Pixel Art can be seen as easier in the sense of drawing characters as you’re limited to only limited to a certain amount of pixels, meaning that low quality pieces can be much more accepted due to the fact it comes in all forms ranging from 128 x 128 to even 8 x 8. Though in this case I’m going for 64 x 64, the middle ground in order to capture that pixel art feeling without too much detail involved. The character I’ll be illustrating is the same one from the previous post, Sir Brian the First. But in the form of a pixelated humanoid. The step by step is shown below:
Step 1: Preparing the Canvas
As always we begin with laying out the canvas, this time around it’d be far more difficult to just throw down a default canvas and crop it down so I went ahead and used the custom resolution settings to set it 64 x 64px, meaning that I’ll be able to easily pinpoint each pixel to get the proper finish that I need. Instead of using a drawing tablet, this time around it’ll be far easier to simply use my mouse. Once the canvas was displayed and I replaced the existing background with a transparent layer, I went into the View tab of Photoshop and enabled the Pixel Grid in order for me to be able to see each individual block for me to draw upon and colour, a demonstration of this process and example of the canvas is shown below:
Step 2: Commencing the Process
With everything set I began drawing my pixel character, starting from the top down once again and forming the head first and allowing additional changes to be made beneath it, such as the torso and arms. Ensuring that I keep it centred in case of its usage within one of my game projects to allow the easy application of Box Colliders.
Step 3: Adding Character
In this stage I primarily focused on adding the major details to the face and torso then outlining each parts that need colouring in the next step, due to the lack of complexity in this art piece there’s not entirely a lot I can add so I went to the extent of adding the monocle and cigar that he has in the original piece.
Step 4: Colouration and Final Touches
As the foundations were now set in stone and the major details were outlined it was time to use the Fill Tool to flesh out the empty spaces to complete both the set and the project.
Conclusion
This task yielded something a little more plain than I was anticipated but it’s the best my ability could really give, I suppose increasing the pixel count would allow me to add far more detail to the character as a whole but it’s at least a recognisable humanoid character that can function and be used in projects with ease. All in all it has taught me the basic fundamentals of pixel art and what it takes in order to proceed to create artwork in that style.