I was using Ckiss alot when I first started out because I wanted to make very colourful dolls, but didn't have the patience/knowhow to plan out a palette beforehand. I didn't make use of the variable transparency channels available to Ckiss so I can't say I've exploited the potentials of the Ckiss medium. If you do plan on making Ckiss dolls, check out some of Mian's later dolls or Shin's dolls which use Ckiss. Their use of variable transparency to achieve unique visual effects such as a translucent robe or smoke and fog really add to the impact of the doll.
Remember that Ckiss dolls tend to be 3 times larger in size than a palletted doll with the same cel count. Chances are, you can achieve very colourful dolls with smooth shading using a 256 colout palette if you plan out the palette before hand. Recent dolls such as Jade Gordon's Rick Crammer doll is a good example. Before Dov Sherman's Silicon Sue, many single 256 palette dolls effectively used less than 100 unique colours, but the current batch of dolls often use a very comprehensive set of colours to achieve that smooth "Ckiss" look, with the help of limited dithering.
In the end, its pretty much up to your personal preference whether or not to use Ckiss, but if you are already familiar with making paletted dolls, I would suggest that you stick to them, but spend a little time developing a versatile palette (eg one that contains say 16 shades of each hue) that you can use for all your future dolls. Using the colour editor function of PlayFKiss to check out what colours schemes were used in very colourful dolls (like Silicon Sue) and note their RGB values to help you build your own pre-defined 256 colour palette.
Hope this helps. What's important is that you have fun making that doll of yours.
Ruthless
Posted on Mar 23, 2002, 5:48 AM from IP address 203.134.26.93