clyde

What's so special about pixel art?

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Pixel art has so much baggage for me. It's hard for me to see it without the context of retro games. Cross-stitch may be the answer.

I was hoping that y'all could tell me or point me in the right direction so that I could start to understand the inherent aesthetics of pixel-art. There is something to it more than nostalgia.

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Hm! I'm a big fan of pixel art, but I actually get more nostalgic for SNES style graphics. Does that count as a kind of pixel art?

 

Dungeon of the Endless is a really beautiful game, IMO, and I think they have a more traditional pixel art style:

http://pixelartus.com/post/111581563036/dungeon-of-the-endless

http://i.imgur.com/F8ntOoq.png

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/eb/56/ec/eb56ec6cc8a38c4fca932d69c47c973f.jpg

http://www.nerd-age.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Dungeon-of-the-Endless-Monsters-Behind-the-Door.jpg

 

I don't think it's 100% pixel art though - like the floors and walls are a little more textured.

 

I find that I enjoy the "modern-retro" interpretations of pixel art more than the actual stuff from the 90s or whenever. I don't know how to describe it, but it kind of piques my imagination. That third link to a character close-up, for example. It's kinda messy, but it also makes me think "What are those lines? Oh look, that blue thing is a shield! And maybe this is armor, and there's a little sash..." It's exciting for me to look at detailed pixel art and discover how much detail could be put into a tiny space.

 

Dungeon of the Endless also pairs their pixel art graphics with an extra "journal" full of non-pixel art entries that you can collect: http://operationrainfall.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/dungeon-of-the-endless-album.png I think this is cool, too, because then I can look at more traditional renderings of the characters and compare them to their pixel art renditions to learn more about them.

 

I found this interpretation to be interesting, though I don't really understand it. It's a bit more on the high art side of things: http://arcadesushi.com/the-new-aesthetic-and-8-bit-nostalgia/

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Personally what appeals to me is just the abstraction of everything, you're not giving everything thing tons of detail like in a modern game where everything is super high-poly so you end up filling in more of it in your head.  That doesn't have to be pixel art though, I mean I guess the HD version of Another World wouldn't be considered pixel art, but it's still super simple.  I don't play that many modern games that have pixel art, Superbrothers Sword & Sorcery EP is one of the few things that comes to mind (and I think it looks super good).  I've looked at Titan Souls though and I think the pixel art works really well in it.  Another thing that doesn't necessarily have to do with pixel art, but is a big part of the pixel art games I do like is having a simplified/constrained color palette.  That's another thing that really makes Superbrothers appeal to me.  Those gifs of Dungeon of the Endless aren't really my cup of tea for that same reason.

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I found this interpretation to be interesting, though I don't really understand it. It's a bit more on the high art side of things: http://arcadesushi.com/the-new-aesthetic-and-8-bit-nostalgia/

 

Personally, I'm most interested in reading about the high art side of things in reference to pixel art. I'd also be interested in finding a technical manual of some sort that describes tricks that pixel art uses and provides convincing arguments about what makes those tricks attractive. Anything that references some pop-psychoigy or real psychology might give me explanations I can get down with. 

 

I find that I enjoy the "modern-retro" interpretations of pixel art more than the actual stuff from the 90s or whenever. I don't know how to describe it, but it kind of piques my imagination. That third link to a character close-up, for example. It's kinda messy, but it also makes me think "What are those lines? Oh look, that blue thing is a shield! And maybe this is armor, and there's a little sash..." It's exciting for me to look at detailed pixel art and discover how much detail could be put into a tiny space.

 

This is a good example of what I'm looking for, now I can look at pixel art and ask myself "What in this picture is ambigious due to the large resolution?" and "How are they using that tiny amount of space?" 

 

By the way, these are the examples by @Cellusious that are making me interested in the decision to use pixel art.

 

 

pic.twitter.com/OcdARjcg8b

— Olav (@Cellusious) May 2, 2015

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I have much to say about this when it's not 4am, and will likely be an arrogant twat who uses my own work as an example, but it's about abstraction, minimalistic representation and extreme detail. Some stuff I've worked in can take many hours of meticulous pixel placing where I can control every dot of the whole picture. The sheer control while still being able to make a surprisingly organic picture is why I'm drawn to it so much.

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I have much to say about this when it's not 4am, and will likely be an arrogant twat who uses my own work as an example, but it's about abstraction, minimalistic representation and extreme detail. Some stuff I've worked in can take many hours of meticulous pixel placing where I can control every dot of the whole picture. The sheer control while still being able to make a surprisingly organic picture is why I'm drawn to it so much.

 

I'd say this is pretty true. Then, there is also something attractive about using a medium that has a built in structural matrix to it. The grid that underlies all of your work gives you something to 'work against', meaning to go along with or to subvert in order to generate tension. It has a lot in common with the warp and weft in weaving. I think it's probably similar to the grain in wood carving too. Look at these images by the weaver Ethel Stein and note the similarity to some pixel art:

 

MARTIN_GAILMARTINGALLERY_STEIN_Red_and_Y

 

48es.Ethel%20Stein.jpg

Cht5287a.jpg

 

tumblr_n7fdycOfY21s6h2wzo10_1280.jpg

 

 

There are also superficial similarities to pointillist painting, but from what I've seen, pixel art doesn't really use optical color mixing and instead tends to use relatively simple color palettes. This is probably a result of old technical limitations.

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I like it 'cause it looks cool.

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Is there something cheap that is better for making animated pixel art than Gimp?

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Yes

 

I don't know what it is but I can guarantee you it's better than Gimp.

 

I've heard Graphics Gail and PaintTool SAI are good? I don't know if there's a much better one.

 

As for the original question, I'd ask what's so special about surrealism.

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Ok, here's the bigger non 4am post where I reference a bunch of my own stuff. (that's more because I know what I was thinking as I made them, not because I think these are great works or anything).

 

First, this animated gif:

531285_wk6x6mbivvun43kqcf7quidfm.gif

I did make this first by sketching on paper and then tracing it into a pixel art form. The reason I think it's valuable as pixel art is that it can be so small and still clearly recognisable. The shoulder strap for his bag is rarely more than 10-20 pixels per frame but it still stands out as readable. I think the tiny little gif has real charm from the simple readable nature of it (though obviously that's also to do with the character design and the animation). I much prefer the exacting meticulous nature of tracing this and turning my rough and messy pencil sketches into a clear and direct form. The ledge that the character catches onto is not totally consistent in the pages but in these tracings it's an exact inert surface that makes it felt much more clearly.

 

 

Then this picture

post-34425-0-14219600-1430661869_thumb.png

which I spent a serious length of time working on for a commission thing. I really enjoyed that I could go through a long process of building the basic structure and then build on new details to refine and make it look nicer. If i had more time I would've added textures and roughness to the overly clean surfaces (especially on the roof) but with pixel art I can do that very easily and cleanly. Plenty of art can be iterative and build on a base, but with pixel art you can both do it in a 100% clean manner where it's never destructive while also meticulously detailing out exactly what I want point by point. In media like painting I'd need to be skilled about how I hold the brush and how I control it.

 

Also there probably is a better program but I just use GIMP cause I really like it and it works fine even if it's not totally optimised for it.

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Ok, here's the bigger non 4am post where I reference a bunch of my own stuff. (that's more because I know what I was thinking as I made them, not because I think these are great works or anything).

 

First, this animated gif:

531285_wk6x6mbivvun43kqcf7quidfm.gif

I did make this first by sketching on paper and then tracing it into a pixel art form. The reason I think it's valuable as pixel art is that it can be so small and still clearly recognisable. The shoulder strap for his bag is rarely more than 10-20 pixels per frame but it still stands out as readable. I think the tiny little gif has real charm from the simple readable nature of it (though obviously that's also to do with the character design and the animation). I much prefer the exacting meticulous nature of tracing this and turning my rough and messy pencil sketches into a clear and direct form. The ledge that the character catches onto is not totally consistent in the pages but in these tracings it's an exact inert surface that makes it felt much more clearly.

 

 

Then this picture

which I spent a serious length of time working on for a commission thing. I really enjoyed that I could go through a long process of building the basic structure and then build on new details to refine and make it look nicer. If i had more time I would've added textures and roughness to the overly clean surfaces (especially on the roof) but with pixel art I can do that very easily and cleanly. Plenty of art can be iterative and build on a base, but with pixel art you can both do it in a 100% clean manner where it's never destructive while also meticulously detailing out exactly what I want point by point. In media like painting I'd need to be skilled about how I hold the brush and how I control it.

 

Also there probably is a better program but I just use GIMP cause I really like it and it works fine even if it's not totally optimised for it.

Your bias is showing :P! Seriously though, I like it... I take it the mall is spread over many, many layers.

 

 

That's lovely, SuperBiasedMan. I really like the shop frontage.

 

This caught my eye on the twitters yesterday

 

https://twitter.com/ThomasShahan/status/593637520560128000/photo/1

That looks fantastic! Apologies for my Monday morning brain, but seeing this reminds me of one of my favourite lessons in photography: a good sign of a compelling image is that it is still interesting from far away. In other words, the large scale features and composition are often as important as the fine detail, if not more so.  Pixel art can be very good at describing the larger scale features, even when it is very primitive. Added fine details are a bonus.

 

Back in the old days, pixel art was at the cutting edge of what games were capable of; similarly, today's smaller studios might only be able to express their game via pixel art due to lack of resources. But at its best, it is a clear design choice to ignore realism. The result can be as pure and clean and vivid as the artist desires, without having to worry too much about subtle variations that would bother people looking for a more realistic image; the artist can chose the rules they want to follow.

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That's lovely, SuperBiasedMan. I really like the shop frontage.

 

This caught my eye on the twitters yesterday

 

https://twitter.com/ThomasShahan/status/593637520560128000/photo/1

 

Thanks! The shop stuff was surprisingly un time consuming  I looove that picture you linked. Especially when I first saw it on my phone it looked so much more solid as a scaled down image.

 

Your bias is showing :P! Seriously though, I like it... I take it the mall is spread over many, many layers.

 

My bias is a blatant one. Also a bit but actually not as many as you'd think, a lot of the stuff was on relatively few layers because I mostly work on just one for the picture and then a couple more for certain occasional details and shading/highlights. I probably work terribly inefficiently but I enjoy it.

 

EDIT: Just saw this posted too now.

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I spent years working on a pretty large eBoy-esque hyper-detailed isometric pixel cityscape with a bunch of buildings and cars and trees, all with correct shadows and reflections and it was so much work, and then I lost it, just like that. I can still recall the painstaking process of adding a rooftop ventilation duct to one of the buildings and then going over the shadow to make sure it projected correctly across a bunch of cars and stuff.

 

As for pixel art, I have a deep love for it, and it's very much rooted in video games, in particular VGA graphic adventures, very specifically the Lucasfilm/LucasArts Indiana Jones adventure games (and if I had to pick just one, Fate of Atlantis). I can look at these, for example, literally forever. I'm filled with a sense of wonder and amazement that I'm assuming comes from, as a young human, exploring these huge, beautiful games and their hundreds of bespoke VGA art assets.

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Largely I think there's plenty of truth in that article. I think the lesson is a bit mislearned though. It's the job of the artist to communicate with an appropriate style but exactly how you present the pixel art makes a big difference. It's not that pixel art ubiquitously signals one thing, it depends highly on how you use and stylise it.

 

A non mobile platform definitely does better with this stuff because of people's expectations. But I do think that you could make a pixel art mobile game work well, it's just hard. And that is generally true of pixel art, it's harder than it really ought to be since you're taking that degree of exact control over work.

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There's no way of presenting pixel art that won't make a significant number of people assume it's just being retro because retro is cool. I believe the previous statement with all of my soul.

 

The question is whether or not that matters to you. And unfortunately for a lot of people, it matters purely for financial reasons.

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