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365 days of pixel art

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Re: 365 days of pixel art

#21
post #20

Great project! I'd like to tell to everyone who want to start drawing pixel art, I built a very simple tool to get started with this technique: http://drawbang.com . Try it, give me your feedback, and share your pixel art masterpieces!

Er, why can I move right or up but not left or down?

Re: 365 days of pixel art

#23

Could you sum up your personal feelings of games using pixel art over a more cartoony vector art? Personally I felt that Paper Mario was a lot easier on the eyes than more traditional pixel art games. BTW moonman looks totally amazing.

Scott McCloud talks about it a bit in Understanding Comics when he talks about the "universality" of cartoony imagery: http://www.kylechipman.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/u...

When it comes to certain kinds of art experiences I think too much fidelity gets in the way of the expressive power of the medium.

As an indie or hobbyist game dev it is way easier to create pixel art assets than higher resolution assets... never mind 3d. That's really powerful when combined with the universality component.

Sword and Sworcery, Fez, Moonman, vvvvvv, Corrypt ... lots of great pixel art goodness out there right now.

Re: 365 days of pixel art

#24

I've always wanted to do pixel art, but somehow things don't seem "right" when I try. What are some good tips for an amateur pixel-artist? And also, what are some resources you would recommend? I really want create something but always feel stuck

Are you good at sketching with pencil and paper? If not, I recommend dropping pixel art for a few weeks, picking up a good book by Betty Edwards or Andrew Loomis (both can be found as pdfs online), and filling a couple sketchbooks. To make good pixel art, or any other kind of art really, first you must learn to see shapes in a particular way that's not intuitive for non-artists. It's a bit hard to explain in words, b…

This might be oversimplifying it, but I think there are basically two kinds of people - maybe not people, but dispositions? states? Anyway - those who see/process/comprehend images in terms of shapes, and those who see/process/comprehend images in terms of light and shadow. Not that you can't be artistic with one approach vs another, but when it comes to what is ostensibly drawing or sketching, especially with a constrained economy of space ala pixel art, it's very important to work in light & shadow rather than shapes to impart something identifiable. For example, I sketch terribly. But if I force myself to do pointillism (no strokes, only dots), I can't help but work in terms of light/shadow. My "pointillist" sketches are 1000x better than my unconstrained sketches. I haven't had much luck with Drawing On The Right Side Of The Brain yet though. :/

Re: 365 days of pixel art

#25
Saving the page doesn't save all the images. How annoying. I guess I'll get called a pirate or a content thief.

You can't even right click and use save as. I don't understand what sort of html or javascript is doing this, but I see it often. I tried using the page info panel and select all the picture and clicked save as, but it downloaded many blank files.

EDIT:

it was caused by the :large and :small. removed them, created a html file, saved as, done.

Re: 365 days of pixel art

#26

Could you sum up your personal feelings of games using pixel art over a more cartoony vector art? Personally I felt that Paper Mario was a lot easier on the eyes than more traditional pixel art games. BTW moonman looks totally amazing.

I can't define it. I love it. And I have no words better than that. I don't know if it's nostalgia of the 8bit era I grew up in. I don't think so. It's a blend of sensations. Legos also bring that feeling. The geometric simplicity, yet complex combinations. Maybe the low-resolution asking your mind to fill in the details subconsciously. Like visual incarnation of words. It goes beyond the instantaneous perception.

I really like pixel art, but good vectorised games (masterpiece sample would be Another World) can have lots of charm and much better animations

Re: 365 days of pixel art

#27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't define it. I love it. And I have no words better than that. I don't know if it's nostalgia of the 8bit era I grew up in. I don't think so. It's a blend of sensations. Legos also bring that feeling. The geometric simplicity, yet complex combinations. Maybe the low-resolution asking your mind to fill in the details subconsciously. Like visual incarnation of words. It goes beyond the instantaneous perception.

I really like pixel art, but good vectorised games (masterpiece sample would be Another World) can have lots of charm and much better animations

Ha, these games fall in between don't you think ? or maybe I'm biased by my love with flashback (Another World cousin), AW was almost entirely flat, while flashback had pixel art elements. But still they share that minimalism found in pixel art (low res, low details, impressionism).

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8vSAxF44FvU/Trk8AnyBdPI/AAAAAAAAKY...

http://www.anotherworld.fr/images/another_world/AW_arrivee_1...

ps: I love reading about AW making of http://www.anotherworld.fr/anotherworld_uk/page_realisation....

Re: 365 days of pixel art

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really like pixel art, but good vectorised games (masterpiece sample would be Another World) can have lots of charm and much better animations

Ha, these games fall in between don't you think ? or maybe I'm biased by my love with flashback (Another World cousin), AW was almost entirely flat, while flashback had pixel art elements. But still they share that minimalism found in pixel art (low res, low details, impressionism). http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8vSAxF44FvU/Trk8AnyBdPI/AAAAAAAAKY... http://www.anotherworld.fr/images/another_world/AW_arrivee_1... ps: I lo…

Yup, also read that. I guess you'd love reading (if not already) the making of Prince of Persia and /or Karateka

Re: 365 days of pixel art

#30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha, these games fall in between don't you think ? or maybe I'm biased by my love with flashback (Another World cousin), AW was almost entirely flat, while flashback had pixel art elements. But still they share that minimalism found in pixel art (low res, low details, impressionism). http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-8vSAxF44FvU/Trk8AnyBdPI/AAAAAAAAKY... http://www.anotherworld.fr/images/another_world/AW_arrivee_1... ps: I lo…

Yup, also read that. I guess you'd love reading (if not already) the making of Prince of Persia and /or Karateka

For a reason I never cared about these technically. Will do.
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