Thanks for the comments...
What tools did I use?
To quote myself from the Outer Court forum, where the same was asked...
http://outer-court.com/php/comments/index.php?section=design
I use different techniques for different drawings. The smaller ones are usually done in Paint Shop Pro 4, using a Wacom Tablet with Lightpen (as opposed to simply a mouse). For the character portraits I go through magazines for reference.
Any magazine will do, like a movie magazine, with the photo of an actor. (E.g. when I want to draw a warrior I would look for a strong, masculine face, and use it as reference.)
Then, I start to black-and-white sketch using about 8 times the final size. After black-and-white I colorize using different shadings. Then, I resample to the final size, and do whatever minor correction still needed. Starting out with a greater size than the final with later resampling helps increase the level of detail, and thus the quality, of the resulting image. It does not work good for very small images, e.g. 16*16, or for complete body portraits of 32*32. It does work better on e.g. sizes of 128 pixels.
BTW, the newer versions of Paint Shop Pro, or other programs like Corel PhotoPaint or Adobe PhotoShop, don't do the job as good as PSP4. It's very simple and easy to use, and helps for small-scale, precise, and straightforward pixel-painting.
And as for the armors, I got some books from the library of medieval clothing, weapons and armory, and worked from that as reference.
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