Game I/O

Game I/0 - W3

Pixel Art

Presentation adapted from this forum post, visit the link to get more detailed information

What is Pixel Art?

If the pixel art loses the sense of the importance of the pixels which construct it, then I don’t think it can be called pixel art. It is when the pixels hold importance to the nature of the work which defines it as pixelart. - Alex HW

Not all digital art is pixel art

Artist has to be in control of the image at the level of the single pixel
Every pixel should be purposefully placed
Automatic tools to blur, blend, smear the pixels are generally not used

Changing a few pixels can have a dramatic effect on the image

pixel parrot

Terms to know

Anti-aliasing

Making jagged edges look smooth anti-aliasing

Dithering

Transitioning between two colors without adding new colors to the palette dithering

Tiling

Useful for creating large areas of texture
Single image gets repeated
Make sure edges line up with eachother (There are tools for this)

Things to avoid

Bad Anti-aliasing

much aa

Too Much AA

little aa

Too little AA

just right

Jaggies

Jagged lines when pixels look out of place
Solution can be to use anti-aliasing

jaggies

Bad dithering

Too much dithering can create unwanted texture

dithering

Banding

Pixels that line up create ‘bands’
They reveal the pixel grid and lower the apparent resolution

banding_1 banding_2

banding_3 banding_4

Pillow-shading

Shading by surrounding a central area with increasingly darker bands
Pays no attention to the light source
Fix by taking into account the direction of the light

pillow shading

Creating a palette

Color palette: The collection of colors used in your image

Color count

Better to have a lower color count

Cohesion:

When you’re using less colors, the same colors will reappear throughout the piece more frequently, thus tying the piece together, unifying the work.

Control:

The smaller the palette, the easier it is to manage. You may, and probably will, want to adjust a color later on. Which will change its relationship between itself and its neighbors. With a smaller palette, the effect of changing a single color is more substantial, and there are less relationships to worry about.