Pixelation

Critique => Pixel Art => Topic started by: madmenyo on May 10, 2014, 02:37:06 pm

Title: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: madmenyo on May 10, 2014, 02:37:06 pm
So how about it?

(http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h343/pokerchallange/Random/MT3.gif)


-

I got inspired by this thread http://wayofthepixel.net/index.php?PHPSESSID=60ftduua57gv5g5bti6109kod2&topic=14902.0 (http://wayofthepixel.net/index.php?PHPSESSID=60ftduua57gv5g5bti6109kod2&topic=14902.0), i hope i can get a real stylish look to it like he does. I am actually hoping he drops in and gives me some pointers, since he is still active here :D. I am struggling a bit with the shader setup but my difuse needs still needs lots of tweaking too.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: cels on May 10, 2014, 03:10:54 pm
To me, this reads like those sequences in Family Guy, South Park or Futurama where they've used some sort of 3D software to make a complex animation, typically one or more moving vehicles, or a rotating camera, and it just looks... weird. Individually, each frame looks like it's drawn the same way as the rest of the show. I don't know if they do it automatically with a filter or if some degree of manual work is required. But put together, there's a level of smoothness that looks completely artificial.

In this piece, I don't know that your filter is actually that good, though. I don't think you could convince me that every individual frame is pixel art. I don't know if that really matters, because it's hard to notice a few jaggies or banding in such a fast moving animation.

It would be interesting to see if the animation looked less computer-generated if you just reduced the number of frames.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: JoeCreates on May 10, 2014, 03:27:23 pm
Yeah, see how it looks with fewer frames. I'd also suggest shifting the hue a bit in the shading.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: RAV on May 10, 2014, 03:42:10 pm
You will trick no one here into thinking that. But that doesn't change it looks pretty cool. It's not necessary to be called pixel art to be pretty cool. And it can be aesthetically inspired by pixel art, that is thematically related. There is a whole debate about process and result. We don't need open up that can of worms here, it comes down to simply this: if the creation method is so different that a normal pixel artist cannot give you any advice on how to improve your work with common pixel art technique, it is better fit in the LowSpec section. That category is great all on its own and needs no further validation, and we're glad you're sharing your efforts with us.

My comment here is more about the practical merit of discussing it. I see no value in obsessing about definition such as to argue much for or against what is pixel art. There definitely is a wisdom and value in its tradition as guideline to understanding certain skills of art.

Maybe Indigo can give you some more useful tips than that.



Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: madmenyo on May 10, 2014, 03:55:31 pm
I should have know you guys had a sharp eye for that  :-X. I rendered a version with every 5th frame like you asked. The piece definitely has jaggies and the linework is not "hard" enough, it still gets anti aliased. However i am still fiddling with different render options. Guess it is time to move it to low spec, sorry for the inconvenience :blind:.

(http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h343/pokerchallange/Random/MissileTurret2.gif)

-edit-
I actually switched pictures with the first post. Cels made a good point there  ::).
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: cels on May 10, 2014, 04:00:41 pm
That's very interesting. Perhaps you should post the low FPS version in the OP, and keep the high FPS hidden behind a [ spoiler ] tag. That'll remove bias, I think.

Staring at the low FPS version now, I immediately thought it looked fake, but I can't be sure if I'm biased because I know it's fake. ('fake' as in 'not manually drawn', of course)

In regards the the anti-aliasing, people are able to do that just as well as machines. If you limit the number of colours, the main difference between automatic AA and the AA done by a good artist is that the latter is better and follows certain principles, avoiding stuff like jaggies and banding.  The number of colours in itself isn't really the issue either, because there is PA done with 200+ colours, and it still looks like PA, unless it's a hyper-realistic tracing of a photography, for example. So I don't think you need to reduce the number of colours to 8 or remove AA for this to look like pixel art.

I'm glad you posted this here rather than the Low spec forum, otherwise I would never have seen it. It's an interesting discussion, and I would argue it belongs here as much as in any other forum, since the issue is whether or not it looks like pixel art.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: madmenyo on May 10, 2014, 04:08:51 pm
That is what i thought too but after the first 3 comments i realized it looked nothing like pixel art i figured i failed on that point. And like RAV said, nobody here can help me either achieve this as a matter of fact not many people can since this technique is not used often. But if the lower amount of frames really do help i'm fine with this post being in pixel art, at least for improving on the pixel-art(ish) look. For the game i will be using a higher frame rate though, maybe not the original 65 frames but about half sounds good.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: RAV on May 10, 2014, 04:16:48 pm
@Cels
Well, the true issue would be how to make it look like pixel art. However that practice is much more relevant and interesting for LowSpec artists, it is in their practical interest most to find this sort of information where they'd expect it. In terms of usefulness, a classic pixel artist has the least stake in it. That is no complain, just commenting on the question.

@madmenyo
I don't want to discourage your effort in having it look like pixel art, I'm very interested in how well you can get it towards that goal.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: Mr. Fahrenheit on May 10, 2014, 05:20:58 pm
Maybe if it was a less complex motion, because it is rotating and tilting at the same time, which is something that seems fairly complicated for just a person to animate.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: Ymedron on May 10, 2014, 05:40:24 pm
Fahrenheit definitely hit the nail there.
It offsets the advantages of using 3d by having you need to do the animation in a longer way, but I think you need to do the animation in a more labored way to give the impression of hand-pixeled art?
(http://i.imgur.com/vfERWF9.gif)
Really lazy thought with zero inbetweening.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: madmenyo on May 10, 2014, 06:01:54 pm
I understand where you are getting at. However, given infinite time everything is possible. In the end i am going for a smooth and complicated animation. I am making "stills" too later, the looks i want as close to pixel art as possible. I removed the shadow and fiddled with the shader for some artificial shading, i hope this helps too. Rendering a single frame takes a bit over 30 seconds which is an age for an image this small  :o.

Anyway, a smooth and one cut down by 5:
(http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h343/pokerchallange/Random/MT4.gif)

(http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h343/pokerchallange/Random/MT5.gif)

The light highlight is coming from the shader, like in the previous version it just "pops in and out", i am trying to get some sort of smoother transition but i have no clue how. It is popping of from a falloff map linked to viewing direction, so afaik it should be transitioning more smoothly.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: rikfuzz on May 10, 2014, 06:05:04 pm
I edited your first one, so a lot of detail missing.  But rather than cutting down the frames by equal intervals, I picked ones I'd use if I were doing the animation myself by hand and changed the timing to match:
(http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/h343/pokerchallange/Random/MissileTurret2.gif)(https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1534394/MissileTurret2.gif)

Also dropped the colours down to a hand-picked palette. 
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: RAV on May 10, 2014, 06:17:39 pm
Just to clear up why I commented the way I did: this subject is considered a bit "touchy" and by clearing up the frame of discussion preemptively the way I did I hoped to have it avoid the usual "trappings" long-term. Other than that it's not important. Having said that, coming back more on topic: I think this almost ties into our discussion about the Uncanny; some properties of it you might call stylistically pixelart-ish, yet it appears right away to be very calculated and artificial in more than just movement: It is inhumanly uniform in its simple rules of presentation overall. You sense immediately that whoever did this -- the software renderer -- has no own idiosyncratic aesthetic will inscribed in every other detail, that's different than a basic right or wrong, it's about making decisions that are right in different ways. It is hard to explain but easily observable. Though mind you, there also is proper pixel art that is decidedly made so as to look 3d-ish like that.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: madmenyo on May 10, 2014, 06:37:44 pm
@RAV: All is fine. I do not mind if this gets moved or closed because it does not exactly belong in this section, i already predicted that before i posted. I'll see where this gets me. I think i start to understand what you mean with calculated and artificial movement, well i think Rikfuzz nailed it there with a edit. The idiosyncratic has to come from the model, diffuse/color map and final animation which are hand made. The software renderer in this case is the tool to make it look as close as possible to pixel art.

@rikfuzz: Amazing edit, i will try to adopt this in my next posts. I might go for a tad smoother but it really looks great. I am wondering what direction this post would go if i started of with your edit  ;D. What program did you use for that animation if i may ask?

Also, shadow or no shadow?
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: RAV on May 10, 2014, 06:50:58 pm
Ah no, it's not about the section itself, you see, the whole discussion about "what is pixel art", I turned it a question of section for practical advice, without serious concern about section, just so as to save you from... a sort of talk you don't wanna know.. be glad it seems you don't have to. I tell you this as a fellow LowSpec'er in some sense. =p

Yes, your goal is to approximate pixel art the way you describe. However the weird detail decisions that's part of what makes the feel is in the pixel level rendering of the result too, not just assets. That in the end is the wall, the limit of your efforts, where it will stay differentiable. The more you want to break through that wall in a quest of perfect illusion, the more it becomes so much work in post-processing by hand, it puts in question the advantage of this.

But if you are aware of that, you will settle for a level of approximation that is its own recognizable style of pixel art, which appears doable manually if so desired, and efficiently producable the way you do.


Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: jams0988 on May 10, 2014, 11:20:57 pm
It looks nothing like pixel art to me. Just looks like a normal cel-shader...
Are you mixing low-poly 3D models with sprite art for your game? If all of your art assets are going to be 3D models, I honestly think you'd be better off just using normal lighting; low-poly 3D has its own charm, I think, while cel shaded stuff like this just looks sterile. Rikfuzz's edit is a step in the right direction, but it still looks somewhat cheap compared to something hand-drawn, I think.

I'd go simple low-poly, or hand drawn. Unless you're trying to mix this turret in with other pixel art, in which case, you might have no choice. (Besides spending a lot longer making your art assets, hahah! X'D )

The model itself is nice, though. Have you tested it with some normal lighting and simple textures? You could even low-res texture it, if you're going for a retro look. Might look good!
Quote
Maybe if it was a less complex motion, because it is rotating and tilting at the same time, which is something that seems fairly complicated for just a person to animate.
It's a box. If we want to be animators, we should be able to animate literally the simplest shape possible, no matter what it's doing. = =;;
Mind you, I can't, but I suck. There are plenty of animators out there who would have no problem with it, though. :lol:
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: madmenyo on May 11, 2014, 07:18:40 am
It looks nothing like pixel art to me. Just looks like a normal cel-shader...
That is what most basic pixel art looks like isn't it? Looking at your avatar it has a outline and on certain angles (cels) it gets another tint. That is what i have going on, or at least somewhat close especially the linework needs to be sharper. I will work on this if only for experiment and study sake.

Are you mixing low-poly 3D models with sprite art for your game? If all of your art assets are going to be 3D models, I honestly think you'd be better off just using normal lighting; low-poly 3D has its own charm, I think, while cel shaded stuff like this just looks sterile. Rikfuzz's edit is a step in the right direction, but it still looks somewhat cheap compared to something hand-drawn, I think.
I am making this for a 2D isometric game, i do not feel comfortable enough with programming for full blown 3D game with shaders, frustum, 3D camera, etc. So yes it probably get's mixed with 2D unless i decide to make the tiles the same way i did this one. If you look at Indigo attempt (http://danfessler.com/work/luckyspace/ (http://danfessler.com/work/luckyspace/)) it does not look dull at all but sadly his skill level is much higher then mine  :mean:.
I'd go simple low-poly, or hand drawn. Unless you're trying to mix this turret in with other pixel art, in which case, you might have no choice. (Besides spending a lot longer making your art assets, hahah! X'D )

The model itself is nice, though. Have you tested it with some normal lighting and simple textures? You could even low-res texture it, if you're going for a retro look. Might look good!
Thanks, i have done some more complicated 3D art work, the thing is that i am not a good hand painter (i do not take the time to practice enough). Like i said i do not feel comfortable enough with 3D graphics programming so i have to go for 2D and do the artwork myself, atleast for now since 2D art for even a simple game can cost $10.000 easily. I want to do characters like this too, this way i can quickly get them quickly in a pose in 8 directions, even wearing different armor sets will be a cakewalk once i made them. I am just looking for a nice style and indigo inspired me with his work. In the end i might fall back to basic (3D) shading but not full 3D.

Quote
Maybe if it was a less complex motion, because it is rotating and tilting at the same time, which is something that seems fairly complicated for just a person to animate.
It's a box. If we want to be animators, we should be able to animate literally the simplest shape possible, no matter what it's doing. = =;;
Mind you, I can't, but I suck. There are plenty of animators out there who would have no problem with it, though. :lol:

I might have to say that I have control over the diffuse/color map, this however is 2048 x 2048 since I am not using 3D models this does not matter for the performance of the final game. I can still add in a ton of detail but i think i want to go for a "sterile" clean look that basic pixel art has https://www.google.nl/search?q=basic+pixel+art&es_sm=93&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=xCJvU7zdL4b_PMm3gKAE&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=1746&bih=890 (https://www.google.nl/search?q=basic+pixel+art&es_sm=93&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=xCJvU7zdL4b_PMm3gKAE&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=1746&bih=890). However i am still searching and experimenting for a style.

Here is the difuse sized down 2 factors.
(http://i.imgur.com/OSS2ll7.png)
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: cels on May 11, 2014, 08:23:31 am
It looks nothing like pixel art to me. Just looks like a normal cel-shader...
Like madmenyo, I'm very curious to know why you say that. What specifically makes this look "nothing" like pixel art? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm sincerely hoping for an explanation, as extensive as you have time for  :)
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: RAV on May 11, 2014, 08:47:09 am
The magic of what makes pixel art special really happens in the manual raster-rendering. I too think you should take pride in the intrinsic qualities of your work rather than dilute it ever more to simulate a strength that in the end looks like a weakness in the hand of a tool. For this reason, I recommend you go for super smooth animation, much better attainable your way, for the price of sterile rendering. There is nothing appealing about having choppy animation plus sterile rendering. Pixel art has the advantage of artistic rendering, but difficulty of complex animation in high-res. So your way should not aim to create what amounts to a "worse pixel art", but an alternative with pros and cons like the rest. What they have in common thematically is restriction of colour, and maybe certain stylistic features like a sort of outline optionally.



Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: Cyangmou on May 11, 2014, 11:46:35 am
It looks nothing like pixel art to me. Just looks like a normal cel-shader...
Like madmenyo, I'm very curious to know why you say that. What specifically makes this look "nothing" like pixel art? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm sincerely hoping for an explanation, as extensive as you have time for  :)

Just my opinion on the subject why it probably doesn't look like pixel-art.
since pixel art usually is drawn from a white canvas the choices the artist would make in order to effectively render this thing would be kinda different and he won't really end up with the decisions made there

1) it's to soft (you would decide on AA every line, quite an unusual choice)
2) it's really high res and has barely any detail (quite an unusual choice, usually you go smaller and put in some more details to make it more interesting to look at)
3) it emphasizes an mathematical approach of art and is there really on the high-skill end (perspective, shadow construction smoothness) - while other areas like colors, depth emphasizing through careful plane selection, structure, detail are not evident - means the skills showed don't align up properly.
4)animation is to smooth (the animator rather would carefully choose well timed keys and differently placed inbetweens to get the impression of speed and weight across)

I don't think  the smoothness of the animation is the biggest problem, it's just adding up.
Rikfuzz basically nailed it in terms of decision making, he reduced the colors and chose frames an animator who would have to draw all frames by hand would rather choose to draw. So the decisions made there are by far closer to the natural decisons a pixel artist would make.
Although it's still easy to spot that it's "edited prerender" mainly because of artifacts and it still feels to exact in some spots and to sloppy in other ones.

If you ask me it's kinda the same problem, why posterized images don't look like pixel art. If that makes more sense. Lots of reasons which all add up, but individually you can point out all of them. The sum of them causes a completely different impression.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: cels on May 11, 2014, 12:27:17 pm
Thanks for the explanation, Cyangmou. Makes sense to me. Kind of like an uncanny valley of pixel art, I suppose.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: questseeker on May 11, 2014, 12:48:57 pm
3D rendering is unlikely to look more similar to pixel art than this, but it looks obviously not hand-drawn because of wrong shading (the left and right outer edges are mirrored images of each other) and sloppy antialiasing (countless shades of grey, without making a deliberate choice of palette and patterns).
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: RAV on May 11, 2014, 01:01:12 pm
Yeah, the problem is added up mix. And I think that the issue of animation we've been talking about is a mixed bag too. What Rikfuzz did first and foremost is making a better animation, it's not just more pixelartish if you will, it is plain better, it's mechanically "snap-ier", more aggressive, fitting to the character of such a weapon. This improvement is "stylistic", unrelated to technical implementation/smoothness, and only peripheral related to pixel art, a 3d animator would have it just the same by hand, it's just that the pixel artist is forced to be more economical in his considerations to begin with. So the problem would be that as of right now content generation was too automized regardless genre of art. This mixes the kind of problem we are dealing with here, of trying to make it a better art in general, and trying to make it look more like pixel art, but I think it shouldn't try too hard about the latter, especially if the mindset of how to get there is just about how to make things worse, rather than aesthetically economical.



And I think this is where we get to the core of the problem: the quickest way to not look in spirit of pixel art is a sense of wastefulness.
A good pixel artist is an effective artist for an economic expression. But this has everything to do with the skill of the artist at creation, and least to do with some shader option, you see.
The software cannot consider the impact of "emotion" in its allocation of resources, that's what the artist does every step.
Before the art is very good in that principle sense, there is not much sense talking about it in terms of how to make it more like pixel art.
And in the very end then what differentiates this art from pixel art is about the depth of control the artist has in realizing his vision as economically as possible -- down to the pixel of result.
All you can try then in terms of tools is keeping the gap in control small -- but someone has to make good use of it with the mindset of pixel art.
The knowledge required for this is pretty much the sum total of this forum, for a general appliance technique this is too much for one thread to cover.
We'll barely make do one asset at a time. It's really not about coming up with that one super solution that auto-solves it all forever, not some overlay filter that turns anything into pixel art.



But here's the thing: avoiding wastefulness is not about making things as simplified as possible, it is about not having more than required; but different visions require different resources -- all the detail is intentional.

That's what I find so strange about most 3d interpretations of pixel art, the assumption of being as simplified as possible in every aspect to be synonym to pixel art aesthetic. But when you look at the standard of professional quality pixel art, it's highly detailed with intricate structure and texture. Just that this detail is perfectly implemented, in a pinnacle of intentionality.

It's almost a paradoxon, on one hand LowSpec 3d art is considered a kindred to PixelArt in terms of minimalist spirit in creation, on the other hand I'd say its biggest problem in terms of visual impact of result really is it's too simplified than required to capture the soul of what many good pixel art shows, which enables naturally more complex visuals than 3d was able to do for the longest time.

Personally, the closer I get to it in my own 3d interpretation of it, I end up with many ten thousand polygons and very high res detail texture, and my tech is about having it not bog down despite. And yet I find it looks more akin to pixel art than ever. But that might be because the very process of creation is closer to it from the get to go, it is about fully integrating the classic pixel artists, not replacing them in favour of a processing that supports 3d artists posing as pixel artists. Being like pixel art really is about the art and the artist first and foremost.



Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: jams0988 on May 12, 2014, 02:33:46 am
Quote
Like madmenyo, I'm very curious to know why you say that. What specifically makes this look "nothing" like pixel art? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm sincerely hoping for an explanation, as extensive as you have time for  :)
I was going to reply, but Cyangmou and RAV have summed up my feelings more eloquently than I could have without spending two hours thinking out my post, hahah.
Quote
That is what most basic pixel art looks like isn't it? Looking at your avatar it has a outline and on certain angles (cels) it gets another tint. That is what i have going on, or at least somewhat close especially the linework needs to be sharper. I will work on this if only for experiment and study sake.
No, mine is obviously hand-drawn art, while yours is obviously computer-rendered. Cyangmou and RAV explained why already, though. The example you posted looks much closer to the pixel art aesthetic (though it still looks like 3D CG), because it appears to be using pixel-art textures, while your coloring is very flat, hence my cel-shading comment. Again, I'd try just using normal low-res textures on your art, and see how that turns out. Paint your textures as pixel art, and apply them to your models. I think the results will look much better. =)
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: Indigo on May 12, 2014, 05:50:52 am
Just saw this thread.  Totally awesome to see some Lucky Space inspired art.  And im impressed you were able to replicate the process as far as you did.  It definitely wasn't a simple pipeline, and I didn't describe it in too much detail in my original thread.

I don't have too much time to discuss this at the moment, but I wanted to give a little context to the goals I had when making the art pipeline for Lucky Space...

for context: Screenshot 1 (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13350050/Junk/LS_luckyspace0.png),  Screenshot 2 (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13350050/Junk/LS_luckyspace1.png)

It was never my intention to make people believe this was pixel art, but rather it was the other way around.  We wanted to apply the principals of pixel art for a 2D game using a 3D renderer.  This was a natural progression from another isometric project we had just finished that used actual pixel art called Lucky Train (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13350050/Junk/LT_screenshot.png).  That project was interesting in that we were pretty much the only ones doing the pixel-isometric look with such a strong focus on anti-aliasing.  In large part this was a style we shifted towards when we hired Monsoon2D (http://monsoon2d.com/) onto the team.  Monsoon just had this super slick way of doing it.  Ironically, due to that focus on AA, not many people recognized our game as pixel art - especially in contrast to popular isometric games like hobbo hotel.  If you were making an isometric game with pixel art, that was THE style.  We were breaking that rule.  Lots of players complimented us on the graphics, but not one mention of "pixel art" that I recall.

So when we began working on Lucky Space we did a lot of R&D as to how we'd approach it.  We already knew from experience that hand-pixeling isometric animations - especially rotating ones like the trains - was an extremely time consuming process.  Just look at this sprite sheet (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13350050/Junk/steampunk_engine.png) and tell me you didn't shit you pants.  We developed some ways of speeding up that process like pixeling over rough 3D renders (http://danfessler.com/work/luckytrain//train_tp%28temp%29_anim1.gif), but all of that AA and animation was done by hand.  And we knew that Space would need a heck of a lot more animation than that.  Every building was going to be animated.  We knew we didn't want that crude isometric pixel style that everyone was doing, and we also know that we didn't want hyper-realistic 3D renders either.

So what we decided to do was develop a render shader in 3DS Max which simulates the style we had developed on Lucky Train, and render out all our assets.  Not only did this jive with our "brand" we developed, but allowed us to do all the crazy animations that we wanted (https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/13350050/LuckySpace/dropshipSWF/ShipDrop.html).  It also kept the clarity to our assets that usually only pixel art provides.  But keep in mind, we were a team of 2D artists.  We painted our textures specifically keeping in mind how the line thicknesses would translate into pixels in the end render.  We constantly were refreshing the render to check.  We were essentially making a lot of the same decisions we would make as pixel artists, but we were doing it in 3d space.  Even the shader itself was perfected over many weeks to get the exact result we wanted.  For example, the outlines weren't a solid color, but rather a darkened version of the colors it surrounded exactly like we did with Train.  Our lighting setup was done with a layered composite map rather than just using scene lights so we could maintain consistent control over the 2D image.  Nearly every decision we made when crafting Lucky Space were 2D decisions, not 3D.  We learned 3DS max on-the-job to accomplish our goals

The result was a game that felt much in line with our company brand - an attention to detail at the pixel level - but with a much more broad depth.  Like I said, we never set out to fake pixel art, we set out to achieve the benefits of pixel art in 3D.  And to that end I think we succeeded.
Title: Re: Could i trick you saying this is pixel art?
Post by: RAV on May 12, 2014, 08:07:08 pm
Yes you did. It's a very good mindset, it looks pretty damn cool, and that's a fact. People can call it whatever. It's a worthwhile direction to pursue in any case. It profits from pixel art skill.

Since this topic is rather close to my interest, I have some more general comments on the issue of "looking like pixel art".
This is not meant to discourage any other kind of effort in that direction, just my thoughts about the difficulties of it, to take into account.

You can have things like cross-stitching -- an entirely different matter of medium altogether -- to which people say it "looks like" pixel art, and you can have two pictures side by side on the very same computer screen, yet one of them does not look like pixel art -- although literally made of pixels -- because you do not recognize the same creative logic of medium in it.

It seems a common approach in interpreting pixel art is to employ the most popular stylistic choices of it. Like, make chibi characters, give them outline, flat lighting -> now it looks like pixel art, merely because that's the style many famous pixel art games employ. But this "looks like" really is very different in meaning than the first. It's sort of a "psychological trick". That's not to say it's bad. It may be finicky in whether the impression works out, depending on how important "being like pixel art" is considered to the atmosphere.

Pixel art can be realistic or comic, few details or high detail, all kinds of lighting, proportions, perspectives, super smooth or very rough, simple or complex, cute or "mature", clean or "dirty", all kinds of content depicted. Any and all of it can be amazing in its own right, and although it's all so different, it's all readily identifiable as pixel art -- even if it's bad pixel art! -- because none of this really defines pixel art, it's just a choice within, and what ties it all together is about something else, the obvious logic of creation, the less obvious the process is recognizable in the result, the less likely people recognize it as pixel art, and the more obvious, it gets very flexible what people call pixel art. That's why I emphasize so much the process instead of result. At that point, even despite after-effects, aa, "bleeding", all these cardinal sins or quirks or fads, or mode of view, or platform, or whatever, it still stays recognizable throughout as pixel art -- its very nature very resilient. If the process is obviously different, every littlest thing that's "off" in the result will quickly make it appear uncanny as pixel art, or simply not identifiable as such at all. (However this is a different discussion from "short-cuts" or "helpers" or "little dirty cheats" along the otherwise same workflow, which in the hand of a pixel art expert doesn't take away from looking like it in the end.)