Rainbow Dash pixel art (Minecraft)

[Tol'Satha 163]

Hello everypony!

 

So, I've been bored lately (which is quite obvious by the amount of effort i put into this thread), and felt the need to draw/make something. Since my drawing skills are terribad, i went for a giant Rainbow Dash pixel art in minecraft, and finished it today.

 

Its made of exactly 50,168 blocks of wool, and took me around a week to finish (around 15+/- hours of actual worktime).

 

very big pics

 

 

 

This is the reference i used in 1:1 ratio (1 pixel = 1 block)

 

And this is what it looks like ingame. Note: minecraft can only display 8 by 8 chunks (256x256 field), so part of the tail is not shown.

 

 

 

I first built it standing up, then when i realised it doesnt fit (height limitation at Y=256, forgot about it), i flipped it down with McEdit.

 

 

After it was flipped down and top part completed:

 

 

Bad lighting by minecraft so heres a screenshot from McEdit (yellow shown as light blue for some reason):

 

 

 

 

Also, here is the McEdit .schematic file if anyone wants this:

http://www.mediafire...6ogcfq2zs1hfk1k

 

Do you like it, should i make more (which pony?), any noticable mistakes that need fixing?

Edited September 7, 2012 by Tol'Satha

[FunkiiPanda 199]

That is incredible, how long did that take to create? the biggest pixel art I have done is of Vinyl Scratch and I think that was about200x200 blocks which took me about 2 hours

Edited September 7, 2012 by ThatBlueChicken

[Tol'Satha 163]

That is incredible, how long did that take to create? the biggest pixel art I have done is of Vinyl Scratch and I think that was about200x200 blocks which took me about 2 hours

 

It took me about a week (few hours every day, im lazy) mostly because i am inexperienced at making these. Half the time spent i was trying to figure out why the ingame coordinates and reference image werent matching up (turned out to be some stupid settings in the image editor).

[Pix3M 607]

You did not manually place every pixel. There are a bunch of jagged lines, and there's single-pixel noise in the cutie mark. The inconsistent line thicknesses of the outline of the cutie mark clearly suggests that you scaled the image with nearest-neighbor interpolation to try to make the image at a more suitable size. I cannot imagine why a human being would decide to do any of these, so I'm inclined to think that you got some computer to attempt to convert the reference picture into pixel art. It's like tracing, except even lazier.

 

At least be honest, okay? I don't like seeing people lower the quality of images already in existence call their work 'pixel art'. =/

 

If it's useful, here's the sort of smoothness a real human being can achieve. This is a very quick and dirty edit. There are going to be mistakes, but it's far smoother than careless scaling with nearest neighbor interpolation.

 

 

If you ever wanna go deeper into pixel art, it's always helpful to pay attention to the placement of every pixel to make something appear as refined as you want it to be. Also, a friendly warning... you still need to be able to draw to make great pixel art.

Edited September 7, 2012 by Pix3M

[Tol'Satha 163]

You did not manually place every pixel. There are a bunch of jagged lines, and there's single-pixel noise in the cutie mark. The inconsistent line thicknesses of the outline of the cutie mark clearly suggests that you scaled the image with nearest-neighbor interpolation to try to make the image at a more suitable size. I cannot imagine why a human being would decide to do any of these, so I'm inclined to think that you got some computer to attempt to convert the reference picture into pixel art. It's like tracing, except even lazier.

 

At least be honest, okay? I don't like seeing people lower the quality of images already in existence call their work 'pixel art'. =/

 

If it's useful, here's the sort of smoothness a real human being can achieve. This is a very quick and dirty edit. There are going to be mistakes, but it's far smoother than careless scaling with nearest neighbor interpolation.

 

 

If you ever wanna go deeper into pixel art, it's always helpful to pay attention to the placement of every pixel to make something appear as refined as you want it to be. Also, a friendly warning... you still need to be able to draw to make great pixel art.

 

I think you completely misunderstood what i said. I took the reference image, zoomed in as far as i could, and rebuilt it pixel to block manually in minecraft. That green picture is a top-down screenshot in McEdit of the map with the pixel art. By "pixel art", i dont mean the screenshot, i mean the 50 thousand manually placed blocks in minecraft.

[Pix3M 607]

I think you completely misunderstood what i said. I took the reference image, zoomed in as far as i could, and rebuilt it pixel to block manually in minecraft. That green picture is a top-down screenshot in McEdit of the map with the pixel art. By "pixel art", i dont mean the screenshot, i mean the 50 thousand manually placed blocks in minecraft.

 

 

Gaah, I jumped immediately to the McEdit as it's difficult to see the actual pixel art from a screenshot of a 3D game. Sorry. All I saw was the single-pixel noise in the cutie mark and the misplaced pixels in the front of RD's front leg and saw it in the McEdit, and thought the McEdit was the exact copy.

 

Even then, putting aside the McEdit screenshot, I still doubt you actually spent 15 hours on this. How did you build the entire thing in the second screenshot (manually too) just to decide "oh, I think it's too big." Did you really go through all this trouble?

[Midnightive 458]

Thats so cool! I don't see anything wrong with it though... not sure why lol!

 

I wonder why the mcEdit didn't pick up the yellow? silly Mc edit

 

also... make ALL the mane 6! and maybe spike if thats not to much trouble >.> <.< X3

[Tol'Satha 163]

 

Gaah, I jumped immediately to the McEdit as it's difficult to see the actual pixel art from a screenshot of a 3D game. Sorry. All I saw was the single-pixel noise in the cutie mark and the misplaced pixels in the front of RD's front leg and saw it in the McEdit, and thought the McEdit was the exact copy.

 

Even then, putting aside the McEdit screenshot, I still doubt you actually spent 15 hours on this. How did you build the entire thing in the second screenshot (manually too) just to decide "oh, I think it's too big." Did you really go through all this trouble?

 

Im not sure exactly what you mean, but the second screenshot is identical to the first, just from a different angle (you can see the npc village in the lower left on the first screenshot).

The jagged lines are simply due to minecraft limitations, and the single black pixel in the cutiemark was actually my fault, because i was doing it line by line from bottom to top without looking or thinking about the entire picture, and the lines were too thin so i judged them to be white (minecraft has a very limited color pallete, so making edges is mostly based on deciding where the colors A and B split, you cant fade it like in the reference)

 

Also, i built it from bottom to top, and when i reached the maximum building height allowed by minecraft (265) i couldnt build up and had to roll it over in McEdit to continue the work.

[Pix3M 607]

Im not sure exactly what you mean, but the second screenshot is identical to the first, just from a different angle (you can see the npc village in the lower left on the first screenshot).

 

The jagged lines are simply due to minecraft limitations, and the single black pixel in the cutiemark was actually my fault, because i was doing it line by line from bottom to top without looking or thinking about the entire picture, and the lines were too thin so i judged them to be white (minecraft has a very limited color pallete, so making edges is mostly based on deciding where the colors A and B split, you cant fade it like in the reference)

 

Also, i built it from bottom to top, and when i reached the maximum building height allowed by minecraft (265) i couldnt build up and had to roll it over in McEdit to continue the work.

 

In the context of aliased lines like what we have, what you do instead is pay attention to the lengths of your line segments. Paying attention to what the curve actually looks like is something you gotta be able to do before you begin trying to manually antialias with your pixel art anyways. Let's look at RD's front leg again. From the top, it starts with line segments that are most about 1 or 2 pixels long before the line jumps on to the next column to convey an angled line. As you go to the bottom you get a really long segment that's suddenly interrupted by a very short segment only two pixels large, then it jumps back to start curving the other direction. Those two pixels create a jag. Two possible solutions could be either removing them, or making them much longer. Am I explaining this clearly enough? =/

Edited September 7, 2012 by Pix3M

[aperture_tech 56]

Very nice! I would love to make my own pixel art, but I am not very creative. One time I tried in minecraft, but I got bored after like three blocks. You must have a lot of dedication.

[Miss Light Diamond 2,802]

That is SO AWESOME. I stink at pixel art I am better at building...building's and castle's and such. How long have you been doing pixel art ?

[Tol'Satha 163]

In the context of aliased lines like what we have, what you do instead is pay attention to the lengths of your line segments. Paying attention to what the curve actually looks like is something you gotta be able to do before you begin trying to manually antialias with your pixel art anyways. Let's look at RD's front leg again. From the top, it starts with line segments that are most about 1 or 2 pixels long before the line jumps on to the next column to convey an angled line. As you go to the bottom you get a really long segment that's suddenly interrupted by a very short segment only two pixels large, then it jumps back to start curving the other direction. Those two pixels create a jag. Two possible solutions could be either removing them, or making them much longer. Am I explaining this clearly enough? =/

 

I see what you mean. Now that i look at it, it does look quite awkward. As i said in my reply to ThatBlueChicken: "...mostly because i am inexperienced at making these."

 

Anyways, fixed the leg and the cutiemark, heres another ss from McEdit. Tell me if you see any other major defects.

 

 

As for legitimacy, i guess ill just have to record and upload a video doing the whole thing next time... Preety stupid, but it seems to be the only way to avoid this...

 

also... make ALL the mane 6! and maybe spike if thats not to much trouble >.> <.< X3

 

Hahah, thats gonna take a while, but why not?

 

 

Very nice! I would love to make my own pixel art, but I am not very creative. One time I tried in minecraft, but I got bored after like three blocks. You must have a lot of dedication.

 

Not really, im actually VERY lazy and give up very quickly. Something like this could have been completed in a single afternoon. Instead, i stretched it over a week. Not much dedication there

 

 

That is SO AWESOME. I stink at pixel art I am better at building...building's and castle's and such. How long have you been doing pixel art ?

 

Thanks, and im very inexperienced at pixel art. Be it minecraft or any other form. I've done a few really small pictures in the past, this is the biggest project I've worked on so far.

[Pix3M 607]

I see what you mean. Now that i look at it, it does look quite awkward. As i said in my reply to ThatBlueChicken: "...mostly because i am inexperienced at making these."

 

Anyways, fixed the leg and the cutiemark, heres another ss from McEdit. Tell me if you see any other major defects.

Anything other 'defects' are gonna be minor or not an issue at all, especially to everyday people who are probably not gonna be the biggest art critics ever. There isn't much to critique to begin with as it's basically a really simple piece done in a game where your color choices are so limited that you can't even begin to try out any antialiasing. The only other thing is to try to make sure those line segments change at a more consistent rate to achieve smoother lines (i.e. instead of going from 2-3-2-2-3-3-4-6-5-7, it could go 2-2-2-3-3-3-4-5-6-7)

 

As for legitimacy, i guess ill just have to record and upload a video doing the whole thing next time... Preety stupid, but it seems to be the only way to avoid this...

I think another alternative is to try creating original stuff so people can't doubt that you made it if they have never seen it before. Stuff like this looks so show-accurate there's a chance that somebody like me will wonder if they used programs to cheese through the process.

 

Speaking of show-accuracy, you're never going to make the most out of pixel art by sticking with show-accuracy without second thought.

 

If you're working smaller scale, you cannot unthinkingly borrow colors used by the show or you'll get really bad contrast and boring colors (see how my avatar uses a grayish-blue outline to make her pop out. You're also not going to have show-accurate proportions as you're confined to a grid (try drawing a 8x8 chess board on a 12x12 canvas, lolol)

 

If you're working larger scale, pixel art starts becoming silly to use as you're likely better off doing vector art for something show-accurate.

Edited September 7, 2012 by Pix3M

[Lost Profile 644]

OMG that is BIG!!!

 

like they say... the bigger the better...

 

is this on PlanetMinecraft? if it was... i bet it will get SOOOOO many diamonds!

[Tol'Satha 163]

 

I think another alternative is to try creating original stuff so people can't doubt that you made it if they have never seen it before. Stuff like this looks so show-accurate there's a chance that somebody like me will wonder if they used programs to cheese through the process.

 

Speaking of show-accuracy, you're never going to make the most out of pixel art by sticking with show-accuracy without second thought.

 

If you're working smaller scale, you cannot unthinkingly borrow colors used by the show or you'll get really bad contrast and boring colors (see how my avatar uses a grayish-blue outline to make her pop out. You're also not going to have show-accurate proportions as you're confined to a grid (try drawing a 8x8 chess board on a 12x12 canvas, lolol)

 

If you're working larger scale, pixel art starts becoming silly to use as you're likely better off doing vector art for something show-accurate.

 

http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcFWdVLLh0Q

 

Well, Minecraft, not fassion, but you get the point

 

I know and agree with what you said, except i absolutely suck at drawing, so no real way of getting any "original stuff". Then again, school just started and the classes are booring. My drawing skills might get better soon

 

OMG that is BIG!!!

 

like they say... the bigger the better...

 

is this on PlanetMinecraft? if it was... i bet it will get SOOOOO many diamonds!

 

No, its not, but thanks for the idea

[Pix3M 607]

 

I know and agree with what you said, except i absolutely suck at drawing, so no real way of getting any "original stuff". Then again, school just started and the classes are booring. My drawing skills might get better soon

 

I once saw a really good book that you should consider looking around for. It's called drawing on the right side of the brain. It explains that there are right and wrong ways of thinking when trying to draw. If you're serious about improving your art skills, that might be worth your time.

[Tol'Satha 163]

I once saw a really good book that you should consider looking around for. It's called drawing on the right side of the brain. It explains that there are right and wrong ways of thinking when trying to draw. If you're serious about improving your art skills, that might be worth your time.

 

Oooh, tyvm! Will most certainly check it out. I dont intent to make a career out of drawing, but its something that i allways liked but sucked at. I'm also an egghead