, but I'd like some advice on how to improve the starry patterns in the middle! Currently, they're just solid colors with some dots, and I'd like them to look a bit more detailed and maybe blend together better. There are six colors in total.

Streams:

These I'm not really satisfied with at all. I'd like some ideas for streams with the same basic concept of stars in the water, but I think it needs to be completely redone. There would be a vertical stream, horizontal stream, and four corners.

 

[Barbara]

For the stars, I think it might be a good idea to blend the background colour into black at the edges. That way, all patterns will smoothly connect. Maybe it's an idea to add different colours for the stars and perhaps add purple strikes in the background as galaxies, if done right that could look really good.
I don't really have advice for your waterway, sorry. Good luck!

 

[Miqui]

Yes.

INCOMING BLOCK OF TEXT AND LINKS.

[Every image I link belongs to their respective owner, I'm not claiming anything.
ANYTHING I SAY.
Also, you'll have to forgive the fact that some of the water images were screenshotted from my phone,
so if they say Tumblr or something at the top, you'll know where I was looking...]

I agree! I love the way the star stone bricks look.

I also agree with Barbara, blending will help with the smoothness from block to block. As for the galaxy idea: Here's a purple/pink sample. Or, if you prefer different colors: Here's a red/blue. But this is assuming you can make it look agreeable in pixel form.

THIS is probably the end form you're looking for, of course in a more block shape. Here's a more pixelated form. And here's a more simple blending.

Considering the fact that you're probably just copying the same block over and over, changing the color as needed, you might want to look into altering the stars slightly in each block so that it doesn't look so copy-and-pasted. But that's if you're willing to put for the effort.

On the other hand, I prefer the blocks in different colors, so you can see the difference in colors, i.e. no shading connecting them, like you have now, but that's my opinion. And in that case, you'd still could mess with the stars and/or backgrounds while still maintaining an overall color in each block that separates it from the next. (Having one block a much darker/lighter shade then the another.)

Here are some galaxy ACNL for an examples: [x] [x]

I've seen these galaxy paths a couple of times while searching around:
[x] [x]

Here are some ways to blend,
(Dithering is another word to use instead of blending.) :
[1] [2] [3] [4]

As for the water:
I tried to make my own water also, so I did a bit of “research” on the subject.
There are different kinds of water to make, depending on how good you can manipulate pixels.

Simplest
Some games do this, just a simple water color, and then put shading around the edges where it would hit the ground.
Gives a more cartoonish look.
Simple
This is pretty much just a plain background, or simple shading with lines on the top layer to represent the shine of the water.
Simple-Medium
Medium
This is the more common water seen, it has the oval-ish shapes of shine and shades underneath it.
Another Medium
Again, shine from the light, shades underneath.
Rather hard.
I couldn't even manage to reproduce this kind of water…
Another hard
I do love the shading on these, they look so pretty to me.

Here's a guide for how to do the “simplest” type of water:
[x]
Here's a guide for how to do the “medium” type of water:
[x]

This is my favorite.
I absolutely loved the dark colors, and this is the one I tried to mimic for my town.
What I did was picked 3 or 4 colors, (sorry, typing this from memory) and did vertical stripes like this:
(Color 1 = [1] And so on, you get the point.)
[1] [2] [2] [3] [3] [4] [4] [3] [3] [2] [2] [1]
Used this as my simple background then did:
[1] [2] [1] [2]
[1] [1] [2] [2]
[1] [2] [1] [2]
[1] [1] [2] [2]
As my shading. Added some lines on the top to show the shine, didn't use any shadows, since the background was a much darker color, and that was it. Added a stone outline too. Overall, I liked it, but I didn't really try any of the other water designs myself.

(Yay for trying to type out patterns since I reeeeeeeally didn't want to upload stuff. I'M LAZY DAMMIT.)

As for the stars on the water.
Once you get the water how you like it, the stars really shouldn't be that big of an issue. I wouldn't put too many, or you'll make the water look too crowded, and I wouldn't make them too big, or you miss the water effect. Something small, and bright, so that it stands out.

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And… Um… I think that's about it. Any questions? Comments? Happy slogans? Eh?​

 

[dino]

agree with the above advice that adding depth and shadowing, making more use of gradients would add to this already AMAZING path set.

for real, i love this so incredibly much. i think it looks awesome and beautiful. there's never enough spacey paths i think. do you have a d.a./will have one when the paths are updated ! i would love to see these in action :")

also i agree that lowering the amount of stars in the water and increasing the depth of them too would help !

best of luck !