Pixel Art?! Why not Call it Rather a Grid Art

[Lunarovich]

Hello! I just wrote an article trying to explain why "pixel art" should be rather named and understood as grid art. It offers a screen technology independent (= pixel independent) definition  of our art.

Here is the link to the article: http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/DarkoDraskovic/20140609/219022/Pixel_Art_Why_not_Call_it_Rather_a_Grid_Art.php

[Ryumaru]

Why seek a screen technology independent definition when many pixel art techniques ( AA, dithering, selective outlining) are influenced or decided upon by the nature of screens? I've always disliked the analogy between pixel art and textile art, as representation of form in pixel art is so different from the imperfect, natural, and physical realm. It's like trying to contain digital and traditional painting together.

It seems you're trying to lump in the "problem" of pixel art being linked to nostalgia and how it effects an audience, with it's naming. Calling it grid art won't take any stigma away from the medium in viewers' eyes. Pixel art has no future in terms of evolving as an art form, because it is a segment in the larger lifespan of digital art as a whole. Of course beautiful, aesthetically pleasing, and to a certain extent, unique things will always be possible within it- but there is no " moving forward".

[PixelPiledriver]

It's an entertaining article.
I think you should add images to the article to help illustrate some of your points and ideas.
As a side note, Japanese people call it dot-art I think.

[RAV]

It is quite behind contemporary discussion on that matter. From my point of view even this new model of thought is old and obsolete. Then there are a bunch of descriptive details of definition I'd be nit-picky about, for example pixel art is much closer to the general notion of manual raster-rendering, than having to look blocky by minimum cell size -- if this is supposed to be a redefinition instead of its own genre, then you are excluding too many an existing art. Altogether, on a journalistic level, it is not well enough investigated, interviewed or cited. However, that the strategy of pixel art should be understood screen independent is an agreeable opinion that is currently reviewed a lot. That pixel art behaves a bit differently in different media, with preferences or accentuation of techniques, is no argument against it: painting also behaves situationally, yet it is understood that the basic line of thought -- or thought of line -- translates across means, and specializations sprout from a common root. But even within pixel tech itself, the screens have changed drastically, and with it how the art is gone about. That old pixel art relied a lot on taking into account colour-bleeding, scanlines, etc, and today's not, doesn't make pixel art for CRTs not pixel art. And that thought doesn't stop there.

I would only call something Grid Art, if the visualization of the grid lining itself is the most significant element of how the artwork communicates. Otherwise it is just a secondary property of the medium for an optional helper on creation. Altogether, this redefinition is going from smoke to smother, in that it tends to fixate on ephemeral qualities of a medium. As a funny historical anecdote, early computers visualized their images only mechanically, eventually refined into printing images on paper; the same computational logic, yet again with its very distinct qualities of output. If you are hipster enough, it is conceivable, although hilariously impractical, to build a computer screen device that is an auto-cross-stitching machine.

[Carnivac]

Cos 'grid art' doesn't sound like it has anything to do with computers and 'pixel art' clearly does.   Even people not that into computers in general likely know what pixel refers to.

[Lunarovich]

Hello! Thank you on your feedback.



@Ryumaru
I don't think that pixel art techniques such as AA, dithering, selective outlining depend on the pixel. Rather, they depend on the grid like structure of the rasterized image. You can do the same techniques in the non-digital forms of art, such as pointilism or tapestry.



@PixelPiledriver
Thanks for the info on "dot art". It reminds of an art of post-impressionist poinitilism paintings.



@RAV
Thank you on your comment. First of all, could you please be kind and refer me to some of "contemporary discussion" that you mention. I would appreciate very much links to some articles. Again, I am not aware that the screen indepdency of pixel art "is currently reviewed a lot". Can you please point me to some sources - links to articles, etc.

As to the fact that "pixel art is much closer to the general notion of manual raster-rendering, than having to look blocky by minimum cell size", I absolutely agree with you. I have never said that pixel art must look blocky. In fact, a contemporary pixel art does not, for the most of the time, and consciously tries not to look blocky, using techniques such as AA. The blockiness is indeed one of the possible pixel art styles. In fact, the only thing I was holding to was the size of the minimal square blotch of paint, that is, its naked eye visibility.

I agree that "specializations sprout from a common root" and that "within pixel tech itself, the screens have changed drastically, and with it how the art is gone about." That is exactly why I think it is necessary to have a screen technology independent definition of pixel art. To be able to include all genres of pixel art inside a common definition and to pinpoint "a common root" of all pixel art.

It is true that "the visualization of the grid lining itself" is not present in pixel art. However, that does not reduce the grid to "an optional helper on creation". Every minimal square of paint must be aligned exactly to the grid - there is nothing optional about it. This necessity makes a grid an underlining structure of every pixel art work. And foundational structure cannot be "a secondary property of the medium".

That said, it seams to me that the a non-optional naked eye visibility of the grid cell and foundational/structural role of grid cannot be taken as "ephemeral qualities of a medium". However, if you have some less ephemeral definitions, I would be very glad to hear them.

[Pix3M]

@Ryumaru
I don't think that pixel art techniques such as AA, dithering, selective outlining depend on the pixel. Rather, they depend on the grid like structure of the rasterized image. You can do the same techniques in the non-digital forms of art, such as pointilism or tapestry.

I think he meant that those techniques were used differently back when we had CRT screens. CRT screen pixels are arranged on a hexagonal (or triangular?) grid, and on game consoles, the console has to convert the screen into an analog signal. Often, both hexagonal pixels and the TV signal conversion came together and pixel art, back then, was blurry.

I have an example from The Adventures of Lomax. First pic is taken directly from Henk Nieborg's site, and the second one is a picture taken from my LCD TV screen... This is the effect of converting a picture into an analog singal:

Spoiler

[RAV]

Well, public perception on the word plays no small role. There's another angle on how to look at it: the word that's most significant to understanding and developing your own technology or art is what you may call it. If calling it grid art helps you accomplish something real yourself, and describes best the nature of what you do and what it is about, then call it what you need to succeed. Personally, the driving force behind my project is a word different from pixel or grid. And yet, as a natural epiphenomenon, you may recognize any of these concepts in the result just as well. Some things go together, but if I have to make a choice which of them to pick for a name, I'd pick one over the other of what you picked. Does the grid follow from the properties of the pixel, or does the pixel follow from the properties of the grid? When an artist works on the medium, his primary concern is manipulating the properties of the pixel, in colour. Grid art suggests that he'd be primarily concerned about manipulating the properties of the grid, in geometry. Grid art then would be about suggesting images by morphing gridlines / moving cross-section-points as primary means of expression. This word then is actually much closer to 3d art mesh modeling. I have been working on and discussing this problem of screen independent notions of pixel art in-depth with pixel artists for the past two years, mostly in the chatterbox on PixelJoint. My own work is based on the notion of virtual screens. We've also been talking about it historically, pre-computer era. The tendency has been to expand the meaning of pixel, beyond one single specification, instead of getting rid of the namesake. My own choice of word for abstracting it cross-media even further is my understanding of Cluster Art, a certain logic of flexible grid follows from that and is observable, as a side-effect from the primary mode of thinking.

[Lunarovich]

I agree on the fact that "public perception on the word plays no small role". I personally am not sure which name is better. Please think of my article as a proposition to be discussed.

Moreover, that is a general purpose of every article: to propose something to be discussed and not to state it dogmatically. I am sad that you have not published your chats. Maybe I would have written a different article. That said, a chat is not an article, nor a discussion, for that matter. The crucial difference is that an article is a published and structured train of thought which states something and proves some point (or at least tries to), while the chat is unpublished freeflow thought exchange (important in its own right). I have personally discussed many things over chat with many people. However, I cannot call it for that reason "a contemporary discussion". It has to be published, structured and known by the community in order to name it a "contemporary discussion". Again, a chat between likely minded people or friends does not qualify as a "contemporary discussion". Again, I am sad that you cannot point me to online articles, or at least forum posts, which exhibit contemporary discussions and contemporary pixel art definitions. I have written my text precisely because I did not found any on internet. I was motivated by the lack of theory on pixel art. And I wanted to open a discussion like this one.

"Does the grid follow from the properties of the pixel, or does the pixel follow from the properties of the grid?" Well, the pixel is simply a picture element. The name does not state nor imply that the picture element hast to visible to the naked eye or to be a perfect colored square that fits a grid cell. That is why I think "pixel" is not a sufficient word to describe pixel art. However, I agree on the fact that the idea of cell/field is logically connected to and even equivalent to the idea of grid. Simply put, one implies the other. So, I could have said also, let's call it a cell art. However, pixel is not a same thing as a grid cell. Pixel does not imply grid.

I agree that "grid art suggests that he'd [artist] be primarily concerned about manipulating the properties of the grid, in geometry." That is why I opened this discussion: in order to be englihtened about the deficiences of concepts I propose. And this indeed is a deficience of the name I propose. Still, it is less imprecise than "pixel". What is more, grid, in my opinion, suggests certain rigidity and regularity, and two-dimensionality, unlike, for example, the word mesh, which describes perfectly 3D geometry.

"The tendency has been to expand the meaning of pixel, beyond one single specification, instead of getting rid of the namesake". That is exactly what I am trying to do with my article. I will repeat, for me, a "pixel" in pixel art is a square of paint which has to be visible to the naked eye and has to fit the rigid, regular 2d grid cell perfectly. Than again, I would be indebted to you if you could point me to some less ephemeral than chatterbox internet resources for the pixel redefinition.

[RAV]

I think it would have been proper preparations to seek discussion with experts of their trade first, most here already know of the problem, before writing an article on a major news outlet about it. The situation is messy, it's not that I disagree fundamentally on every detail of what you say as such, but I think it's not wisely applied overall; concentrating on this view does not help me best in my own work of figuring out next gen tools for pixel and voxel art. Speaking of which, I need to work on more now, over all that time I have put too much concern into explaining myself on this issue. You are in your right to remain convinced of your proposal as you laid out; certainly it's not unreasonable, especially not if it just works for you, and it may for others as well.