Art on Rene van Belzen

Sat, 14 Feb 2026 08:19:50 +0100

On February 15 we celebrate those who are happily single, me included. There’s no need to explain one’s preferences, nor any need to conform to old-fashioned societal norms. 🎨👾

Tue, 10 Feb 2026 09:22:38 +0100

Here’s the finished fanart pixel art piece, I called “Avengers Assemble.” 🎨👾

Thu, 15 Jan 2026 10:19:28 +0100

A new sign for a 3-star restaurant with a rat as its master chef. Free after the 3D animated movie Ratatouille.🎨👾

Mon, 05 Jan 2026 12:11:40 +0100

I’m starting to use CC photos of toddlers as references for my cat character. Problems mainly arise from not understanding the pose in the photo. Also real toddlers are four heads high, and I want to draw characters that are three apples stacked on each other in height.

Sun, 04 Jan 2026 07:22:38 +0100

Trying to solve drawing problems, and make this character “animateable.” Progress is slow, since I need to think things through. The aim is to simplify, and add more appeal at the same time. Still a long way to go, alas. Things will change radically.

My Most Popular Pixel Art On Divoom

Thu, 01 Jan 2026 07:40:32 +0100

On December 24, 2024 I received my Divoom Pixoo 64 and published my first pixel art design on the community’s servers. Since then I’ve made more than a thousand pixel art drawings, mostly at the Pixoo 64 resolution of 64 rows of 64 columns of colored LEDs for pixels. Not all were good enough (for me) to put on Divoom.

I only recommend the Divoom app and its community if you happen to own a device that uses the app. The community has a lot of non-artists, who are just there to favorite art made by artists, as to display it on their devices. There have been some incidents with trolling, and there’s no age limit, so you have your teenagers who lack the social etiquette of polite society and the wisdom that often goes with adulthood. I wonder if this is going to change with the introduction of age verification, which seems imminent in most Western countries with a conservative government.

Top 10 Most Liked

Here is the top ten (in reverse order) of the designs that received the most likes. I’ve included the caption, date, and number of views and of likes.

10. Nature

Another experiment with muted colors #64x64

9 March 2025 - 64x64 - 1.3K views - 96 likes

9. Made With A.I.

The design was based on a Dutch-language prompt: "Gezelligheid kent geen tijd." Of course, I redrew the whole thing at 64 x 64 and added scrolling text, as you do. I still got my 10 points 🤪 and more importantly, credit for another pixel art drawing instead of just one a day.

24 October 2025 - 64x64 - 2.2K views - 98 likes

8. Knight DK

Not quite what I had in mind, but there's a time constraint and minimum quota to keep the Divoom Master Pixel Artist badge.

22 July 2025 - 64x64 - 4.5K views - 99 likes

7. Star

Another animation done in Callipeg, at 256x256 and scaled down (nearest neighbor) in Procreate to 64x64 pixels and then added the four red center pixels. 8 Frames at 25 fps, the fastest the Divoom app allows. All this to make a solid workflow.

12 November 2025 - 64x64 - 3.5K views - 104 likes

6. Squeaking Clean

Edited Al art on the Dutch-language prompt: "Zoals het klokje thuis tikt tikt het nergens."

27 October 2025 - 64x64 - 2.2K views - 105 likes

5. The Naked Gun Movie Poster

Perhaps the funniest movie ever made.

12 September 2025 - 64x64 - 2.7K views - 113 likes

4. Cat on a Carpet

A piece I made for the Pixel Dailies prompt of February 26, 2021. #64x64 #cat #flyingcarpet

31 January 2025 - 64x64 - 2.7K views - 150 likes

3. Bubble Bobble

The little dragon from Bubble Bobble. I used 24 x 21 pixel art reference, presumably from the C64 version (found it through an image search).

2 September 2025 - 64x64 - 6.1K views - 256 likes

2. Oil Study

Time lapse of an oil painting in ibisPaint X. I used a reference by Karen Wilson. It's just a proof of concept of using other media as the basis of pixel art.

25 July 2025 - 64x64 - 5.4K views - 298 likes

1. Star Wars movie poster

What a little tracing can do. The animation of the title was so much fun!

18 August 2025 - 64x64 - 6.9K views - 381 likes

Honorable Mentions

Here are some additional pieces that didn’t receive the most likes, but are still worthy of mentioning in my opinion. The designs are in no particular order.

Perspectively Rotating Cube

I found a Reddit thread on how to rotate a cube correctly in two-point 3D perspective. I traced the example and gave it my own spin. Sorry for the dad joke. Now it could be done for any object that can be drawn in perspective inside a cube, or inside several cubes on top of each other.

3 October 2025 - 64x64 - 2.1K views - 76 likes

Chibi Star Trek TOS

l used the stick puppets in the outro of the Netflix anime series "Qi Refining For 3000 years," and applied those on Spock, Kirk and McCoy of the 1960s SF series Star Trek (aka ST TOS). I hope you like it.

3 November 2025 - 64x64 - 1.5K views - 60 likes

Commodore 64 Ultimate

Thirty years after Commodore went bankrupt, someone has bought the brand and started producing official new 8-bit computers that are C64 in hardware, in which a field programmable gate array replaces the 1980s chips. That calls for a nostalgic celebration, since I owned several C64s in the 1980s and 1990s.

19 December 2025 - 64x64 - 2.3K views - 68 likes

Mon, 03 Nov 2025 07:06:51 +0100

WIP of today’s contribution to the Divoom community. The character is approximately 20 pixels high. There are supposed to be six poses, two extra per punch already drawn. It isn’t hard, just a lot of work. Enlarging the character would complicate things exponentially, though.

Thu, 23 Oct 2025 09:42:27 +0100

Between September 18 and October 20 this year my account’s level on the Divoom app shot up from 17 to 59. I managed to draw commemorative pixel art up to level 57, included, before the bug got fixed, and the level was demoted to 17. It feels a bit harsh, though.

Sat, 11 Oct 2025 07:38:28 +0100

When someone else reviews a new photo frame on YT and one’s pixel art is casually shown by the reviewer, one can’t but feel like proud of oneself. At least, I felt that way, searching for a review of the new 10.1 inch Divoom Time Frame, and found this video by Marc The Geek.

Mon, 06 Oct 2025 20:37:44 +0100

Rolling Down Without End, a Penrose staircase.

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 12:48:01 +0100

Here’s the animation celebrating that I reached level 30 in the Divoom community yesterday. No other artist has reached this level yet, and some are on the platform since 2021 (I only 9 months). I suppose posting on average more than once a day, and being recommended by the staff a lot helped.

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 06:33:27 +0100

I removed my image archive with Pixoo64 gifs from micro∙blog, because it didn’t work for me. I’m moving them (slowly) to my Flickr account. Flickr has its problems with animated gifs, but management isn’t one of those; on micro∙blog there’s no management for large (100+) collections.

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 06:28:33 +0100

I’m about to reach level 30 in the Divoom community, higher than any expert artist of the app, much more skilled than me at pixel art. I suppose I happened to tick the right boxes with the algorithm, since I’m only using the app since Christmas 2024, and most experts since 2021 or so. Anyway, I made a rough animatic based on a rough sketch with all the key poses, and made a pixel animation from the frames.

I will share the finished pixel animation if and when I’m awarded level 30.

Tue, 02 Sep 2025 15:33:39 +0100

Here is a process video of the sketch I did of the dragon from Bubble Bobble, and next the 64 x 64 pixel art animation of said sketch.

Wed, 27 Aug 2025 14:28:37 +0100

Since it’s inspired by his self-portrait, I call this one “Vincent.”

Sun, 13 Jul 2025 20:06:15 +0100

Heads are going to roll. No idea why.

Fri, 27 Jun 2025 09:06:15 +0100

Serving smoothies endlessly on my Pixoo-64 64 x 64 pixel art frame. Drawn in Procreate on an iPad.

Sat, 03 May 2025 20:56:18 +0100

I drew this stylized head of B.A. Baracus of the 1980s hit series The A-Team, played by Mr T.

Mon, 28 Apr 2025 14:23:58 +0100

It seems the basis of good 2D animation is solid drawing skills. Without it, the result will be poor, or, at best, occasionally hit, but mostly miss. I know where to spend my time in the coming months. I only hope I don’t lose my Divoom Master Pixel Artist status with still images.

Mon, 28 Apr 2025 08:51:08 +0100

I made a rough animation in the Animatic app on iPad and traced the frames into a pixel animation with Pixaki. It took much longer than I expected, but I’m pleased with the (very rough) result running on my Pixoo64 LED panel.

Fri, 11 Apr 2025 15:50:45 +0100

I’ll be running a marathon on 13 April 2025. It almost didn’t happen because of injuries, which only healed a week ago. To celebrate in advance I made this jumble of legs, arms, and a confused head. Its animation lives on the Divoom community, where I became a master pixel artist, also this week.

Thu, 10 Apr 2025 10:48:20 +0100

Using Quick Poses I found a reference for a pose. After pixeling the nude I put some clothes on her to avoid flagging on the Divoom community. BTW, it wasn’t quick at all.

Wed, 09 Apr 2025 20:13:58 +0100

A larger piece, and Fate/Apocrypha fan art. I know I can do better, if I weren’t so out of practice. I also might have traced a little to get it done, after spending more than 12 hours on it today,

Tue, 08 Apr 2025 07:58:06 +0100

It’s been a while since I posted some pixel art on here, while I’ve been inundating the Divoom community with my creations, being mostly recommended by the staff. I don’t judge it high art, but I can see why they want to see more of it. Most don’t seem to post anything, or at best it’s low-effort.

Sun, 30 Mar 2025 11:53:18 +0100

The @pixeldailies.bsky.social #PixelDailies theme was #ladder Link has to climb the ultimate infinite ladder.

Sat, 29 Mar 2025 18:33:05 +0100

I suppose if you always play it safe (read: draw for more likes), you will never learn new things, and keep repeating old things until you’ve bored and stop creating. For me, this is a place of experimentation, finding your artistic limits, go beyond them, then dial back a bit.

Sat, 29 Mar 2025 08:57:49 +0100

I started a new project in Procreate for pixel art. I already made a rough sketch and applied base colors (white, green and light-brown). It will become a 64 x 64 pixels piece for my Pixoo64. It’s been a while since I did a landscape, so it will be a challenge to finish it. Here’s a WIP.

Fri, 28 Mar 2025 18:28:09 +0100

Here’s the process video of the pixel portrait of Jean-Luc Picard.

Fri, 28 Mar 2025 17:31:53 +0100

I hand-made a pixel portrait of captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek TNG, using Procreate.

Fri, 28 Mar 2025 09:02:10 +0100

I tweaked yesterday’s still pixel art thoroughly, so I think it got more “readable.” Next I did some simple animation, since that’s preferred, apparently, in the Divoom community.

Thu, 27 Mar 2025 13:45:55 +0100

Here’s the finished version of a baby enthusiastically holding a puppy.

Thu, 27 Mar 2025 08:37:42 +0100

A little WIP. Yesterday I made this tiny 64 x 64 pixels baby head, based on reference.

Today I gave the baby a torso. The dots are to easily scale between 64x64 and 1280x1280 pixels in Procreate. The latter resolution I use to sketch a new layer before turning it into pixel art, pixel-by-pixel.

Tue, 25 Mar 2025 10:16:42 +0100

I repurposed a previous pixel drawing for today’s pixel drawing for the Divoom community. The little guy is supposed to represent a nasty germ. We’ll see how it’s received. I like it.

Mon, 24 Mar 2025 15:31:31 +0100

Sometimes a piece is just not worth sharing.

I made it for the Divoom community, even posted it on there, but soon deleted it, because it was not making me feel happy with it.

Mon, 24 Mar 2025 10:26:43 +0100

The @pixeldailies.bsky.social theme for 23 March 2025 was #jar #pixel_dailies

Sun, 23 Mar 2025 12:22:17 +0100

I used this image as a reference for my contribution to March of Robots 2025. Though I didn’t design the robot, I did the color palette and animation.

Sat, 22 Mar 2025 12:22:22 +0100

If you assume you’re right, you’re probably aren’t. This is the self-deprecating idea that sprouted from using the import filter of the Divoom pixel editor wrongly. I thought it needed more pixels to avoid blurring them, like web browsers. Not so, just import 92 frames or less of 64 x 64 pixels.

Fri, 21 Mar 2025 14:32:19 +0100

According to the robot 🤖 this is a snow leopard, which seems fair considering the coloring, but I meant to draw a tiger 🐅 Ah well, it was from memory, and hence didn’t look much like the real deal anyway.

Fri, 21 Mar 2025 09:46:28 +0100

In this time of glorification of autocrats it seems somewhat uncool to post a selfie, since it tends to narcissism, one of the traits of an autocrat. Nevertheless, it was a fun exercise in panning around a main subject, even if it’s me, represented in pixel art for the Pixoo64.

Thu, 20 Mar 2025 09:55:28 +0100

I used a reference photo—downloaded a long time ago—of a tiger walking in the snow, and thought of animating it as such. It didn’t come to that, yet, because of lack knowledge of animal anatomy. The creation started in Pixquare, refinement in Procreate, and final touches in Divoom’s pixel editor.

Wed, 19 Mar 2025 19:09:02 +0100

Dreaming at the dinner table when I was a preteen. We didn’t talk much, so I had to use my imagination to fill the silence. Vroooom-vroooom! And oh, it was todays theme #forklift from @pixeldailies.bksy.social #PixelDailies

Wed, 19 Mar 2025 13:40:40 +0100

I made a photo of a bunch of daffodils a few days ago, and made a 192 x 64 pixel drawing today, which I turned into an infinite panning frame of 64 x 64 pixels for my Pixoo64 Cloud LED display. I also entered it in the Bloom2025 competition of the Divoom community.

Here’s the reference.

Tue, 18 Mar 2025 14:52:33 +0100

The @pixeldailies.bsky.social theme was #castle #PixelDailies #Pixoo64

Sat, 15 Mar 2025 08:23:24 +0100

This was constructed for the #64x64 pixels #Pixoo64 and #PixelDailies theme #RobotController @pixeldailies.bsky.social

Fri, 14 Mar 2025 10:38:50 +0100

I made a pixel drawing of a #tiger refining it using this CC reference from Flickr. Thusly I didn’t mechanically copy the reference, and made my own version for @pixeldaily.bsky.social theme for 13 March 2025.

Thu, 13 Mar 2025 07:39:41 +0100

The theme of Pixel Dailies for 12 March 2025 was #frame #64x64 #PixelDailies #Pixoo64

Tue, 11 Mar 2025 10:59:07 +0100

The theme of Pixel Dailies for 10 March 2025 was #OversizedClothing #64x64 #PixelDailies

Mon, 10 Mar 2025 10:52:16 +0100

At least the robot 🤖 got the number right, otherwise putting candles on my humongous BD cake has become ridiculous, and a real chore. 🎂

Sun, 09 Mar 2025 17:34:49 +0100

For when I’m too busy making pixel art…

Sat, 08 Mar 2025 06:57:19 +0100

Yesterday I failed at the day before’s prompt #CharacterGenerator of the Pixel Dailies daily challenge. The idea was a normally clad person stepping into the booth and coming out as another person wearing spectacular clothes. Alas, it will never be completed 😕

Thu, 06 Mar 2025 14:07:25 +0100

I made an isometric cube rotate in 72 steps. After importing it into the Divoom app’s pixel editor, I found a limit for the number of frames in an animation (60 for 64x64 pixels). So I had to be creative with 36 frames. After reuploading to the Divoom app, I tweaked it to get it even more perfect.

Wed, 05 Mar 2025 17:20:15 +0100

A pixel art depiction of a smiling orange cat with its tail raised, set against a green circular background. That’s what the alt text says.

Tue, 04 Mar 2025 12:59:22 +0100

When I notice my peripheral vision, besides blurring, I can see distortion in the perspective. I tried to illustrate that effect in a pixel animation. Not sure it’s because of my bad vision, or if it’s more general for all seeing humans. It could also be my imagination playing tricks on me.

Sun, 02 Mar 2025 11:49:39 +0100

I made this for yesterday’s prompt of Pixel Dailies: #scale. It’s based on my pixel font at original and 300 percent scale. Rotating a plane is some kind of scaling as well. Note that I’m in favor of human made pixel art, as opposed to a purely (and copyright-wise questionable) AI-based version.

Sat, 01 Mar 2025 10:15:28 +0100

I’m trying to make putting text onto my Pixoo64 much easier with (possibly) a pixel font. The matrix is 4 pixels wide and 6 pixels high, so there’s room for 10 lines of 16 characters (64 x 60 pixels in total) on the 64x64 pixels screen. I can has a scroll like in Star Wars 😂

Fri, 28 Feb 2025 17:02:37 +0100

When the clock strikes twelve…

Fri, 28 Feb 2025 08:08:18 +0100

This game is about getting the ball off the platform using the helicopter, yet without crashing it.

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 15:21:34 +0100

Didn’t expect to reach level 11 in the Divoom pixel art community so soon, so I had to put together something in a hurry.

Tue, 25 Feb 2025 14:06:39 +0100

An imbalance of power between a teapot and a teacup.

Mon, 24 Feb 2025 19:45:26 +0100

I imagined how Mega Man would look like sans armor. I can do a turn around of this character to learn more about character development. At least, that’s what I hope will happen. It could all end in disappointment.

Sat, 22 Feb 2025 07:18:14 +0100

Since I clearly don’t understand how to construct the head, all I can do is the next best thing, try to learn by osmosis, by doing it often enough. I might develop an intuition for it, while a clear mental picture how to proceed keeps eluding me.

Thu, 20 Feb 2025 09:27:20 +0100

Divoom has a RetroTime2025 art competition, for which this is (one of) my contribution(s), the MITS Altair 8800, which started the personal computer revolution. It was soon followed by the Commodore PET, Atari 400 and 800, and the Apple II, all computers I grew up with, hence “retro” for me.

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 15:00:27 +0100

My new colors are rolling along.

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 07:07:00 +0100

I’m still learning about color palettes, contrast and such. It appears that different mediums have different requirements. Pixel art is very different from, say, quilting. So I edited a piece I did yesterday, making some of the mini-drawings more clear. Five is better than three grades of a color.

Mon, 17 Feb 2025 17:34:05 +0100

I made two noteworthy 64 x 64 pixel art pieces today. These are stills; the Divoom community got the animated versions.

Sat, 15 Feb 2025 07:12:43 +0100

It’s clear to me from these two recent pixel art pieces, that I need to be more patient (and deliberate) with my art. Especially the edges need work, but also the shading, if approaching realism was the goal. It’s pretty much absent or “wrong”, as is the contrast in the overall image.

Fri, 14 Feb 2025 15:36:15 +0100

I’m happy my contribution HUG got an honorable mention in Divoom’s winner announcement of Hug Day 2025 (link to pdf) on Singles Awareness Day.

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 15:59:36 +0100

Just don’t forget to eat your eggplant, or it’ll become a rotten-egg-plant. Pixel art made for the Divoom community.

Tue, 11 Feb 2025 16:23:59 +0100

I’m still trying teach myself coloring using color palettes based on human vision instead 19th century art philosophy. My idea that I should’ve mastered it by now was clearly over-estimated. Art as a subject matter is both wide and deep.

Tue, 11 Feb 2025 11:19:19 +0100

For all of you Whovians out there, I made this 64 x 64 pixel art piece for the Divoom community to celebrate me reaching level 10 on that platform.

Grappling with color theory

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 11:08:24 +0100

I was taught color theory in high school, and did self-study when I became more serious about art. That old theory is clearly not taking into account how the human vision system works. It told me how to mix paint (oil paint, and other particle-based coloring mediums), and get a harmonious color palette that appeals to the observer. Then you mixed what seemed right, after a lot artworks in which these loose ideas about color were applied, so based on experience. However, it remained a lot of guesswork, and I never got good results, at least, not consistent good results. So I kept second-guessing myself, and thought I must misunderstand the theory I was taught. It turned out I wasn’t wrong, the theory was.

Below (and in articles to follow) are my first steps into getting to grips with colors and how they interact in the observer’s vision system.

I used the accessible color palette generator at Venngage to create a random vivid color palette that contrasts enough with black text to be generally legible. The palette was based on the mid tone with RGB value #d0d57b.

#d8c7c2, #000000
#d8c38c, #000000
#d0d57b, #000000
#92b17a, #000000
#92a89d, #000000

Next, I converted each color to OKLCH, to check if these colors were even in the range of human perception:

oklch(84.23% 0.0204 37.03)
oklch(82.18% 0.0756 89.54)
oklch(84.95% 0.1136 111.35)
oklch(72.3% 0.0838 132.1)
oklch(71.13% 0.0292 164.02)

Next, I made a test animation at 32x32 pixels size to check if text indeed was legible with this color palette and black as the letter color, plus the reverse, this color palette as text color on a black background. It seemed to work, though I’m hardly a good judge, not having color blindness or poor vision, despite some astigmatism, which is (partially) corrected by my prescription glasses.

The AI micro∙blog uses could read it, so that’s a thing.

Text with a pixelated font says Can you read this clearly enough? against a background of squares in muted colors.

Though, the “muted colors” worried me a bit. Weren’t these supposed to be “vivid colors”? I suppose that’s the sacrifice one has to make in order for your creation to be have enough contrast to be legible. Of course, pixel art isn’t about text, like html documents clearly are, though readability plays an important part in what you want to convey to your audience, if you so wish—you might do this just for you own enjoyment, after all, as many seem to do. Not every artist is a professional, nor wants to become one.

I sent this over to the Divoom community with the caption:

I’m trying out new (to me) color theory. The old theory I was taught in school 50 years ago is out of date. This one is based on how our eyes perceive colors, rather than what some dude in the 19th century came up with. #colors #test #accessibility #oklch

So, this color palette seems totally usable for reading, even reading outlined characters on a pixelated screen (read: pixel art). However, there are other ways to present your art than through outlining. Putting an outline around a shape accentuates, makes it stand out. Sometimes you don’t want that, you want your art to integrate into the rest of the image. You could do away with outlines, or be more subtle about outlining, for example by adjusting the color from black to a color that contrasts with the surrounding colors (read: colored outline), or some combination of techniques.

So, how to test that?

I turned to Pixel Dailies for a prompt to use, and apply that with a color palette based on OKLCH, picking a color palette that suited (my interpretations of) the prompt. That day’s prompt was:

AoE

What the heck is that? I had to look it up, and found this on GameTree:

AoE (or Area of Effect), in video games, is an ability or action that affects multiple targets within a specified area simultaneously, rather than a single target. Can apply to damage, healing, or status effects.

Another meaning could be Age of Empires, which seems to be an online strategy game, which also abbreviates as AoE. Gotta love ambivalence! So, basically, I was “allowed” to do whatever I wanted, what usually is the case with Pixel Dailies; they’re are very flexible about interpretations, as long as the art is worthwhile looking at. Anyway, it was something to do with gaming, and I’m a casual gamer at best, certainly don’t own a gaming console or gaming PC. This seemed a disadvantage, but it really wasn’t, because I was free to use my imagination instead of some established gaming lore. I could think outside the box.

Remember, this wasn’t about the prompt, per se, but about using the prompt to get an idea about color theory. Still, it’s always worth putting effort into your art piece, at least think about what you want to create before even grabbing a drawing or painting utensil.

The basic ideo of Area of Effect is that one action has multiple results, so it’s about unanticipated “collateral effects”, a typical trope of storytelling, which makes the reader pay more attention, since the unexpected usually does that. So the author/creator sets an expectation, and does that opposite to make any bored or distracted reader/observer pay attention, and commit to engage fully with the piece in front of them. At least, those were my thoughts about the whole thingamabob, what was it already? Right, AoE, Area of Effect. I’m clearly not paying attention myself.

So, false expectations, and how to depict that using a color palette. A clear example of this is the 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz, with lead actor Judy Garland, which starts in black and white, and changes to full color when Dorothy steps into the Land of Oz. Another example, which clearly borrows from this movie, is the equally brilliant 1989 animated movie The Little Mermaid, in which in the prologue above the sea, muted colors tell us about a drab existence of sailors, while under the sea it’s so bright and vivid, that the contrast couldn’t be higher. It’s the Wizzard-of-Oz effect redone for the times, since moviegoers were accustomed to colors, unlike in the 1930s, when black-and-white movies were still quite normal.

It’s unfortunate I’m not a movie buff, but some knowledge has crept in through watching movies without even considering what thought had gone into it. I’m applying that half-baked knowledge to my current artwork, which has to be an animation, or an otherwise very clever juxtaposition in a still image, telling us a story we weren’t expecting. In traditional pixel art, we generally don’t have a lot of pixels in a frame, but we do have a lot pixels in consecutive frames we can use to tell a story. Of course, with modern computers, canvas size isn’t really a problem anymore, so limiting ourselves to it is more of a stylistic choice than a necessity, as it was in the 1980s with 8-bit computers and consoles.

So, my “trick” is to do a change in color palette, to aid in storytelling. The hero/heroine, after a failed attempt, has answered to the call, and is to embark on his/her journey to get (or remove) the idol, and bring it back/destroy it, to help those at home who are in need. Frodo will destroy the ring, and returns to the Shire a hero, broken, yet victorious, against all expectations. Yes, even in that movie (Lord of the Rings Trilogy) colors play an essential role in illustrating in what dire straits our hero is, almost dying in utter failure. Sorry for the spoilers if you haven’t watched those movies, which you really should in my opinion. And what does Dorothy bring home? Well, nothing good, but she is safe, for now, but clearly scarred by her experience and longing for Oz. Ariel is just happy to have her voice back, and live happily ever after with her true love. At least, that is what we’re supposed to believe, since Ariel must experience a culture shock after having lived “under the sea” whole her life, eating seaweed instead of animal flesh (fish). As far as I know that story was never told, but could be an interesting story to tell, more slice-of-life than the epic coming-of-age story of The Little Mermaid.

Now I have more ideas than time to implement them. That’s the problem if you deep somewhat deeper into a subject than casually approaching it, as I usually do; how to get out with a result that is just possible to implement with the skills that are at my disposal (or can be learned in the allotted time)?

As usual, I have to adjust my expectations, and do my best. It might succeed, might fail, but I will have learned something, one hopes.

I will let you know what I came up with, hopefully later today, or otherwise tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 07:53:38 +0100

Okay, web devs, artists, and other creatives who use colors, it’s time to rethink HSL color theory and adopt color theory based on perception! Here is what convinced me: YT video, blog read, web app.

Sat, 08 Feb 2025 12:55:39 +0100

Such a tiny canvas to play with, yet I made something interesting nonetheless for the Divoom community.

Sat, 08 Feb 2025 08:44:36 +0100

The Tenth Doctor gets a strange signal on his T.A.R.D.I.S. monitor: “What. What … WHAT!?”

Fri, 07 Feb 2025 17:52:59 +0100

I hope you don’t mind I’ve used your avatar for my little pixel animation. @peterw

Thu, 06 Feb 2025 10:26:32 +0100

In prep for reaching level 10 in the Divoom community (probably early next week), I’ve upgraded 🤖 yesterday’s Doctor. It’s a still from a 24 frames animation, running on my Pixoo64 as I’m typing this. Me happy 😊

Wed, 05 Feb 2025 17:09:03 +0100

Sneak peak of an animation I’ve been working on today.

Wed, 05 Feb 2025 10:53:19 +0100

I suppose even for pixel art it’s sometimes smart to do a sketch before putting little blocks on a canvas.

Mon, 03 Feb 2025 08:42:28 +0100

I already made this pixel drawing in 2022, and I uploaded it to the Divoom community. Apparently, they’re having a lot of inappropriate artwork over there, since it has to be approved first, which takes a day or so.

Sun, 02 Feb 2025 08:52:15 +0100

I made this 64x64 pixels portrait before, and I thought my skill has advanced enough to try to improve it. It’s for the Divoom community, titled Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.

Fri, 31 Jan 2025 20:10:24 +0100

A shrunken and improved version of an earlier piece I did for Pixel Dailies, prompted “paperweight.” This one I did for the Divoom community.

Thu, 30 Jan 2025 16:07:20 +0100

For a contest by a user in the Divoom community. It’s my cat Maahir, a Muslim name which means skilled, skilful, proficient, experienced, clever, genius, and fits him perfectly. I used two photos as my reference, and the rest is drawn as in-betweens, with motion blur.

Thu, 30 Jan 2025 10:51:28 +0100

Only a week ago I reached level 7 in the Divoom community and told myself to pace myself with interacting with the app. How did that turn out? I’ve reached level 8 today. ’Nuff said.

Wed, 29 Jan 2025 11:00:09 +0100

My entry for Divoom’s 2025 Hugging Day, with the description:

There are other ways to show love than through embrace. Not everyone is a hugging person. Love isn’t an emotion; it’s a promise to take care of one another, despite what feelings are at play right now.

Tue, 28 Jan 2025 08:34:05 +0100

Seeing how much effort it took to make this animation, I gave it away as a free template to the Divoom community for use in someone’s own projects, with a requirement to mention my username in the description. We will see if this has any legs…

Mon, 27 Jan 2025 21:13:59 +0100

Some pixel art animation for the Divoom community I came up with in a few hours.

Mon, 27 Jan 2025 08:10:37 +0100

I can see where I went wrong here. I was trying to make my sketch look like the reference. I’m supposed to draw a generic head shape first, and only then modify it, adding its personality. I need to step back and squint, so the person goes away, and structure, generic building blocks, remain.

Sun, 26 Jan 2025 10:21:59 +0100

I’m sure there are many out there who are not able to imagine the human head as a compound shape, e.g. a rounded plate attached to a sphere with its sides cut off, or a complicated construction. Why not simplify even more, and build a head out of that? It could be a good intermediate step.

Fri, 24 Jan 2025 21:10:22 +0100

I’m trying to “get” the Loomis method of drawing heads from construction. I got as far as drawing a sphere, but still can’t see it as a three-dimensional object. It hasn’t clicked yet. I’m nothing but patient, though.

Fri, 24 Jan 2025 09:18:31 +0100

I had to confirm for myself that in order to grasp how to render 3-dimensional forms onto a flat plane, one has to understand how to render 3D forms as flat 2D shapes, and add shading and shadows to those shapes. Drawing from life (instead of photos) helps, but it is key to stay open-minded.

Thu, 23 Jan 2025 09:52:19 +0100

I probably should stick around level 7 on the Divoom community for a while, since being there causes me to neglect my portrait drawing skills. Priorities, priorities…

Wed, 22 Jan 2025 18:40:08 +0100

I turned a selfie into a 64x64 subpixel animation for the Divoom community.

Tue, 21 Jan 2025 08:46:48 +0100

Loomis states that we best construct the head “by drawing a ball resembling the cranium, which is round but flattened somewhat at the sides, and attaching the jawbone and features to it.” This proved to be very hard for me, almost impossible, because drawing by constructing is rather alien to me.

Thu, 16 Jan 2025 10:37:19 +0100

I wondered what would be a good animation for my Pixoo64 LED cloud display? I guess a cute cat on a floating cloud. Maybe this is the direction I should be going. It should also appeal to a younger audience.

Wed, 15 Jan 2025 15:49:37 +0100

Just three rapid sketches to keep at least some focus on portrait drawing. I can feel the New Year euphoria quickly fading. There are so many things that need “immediate” attention, since it’s a new year, and people like to try new things, so there’s a need to remind potential customers what’s up.

Mon, 13 Jan 2025 14:45:44 +0100

I made two pixel animations, one to note that I have reached level 6 (whatever that means) in Divoom’s pixel editor, another to celebrate the occasion.

Mon, 13 Jan 2025 08:10:29 +0100

One should often lower one’s expectations, since excellence isn’t sustainable. If your low-effort results are still “passable”, imagine what your maximum efforts will going to look like. So doodling has its place; it’s non-committal practice, here with the POSEmuse app.

Sun, 12 Jan 2025 09:47:53 +0100

I thought I’d try some naive drawings according to Andrew Loomis. Clearly, I need more practice to be able to draw heads using his methods. The heads aren’t stick-figure quality, neither what a serious beginner-artist would do, but somewhere in between. I’m missing something.

Sat, 11 Jan 2025 15:38:03 +0100

An app called POSEmuse wants you to trace nude images. Since those are seen as NSFW by non-artists, I put some clothes on her. It’s playtime for her pets too.

Sat, 11 Jan 2025 10:44:30 +0100

Today something very simple, more like doodling. Circles are important, though, because they are so useful in designing a drawing from imagination, or drawing the “unseen” part of a head, so the seen part makes more sense to the artist.

Fri, 10 Jan 2025 17:34:05 +0100

This was a lot of fun to do, but it also took a loooong time to make (several hours). Some are “better” than others, but the hard ones were the most fun ones to draw. I can see I need a construction method for the head.

Fri, 10 Jan 2025 08:47:34 +0100

Based on yesterday’s find that more is better, I created a new canvas in #pixquare to give me room to sketch eight portraits in ibisPaint X. I used the CC Search Portal to find creative commons portrait photos, of which I added eight to my reference window. Now the only thing left is… sketch.

Thu, 09 Jan 2025 16:52:31 +0100

It is said that if you’re not good at portraits, quantity goes over quality. Better to draw three mediocre rough sketches, concentrating on construction, than one failed drawing you never want to see again. Also, they increase in quality as I keep drawing. Maybe long sittings have a place too.

Thu, 09 Jan 2025 09:49:47 +0100

Being broke scars a person mentally for life. I know this from personal experience, having been without money several times, living above my means.

Wed, 08 Jan 2025 21:50:34 +0100

I solved the problem with fuzzy imported 64 x 64 pixel images into the Divoom pixel editor, by chopping up the original animation into four separate 32 x 32 animated GIFs, and per frame move each 32 x 32 layer into its correct position. It’s a real hack, and rather bothersome.

Wed, 08 Jan 2025 10:53:28 +0100

Today’s sketch is a digital portrait sketch converted into 3D perspective. I suppose I should’ve redrawn it with this sketch as a template. However I was short on time. It’s also my interpretation of today’s prompt in the Sketch-a-Day app.

Tue, 07 Jan 2025 10:05:02 +0100

Another day, another portrait sketch. This time I did try to pay attention to the whole torso of the person, and delay the drawing of the face. It still feels a bit “mechanical.” The face is posed differently from the reference, if that’s of any concern to you.

Mon, 06 Jan 2025 14:00:32 +0100

Redid face and overlaid the photo to check my proportions. There were a bit off. Worse than that, I had missed the foreshortening of the person’s right shoulder. I should’ve sketched an overall posture before dealing with the face. Other than that, I’m happy with the result, not perfect, though.

Mon, 06 Jan 2025 09:10:55 +0100

After 45 minutes of slogging, I noticed something was off, so I stopped to get some distance. Am I going into details too soon, or am I not understanding what I’m looking at, or both? I guess I’ll cheat by putting the photo underneath to compare. Then I’ll redraw the sketch with what I’ve learned.

Sun, 05 Jan 2025 13:56:22 +0100

I should return to drawing portraits instead of all this busy-work with the Divoom community, which feels to me like a popularity contest, similar to Instagram and the like. I’m getting only marginally better, which is to be expected. I’d rather improve at my skill than being inundated with likes.

Sun, 05 Jan 2025 10:49:27 +0100

I drew Spyro the dragon, an old Playstation game character, in 32 x 32 pixels, which wasn’t easy. I both limited the color palette and animation, so I could do it within a day. Drawn in Pixaki on iPad, imported into Divoom’s pixel editor, and exported as a frame hanging on a wall.

Sat, 04 Jan 2025 19:43:00 +0100

I did an image search on a Yorkshire Terrier as pixel art to find a better color scheme, after applying that, it actually looks like the dog.

Sat, 04 Jan 2025 11:49:40 +0100

I’m always amazed how different a 32 x 32 pixel art piece looks from its reference. The color choice might not be the best, but I’m sticking with this pastel-colored palette, which probably demands a more stylistic approach than the realism I’m aiming for.

Sat, 04 Jan 2025 09:39:54 +0100

Today’s art project starts with a rough sketch of a Yorkie. The proportions are likely somewhat off, but it seems to me close enough for a 32 x 32 pixel art animal portrait, using the Sprinkle Cake color palette.

Fri, 03 Jan 2025 23:39:46 +0100

I found out that the Divoom pixel editor prefers 32 x 32 images for import. The 64 x 64 image import leads to fuzzy pixels. Of course, for animation this isn’t a big deal, since sprites are often smaller than 32 x 32 pixels. And I can import 32 x 32 as 64 x 64 pixels if I don’t mind the fuzzies.

Fri, 03 Jan 2025 13:12:17 +0100

I’m learning how to get a color palette from an image in Divoom’s pixel editor. So I created an image in Pixquare and imported that, so I could pick and add colors, and created this post’s animation from that. Since it took so long, I guess I’ll stick with this palette for a while.

Thu, 02 Jan 2025 12:50:03 +0100

I made the animation from scratch in Divoom’s pixel editor (the frame is from the app itself, of which on the display on top the tv set I changed 2021 in 2025). It took a really long time for such a simple 64 x 64 pixel animation.

Thu, 02 Jan 2025 09:46:10 +0100

Today’s sketch started yesterday, when I realized I wasn’t paying attention to my subject, forgetting to analyze it, and not visualizing how it was made out of simple shapes. So today I did just that—badly. It is the prelude to a sketch. Now I could draw it from another angle and perspective.

Wed, 01 Jan 2025 09:52:37 +0100

When in Rome, do like Romans do, IOW, embrace the blurriness of the app that seems to have been slapped together to sell a product, judging by how poorly its features are implemented. Still, I imported my pixel art and retouched it a bit in Divoom’s pixel editor.

Happy New Year, everyone! 🎆

Tue, 31 Dec 2024 23:56:04 +0100

When you don’t succeed right away, try, try, and try again until you do.

Tue, 31 Dec 2024 21:05:16 +0100

You can’t win them all, it seems. This one went awry by a bad choice of colors.

Tue, 31 Dec 2024 16:50:23 +0100

W.I.P. I’m fully aware that progress isn’t always improvement, yet I have to deal with its result nonetheless, as perfection is the enemy of done. After spewing these ~~platitudes~~ »cough« truisms, the next phase should be identifying the shadows and light areas, and then pixelating the portrait.

Tue, 31 Dec 2024 10:12:24 +0100

W.I.P. A first rough sketch from reference, done in an hour, mainly by eyeballing proportions and angles. I let it sit for a few hours to get some distance. Then I’ll do a second version, focussing on the hairdo. A value study will be the third version before I’ll turn it into 64 x 64 pixel art.

Mon, 30 Dec 2024 19:24:45 +0100

I imported my previous pixel art portrait into the Divoom pixel editor and did some touch-ups before I exported it to my photo library.

Mon, 30 Dec 2024 11:17:01 +0100

I made a 64 x 64 pixel art portrait. For a longer description, see this blog post.

Sun, 29 Dec 2024 17:27:10 +0100

Here’s what I could come up with today, a duck in a pond drawn as 64 x 64 pixel art in Divoom’s pixel art editor.

Sat, 28 Dec 2024 10:37:23 +0100

There’s no better way to learn than to just jump in and start drawing and animating, I guess. Shown is a simple animation loop and a color gradient through the 16 colors of the Sweetie-16 color palette.

Sat, 28 Dec 2024 08:28:22 +0100

I thought that 64 x 64 pixel is too small for anything worthwhile, until I saw an image (locked inside an app) by professional artist Laura Aragon in the Divoom pixel art community. Holy cow, I have to up my game to get near this level of artistry. I’d like to see how she made it.

Thu, 26 Dec 2024 11:34:42 +0100

This 64 x 64 “selfie” pixel art portrait took much, much longer than it needed to. I drew an outline in Pixquare, and replicated that in the Divoom pixel editor, after which I colored the sketch. The image is a screenshot, framed in Procreate, because Divoom’s export filter is no good.

Wed, 25 Dec 2024 13:40:40 +0100

On Christmas day I thought it appropriate to go oldskool with ballpoint pens on copier paper. While clearly not finished, I thought I captured some of the original in my sketch, of which I’m proud as a sign of progress.

Wed, 25 Dec 2024 10:44:54 +0100

I reworked a pixel art piece I did earlier this year in Pixaki, imported it via the photo library into Divoom’s pixel art editor, took a screenshot inside the editor, and added a frame around it in Procreate. Of course, it is expected that I draw in Divoom’s app, which I find clumsy.

Mon, 23 Dec 2024 18:19:31 +0100

While awaiting the arrival of my LED panel I made this 64x64 pixel art portrait from imagination. Alas importing into the Divoom app introduces unwanted anti-aliasing, almost impossible to get rid of. Ah well, it works for smaller panels too.

Just got a notification, arrival within 15 minutes 😊

Mon, 23 Dec 2024 13:16:34 +0100

I refined yesterday’s stapler pixel art in the Divoom pixel editor at 64x64 pixels. Now I’m waiting for the LED panel to arrive, so I can test it. 🥁🥁🥁💥🎉🥳

Mon, 23 Dec 2024 09:35:01 +0100

Apparently, getting better at drawing requires some attentive drawing practice, and observing what one is looking at before even drawing. I noticed foreshortening in the face, so I tried to draw that (see process video). As an initial sketch it is descent, but I think I need more practice.

Sun, 22 Dec 2024 16:59:26 +0100

I found this ornate stapler on Sketchfab and took a snapshot of a side view to study and draw. I wanted to see if I could turn it into 64 x 64 pixel art somehow. The sketch took me 4½ hours, and the pixel art version an hour or so.

Sat, 21 Dec 2024 10:09:18 +0100

I believe this is what happens if I don’t really understand the subject I’m drawing and just draw shapes. I suppose a bit of analysis before putting the stylus to the iPad would’ve resulted in a more solid drawing. Based on a toy rocket I found on Sketchfab, of which there are many.

Fri, 20 Dec 2024 14:14:43 +0100

Using several steps I created and refined this sketch, based on a wooden toy duck from Sketchfab. It isn’t a copy, but a recreation based on observation. I can see its flaws, and, therefore, I need to practice drawing solid basic sketches before trying this method on drawing portraits.

Fri, 20 Dec 2024 12:01:28 +0100

I redesigned my blank sketch sheet in a pixel editing app (Pixquare). The grays are obviously for shading, and the four colors are for blocking in straight lines, from big to small:

green - overall dimensions
red - rough outline
orange - inner shapes outlines
blue - darkest areas outlines

Thu, 19 Dec 2024 14:33:56 +0100

If I want to get any good at blocking in sketches, I probably should start with an easier subject matter, and work my way up to portraits. Here’s my sketch (and its process video).

Wed, 18 Dec 2024 09:21:13 +0100

As soon as I go a little more in the direction of stylized drawing, I find the quality of it increasing. This sketch is loosely based on Preston Blaire’s animation drawing, using a reference photo to get the details in. I’m somewhat pleased with the result, but know I can do much better.

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 09:19:44 +0100

I really should try a portrait tutorial, work on my art fundamentals, and draw a skull from lots of angles to improve my drawing skill. This portrait is from a photo reference, and I think it’s meh, though better than what I’ve drawn a week ago. So there’s progress.

Mon, 16 Dec 2024 09:59:28 +0100

Such a messy messy sketch, with lots of mistakes I can learn from. I’ve redone the nose and mouth, which were placed in the wrong position. They still aren’t correct, though, but better. Unlearning bad habits is hard, yet I will get there.

Sun, 15 Dec 2024 17:46:28 +0100

Has it been two years already since @relayfm left Twitter? Original post here.

Sun, 15 Dec 2024 09:08:23 +0100

Quick sketch of Peter Capaldi as the 12th Doctor.

Sun, 15 Dec 2024 07:14:15 +0100

Forgot to charge the iPad overnight, so I doodled instead.

Sat, 14 Dec 2024 08:25:39 +0100

Sometimes all I can manage is a wispy sketch, and no more. I don’t want to continue, so I shouldn’t. I guess I needed some distance, and perhaps finish it later. The creative mind is an unpredictable mess that doesn’t listen to time tables and deadlines.

Fri, 13 Dec 2024 10:31:49 +0100

What to do with circles I took so much care constructing? I know…

Whimsical is good!

Fri, 13 Dec 2024 08:43:24 +0100

Trying to apply what I’ve learned in the past days to a portrait from a photo. Though it’s rather “mechanical” I’m pleased with the progress I made in such a short time. Furthermore, drawing longer than 30 minutes doesn’t seem to bother me anymore. So that’s progress too.

Thu, 12 Dec 2024 08:32:52 +0100

Today’s rough sketch is a stepping stone in getting better at drawing portraits. You can read my self-review here.

Wed, 11 Dec 2024 08:40:52 +0100

Today’s sketch is a squirrel. I did a little self-critique you can read here.

the rough sketch of a squirrel

Tue, 10 Dec 2024 11:11:05 +0100

Anyone can doodle. You don’t have to be good at it. That’s the whole point. Let your imagination run free. Liberate your inner child. At least, that’s what I told myself…

Tue, 10 Dec 2024 08:52:49 +0100

Unlike 2024, when I should’ve made a game, but didn’t, in 2025 I want to challenge myself with something I’m more familiar with. I want to get better at creating art for myself at first, and perhaps for others later in the year.

SepPixel 2023

Sat, 30 Sep 2023 18:03:48 +0100

For the month of September 2023 micro∙blog organized a photo blogging challenge with daily prompts, and I adopted it for pixel art.
👾

It was mostly a fun experience. Sometimes I had to try another, less ambitious drawing, on other occasions I accepted a bad drawing for that day. I certainly did a lot of tracing to speed things up.

Drawing process

Sat, 30 Sep 2023 09:27:53 +0100

I was wondering if I could improve my drawing process. I tend to copy what I see, which is fine for studying. Drawing from imagination gives another dimension to one’s self-expression. Of course, to make any sense to an outsider, it has to be based somewhat in reality. So, drawing from observation is still an important practice.

My intent was a dreamy version of a cat. I started with a big fat brush to build the animal out of blobs of digital paint. Not going into detail was hard, and I think I could have remained at the big-blob level longer than I did. The white plant-like thingy started as an accidental stroke with my finger I didn’t notice before saving. Alas, saving in the current version of Procreate destroys the editing history. Not that I expect my memory-starved lowbudget iPad to be able to hold such a file in RAM.

Anyway, the mistake was a blessing in disguise (as mistakes usually are), because it offered me something for the eyes to pay attention to. I’m by no means an expert at painting, nor art design, but keeping the observer looking at an image is perhaps the second most important attribute of any artwork. The first being, to not bore the observer with the expected, with what can be assumed common knowledge. The observer can use their imagination to fill in missing details.

I also need to remind myself that these paintings are but a step in what I want to create, a pixel art piece. The paintings are rough attempts at creating ideas. Some artists may be able to do without such a change in medium and do this imagination bit in a pixel art editor. I found that an additional step with traditional drawing really helps me to iron out vagaries in my art.

After all, art is creating something where there was nothing, besides emptiness (which is actually a thing). Filling this void, enhancing life is what makes art worth all the trouble. However, we humans aren’t born as artists, so we need some assistance to aid in the art creation process. If you can do it all in your head, more power to you! The rest of us do what we need to do to get things done, however clumsy it may appear to an outsider.

Sat, 30 Sep 2023 07:26:42 +0100

SepPixel for September 30, 2023, prompt: “Treasure."
👾

Fri, 29 Sep 2023 09:06:35 +0100

SepPixel for September 29, 2023, prompt: “Contrast."
👾

Thu, 28 Sep 2023 09:44:29 +0100

So, I took more time, and it’s only marginally better. I know it’s a difficult subject matter, requiring patience and subtlety. Nevertheless, I assumed I was beyond this skill level. It isn’t bad, nor good, but somewhere in between 😔

Thu, 28 Sep 2023 06:43:32 +0100

SepPixel for September 28, 2023, prompt: “Workout."
👾 ʎʇʇᴉʞ ‘sǝʇnlƃ ǝsoɥʇ uɹnq

Wed, 27 Sep 2023 08:31:28 +0100

If one’s goal is to get better, it’s not enough to claim you suck at it, because that’s true for anyone to some extent, even experts. You should inquire what makes you state that. In this case, I think it’s impatience. I need to slow down, take my time.

Wed, 27 Sep 2023 06:03:58 +0100

SepPixel for September 27, 2023, prompt: “Embrace."
👾 xɐɯ oɹd ϛƖ ǝuoɥdᴉ ʍǝu ɹnoʎ ʎoɾuǝ

Tue, 26 Sep 2023 06:39:06 +0100

SepPixel for September 26, 2023, prompt: “Beverage."
👾 ǝɯ ɯoɹɟ ɟɟnp ou ʇɔǝdxǝ

Mon, 25 Sep 2023 12:43:27 +0100

Tried how my drawing skills of cute(ish) cats are. Let’s say it’s still a “learning experience.” Not much days left until October 1.

Mon, 25 Sep 2023 07:26:54 +0100

When tracing is used to understand what one sees. The goal is to be able to draw hands from imagination, using photos only to add realism, not to copy. This then becomes stylized instead of a literal copy. Still, there’s always room for artistic liberties, or one could better take a photo instead.

Mon, 25 Sep 2023 05:40:09 +0100

SepPixel for September 25, 2023, prompt: “Flare."
👾 spl ǝɥʇ uo ʎsɐǝ

Sun, 24 Sep 2023 13:41:52 +0100

Turning a small illustration into pixel art is still a lot of creative drawing besides tracing. Shown is the intermediate size-reduction step I made in Procreate with a 1-pixel brush, and the 4x even smaller version in Pixaki. It’s based on an illustration from an image search.
👾

Sun, 24 Sep 2023 09:16:04 +0100

SepPixel for September 24, 2023, prompt: “Belt."
👾 uǝʞoɹq sᴉ ʇlǝq ǝɥʇ

Sat, 23 Sep 2023 16:03:27 +0100

Working ahead a few days in my current SepPixel challenge has shown me that my iPad needs upgrading. It doesn’t last longer than a few hours on a full charge, and drawings apps sometimes crash, probably because of low memory and software development with the M1 or better in mind.
👾

Sat, 23 Sep 2023 08:47:39 +0100

SepPixel for September 23, 2023, prompt: “Day in the Life."
👾 ǝƃpᴉɹɹod lɐǝɯʇɐo sǝʌol zᴉz∀ 🤭

Fri, 22 Sep 2023 06:27:04 +0100

SepPixel for September 22, 2023, prompt: “Road."
👾 ʎǝlloʍ qɹᴉɔʞ ɹoɐp

Thu, 21 Sep 2023 06:20:43 +0100

SepPixel for September 21, 2023, prompt: “Fall."
👾

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 08:10:29 +0100

I tried to draw a cute stylized cat from imagination, and see I’ll need more practice. Also, 64 by 64 pixels is a bit cramped for this art style. I probably need to bump it up to 96 by 96 or 128 by 128 pixels.
👾

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 07:03:58 +0100

SepPixel for September 20, 2023, prompt: “Disruption."
👾

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 05:15:32 +0100

SepPixel for September 19, 2023, prompt: “Edge."
👾

Retrospect: 2023 Reddit Sketch Daily challenge

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 14:36:12 +0100

To get back into pixel art, I gave myself the challenge to draw the daily prompts (themes or alt themes) for r/SketchDaily on Reddit and post the result on both it and my blog. Here are the prompts and the links to blog posts with the drawing in it.
👾

July 26, 2023: Pillow Fight
July 28, 2023: Free Draw Friday, a portrait
July 29, 2023: Ogre
July 30, 2023: Witches
July 31, 2023: Microscope
August 1, 2023: Sandwiches
August 2, 2023: Disguise
August 3, 2023: Large Birds
August 4, 2023: Dusty Old Books
August 5, 2023: Free Draw Friday, black and white cat
August 6, 2023: Cycle of Life
August 7, 2023: Gloomy
August 8, 2023: Bump in the Night
August 9, 2023: Gudetama
August 10, 2023: Regatta
August 11, 2023: Free Draw Friday, laser shooting cat
August 12, 2023: High Society
August 13, 2023: The Angriest Looking Fish You Ever Saw
August 14, 2023: Beehive
August 15, 2023: Bears
August 16, 2023: Plumbing
August 17, 2023: Heavy Metal
August 18, 2023: Free Draw Friday (finished the bears of August 15, 2023).
August 19, 2023: The Matrix
August 20, 2023: Olympics
August 21, 2023: Donkey Kong
August 22, 2023: Galaxy Quest
August 23, 2023: Illustrate Your Reddit Username, Ditto version 2
August 24, 2023: The Muppet Christmas Carol
August 25, 2023: Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
August 26, 2023: Movie Week Free Draw Finale (Raiders of the Lost Ark)
August 27, 2023: News Headline
August 28, 2023: Evolution

You’ve undoubtably noticed that the 30 days were in fact 33 days. Who is counting if they’re having fun?

It was indeed very enjoyable, though tiring. Doing pixel art is as slow as doing coloring pencils (i.e. very slow), at least, for me it is. I could easily spend 6 hours on a pixel art drawing, not counting research and pauses. It wasn’t sustainable on the long run. This is why I stopped as soon as I had another challenge in sight, the photo blogging challenge by micro∙blog, which I repurposed for pixel art, called it SepPixel.

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 07:38:49 +0100

SepPixel for September 18, 2023, prompt: “Fabric."
👾

Sun, 17 Sep 2023 08:59:25 +0100

SepPixel for September 17, 2023, prompt: “Intense”
👾

Sat, 16 Sep 2023 05:58:28 +0100

SepPixel for September 16, 2023, prompt: “Oof!"
👾

Fri, 15 Sep 2023 08:39:37 +0100

SepPixel for September 15, 2023, prompt: “Red."
👾

Thu, 14 Sep 2023 11:15:00 +0100

Thinking of my next art challenge for the month of October. It’s Inktober, yet with cats and in pixel art instead of ink on paper.
👾

Thu, 14 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0100

SepPixel for September 14, 2023, theme: “Statue."
👾

Wed, 13 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0100

SepPixel for September 13, 2023, theme: “Glowing."
👾

Tue, 12 Sep 2023 17:06:21 +0100

Pixel Dailies theme for September 12, 2023 is: “Rulebook."
👾

No rules, no game.

Tue, 12 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0100

SepPixel for September 12, 2023, theme: “Panic."
👾

Mon, 11 Sep 2023 07:50:48 +0100

SepPixel for September 11, 2023, theme: “Retrospect.” If books like Animal Farm have taught us anything, it is that civil society is the only way to advance humanity from the notion that being different is a bad thing.
👾

Sun, 10 Sep 2023 05:58:36 +0100

SepPixel for September 10, 2023, theme: “Cycle”, or perhaps “BiCycle."
👾

Sat, 09 Sep 2023 07:38:34 +0100

SepPixel for September 9, 2023, theme: “Language."
👾

Fri, 08 Sep 2023 14:56:35 +0100

SepPixel for September 8, 2023, theme: “Yonder."
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Thu, 07 Sep 2023 14:37:07 +0100

There’s a new set of 7 prompts for the micro∙blog photo blogging challenge for September 2023. There was a request for more prompts, but I failed miserably by suggesting a very negative word. I was never any good at words or writing or narrative. Not for lack of trying, though. There was more than enough of the latter, just too few successful attempts to matter.

Words, how do they even work?

As for my contribution in pixel art… Let’s say it’s a work in progress.
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Thu, 07 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0100

SepPixel for September 7, 2023, theme: “Panorama."
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Wed, 06 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0100

SepPixel for September 6, 2023, theme: “Well."
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Tue, 05 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0100

SepPixel for September 5, 2023, theme: “Forest."
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Mon, 04 Sep 2023 08:15:45 +0100

SepPixel for September 4, 2023, theme: “Orange."
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Sun, 03 Sep 2023 08:26:16 +0100

SepPixel for September 3, 2023, theme: “Precious."
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Sat, 02 Sep 2023 10:00:00 +0100

SepPixel for September 2, 2023, theme: “Buildup."
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Fri, 01 Sep 2023 09:56:59 +0100

SepPixel for September 1, 2023, theme: “Abstract."
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Thu, 31 Aug 2023 15:10:21 +0100

Why, as I grow more mature as an artist, am I still shooting for what I can’t possibly reach with my art skills? Anyway, I’m prepping myself for another 30 days of pixel art.

Did you know the art of the original Mac was inspired by Matisse, not Picasso? Both are conceptual, abstract artists.
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Thu, 31 Aug 2023 07:48:24 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies, theme: “Transporter”, for August 30, 2023 (so, with a day delay). I got all VW Transporters in my image search, so I opted for a vehicle in extreme perspective. Game Boy format (160 x 144 pixels, 4 colors). Drawing time ± 1 hour.
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Tomorrow starts “SepPixel.”

Wed, 30 Aug 2023 14:25:17 +0100

It’s September 0 negative one, and I hope to join the Micro∙blog September 2023 challenge ~~tomorrow~~the day after tomorrow, not with photography, but with pixel art 🙃

I call it “SepPixel.” Let’s see how this one goes…
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Wed, 30 Aug 2023 08:33:29 +0100

Yesterday’s theme on Pixels Dailies was: “Reaction Image.” I did a quick image search to get an idea and then drew from imagination a WTF face. Pixel art 32 x 32 pixels, 4 colors on an 160 x 144 Game Boy canvas. Drawing time: 1u26m. Not posted on Pixel Dailies.
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Tue, 29 Aug 2023 15:32:12 +0100

Pixel art. I made a Game Boy compatible base image (160 x 144 pixels, 4 colors), though with a different color palette (called “Candypop”). I can now easily add the theme and change the date. Though, the date is today 😬 That’s global timezones for you. I’m happy with it ☺️ … Time: 2u22m, oops 😅
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Tue, 29 Aug 2023 09:41:48 +0100

Pixel art at Game Boy resolution (160 x 144, 4 colors), using a different color palette (candy pop). This is me leaning out from art challenges a bit, not going into details too much. Still, drawing time was 2u25m. Not posted on Pixel Dailies.
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Mon, 28 Aug 2023 16:56:09 +0100

For r/SketchDaily. The final pixel art drawing for this streak of 30 days, illustrating the concept of evolution. As always, I reached for the sky, but got a slight hop out of it in reality. Pixel art for Game Boy Advance (240 x 160, 32 colors).
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Mon, 28 Aug 2023 12:13:00 +0100

Taking breaks is important, especially on days you’d rather spend in bed than making pixel art for the last day (for now) on r/SketchDaily.
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Sun, 27 Aug 2023 10:27:16 +0100

For r/SketchDaily. Off-topic: “News headline.” I obviously misread today’s theme, which is: “Not the onion” (alt theme: onion), and pick a weird headline to illustrate. Nah, I stuck with positivity instead. There’s enough downbeat “news” around. India reached the Moon–unlike Russia–in one piece 👏
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Sat, 26 Aug 2023 14:17:32 +0100

I updated my Reddit avatar (was alt theme on August 23, 2023). It’s 144 x144 pixels, 8 colors, which would fit easily on a Game Boy Advance screen. It illustrates my username, Rasheedity. It’s a mashup between the default Reddit alien and a pony I drew earlier this week.
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Sat, 26 Aug 2023 10:32:40 +0100

For r/SketchDaily. Theme: Movie Week Free Draw Finale, where you draw a favorite that wasn’t mentioned. I chose “Raiders of the Lost Ark”, with a twist. Drawing time: 7 hours in several sessions. Pixel art for Game Boy Advance (240 x160 pixels, 32 colors).
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Fri, 25 Aug 2023 13:51:22 +0100

Two days ago I felt I hadn’t the chops to draw a pony in MLP style to illustrate my Reddit username for r/SketchDaily. Today I remedied that omission by doing just that, draw a pony, in glorious 4-colors 160 by 144 pixels Game Boy art.
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Fri, 25 Aug 2023 13:03:03 +0100

For r/SketchDaily. Theme: “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” He’s literally in a frame, together with a Flash animated MyLittlePony, and videogame Mario. Pixel art for Game Boy Advance (240 x 160 pixels, 32 colors). Drawing time: 5u24m.
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Thu, 24 Aug 2023 12:27:57 +0100

For r/SketchDaily. Theme: “The Muppet Christmas Carol.” I didn’t want to blatantly copy an image from the Internet, so I did sloppy environment drawing and then tried to fix it the best I could. Pixel art for Game Boy Advance (240 x 160, 32 colors).

Added a dancer with 🎩
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Wed, 23 Aug 2023 14:20:02 +0100

For r/SketchDaily. Alt Theme Reddit name illustrated. Actually, it was made for r/MLPDrawingSchool, because it was big 11 years ago, “My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.” My pony drawing skills have been worsened since.
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Tue, 22 Aug 2023 16:59:50 +0100

Originally I wanted to mash up all these shows for my Galaxy Quest r/SketchDaily theme, which would have been to ambitious for a one-day challenge:

Doctor Who
Farscape
Quantum Leap
Aliens
Lost in Space
Galaxy Quest
Battlestar Galactica
Star Wars
Babylon 5
Star Trek
Stargåte

Tue, 22 Aug 2023 14:10:23 +0100

For r/SketchDaily, theme Galaxy Quest. Pixel art for Game Boy Advance (240 x 160, 32 colors). I decided to do a mash-up of the logo’s of Galaxy Quest, Star Wars, and Star Trek.
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Mon, 21 Aug 2023 15:31:55 +0100

For r/SketchDaily. Alt theme Donkey Kong. Pixel art Game Boy Advance (240 x 160, 32 colors).
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Mon, 21 Aug 2023 09:39:36 +0100

Studying shadow on a ball in pixel art. This isn’t easy, and probably full of mistakes.
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Sun, 20 Aug 2023 17:17:54 +0100

Pixel art for r/SketchDaily. Alt theme Olympics. Game Boy Advance pixel art (240 x 160, 32 colors).
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Sat, 19 Aug 2023 14:05:00 +0100

Pixel art for r/SketchDaily, alt theme The Matrix. I decided to make a simple animation with some text and graphics. However, the subreddit doesn’t allow animated GIF, it seems, so I shared one frame instead. Game Boy image format, 160 x 144, 4 colors.
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Sat, 19 Aug 2023 08:36:25 +0100

Practicing pixel art… I continued working on yesterday’s pixel art in Pixaki (it rocks!) To do it justice I’ll need a proper pixel editor like Aseprite, the industry standard. Ah well, tools not art make. If I happen to become a pro, buying a Mac will make much more sense.
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Fri, 18 Aug 2023 18:46:32 +0100

When I saw Pixaki could use the iPad’s pasteboard, I tried copy-and-pasting existing pixel art into Procreate, which has an 1-pixel brush installed. I enlarged the original three times, recreated the color palette, and drew over it in a new layer. I can see that having value, though it’s very slow.
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Fri, 18 Aug 2023 15:26:24 +0100

To prep for a free draw (not based on reference), I did a few pencil sketches to explore the drawing space of anthropomorphized bears. It was only a shallow exploration and even didn’t get my feet wet. I liked the idea of actual gummi bears (the sweets) instead of the Disney ones.

Fri, 18 Aug 2023 14:46:10 +0100

Free Draw Friday on r/SketchDaily! Continued my “Famous Bears” of last Tuesday by refining the five I already did, adding four more, and do a free draw, based on the Gummi Bears. I gave up on guessing a drawing time, who cares? It was so much fun! Exhausting, though 🥱 Can’t keep up 10 hrs per day.
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Fri, 18 Aug 2023 07:57:07 +0100

Work in Progress pixel art for r/SketchDaily Free Draw Friday. I fixed some of the problems I discovered with a fresh look. There’s just one portrait to go. Alas, my ambitions are thusly high, that it might take the rest of the day to pull it off.
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Thu, 17 Aug 2023 15:03:11 +0100

🤣 I hope I can get away with pixeling Po’s silly nephew Fo. I was trying another facial expression than in the reference, which went somewhere in the totally-off-model territory. It’s part of a larger pixel art piece for tomorrow.

In other news, I seem to have misplaced my bottle of alien gummi juice.
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Thu, 17 Aug 2023 10:10:07 +0100

Today’s theme for r/SketchDaily is: Heavy Metal. To generate 1.21 Jigawatts you’d need something with a bit more kick. Game Boy Advance pixel art (240 x 160, 8 colors). Partially traced (save time), mostly drawn from imagination. Drawing time: ± 6 hours. 🙄 If I only had a time machine…
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Wed, 16 Aug 2023 17:06:30 +0100

Work in progress on a pixel art piece for Friday August 18, 2023. It’s a continuation (and refinement) of the piece I did for r/SketchDaily on August 15. The advantage of more time is a disadvantage at the same time, more can be added. Not always a good thing, as the initial vision could be lost.
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Wed, 16 Aug 2023 14:49:40 +0100

Today’s r/SketchDaily theme is plumbing. KISS is a wonderful principle, lost to practice. Game Boy artwork (160 x 144 pixels, 4 colors). Drawing time: 1u40m.
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Tue, 15 Aug 2023 16:14:24 +0100

Today’s r/SketchDaily theme is “🧸 Famous Bears." I was only able to do 5 out of 10 famous bears because I didn’t have enough time. Still, I was enjoying the 64 x 64 pixels portraits so much, that I’ll finish it coming Friday. Drawing time: 7u20m for the whole image, around 50min per portrait.
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Tue, 15 Aug 2023 09:12:51 +0100

Work in progress for today’s r/SketchDaily theme “🧸 Famous Bears." I spent over 3 hours just collecting the references, and setting up the 512 x 512 pixels base image for ten 64 x 64 pixel art clips, to be filled with glorious pixel art imagery. Days are too short to pull off stunts like this…
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Mon, 14 Aug 2023 10:45:11 +0100

Today’s theme for r/SketchDaily is Beehive. I drew Brigitte Bardot in a The Simpsons art style in pixel art that could have been draw on a Game Boy Advance (240 x 160, 16 colors). Drawing time: 2u57m.
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Sun, 13 Aug 2023 13:44:39 +0100

Another self-challenge, this time from Pixel Dailies, theme Gengar. I really didn’t like visiting Twitter (now X), but, luckily, PD is now on Discord too. Drawing time: 1u40m.
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Sun, 13 Aug 2023 10:14:36 +0100

Today’s theme for /r/SketchDaily: The angriest looking fish you ever saw. Pixel art drawn from imagination. Size: 240 x 160, 16 colors. Drawing time: 3u6m.
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Sat, 12 Aug 2023 17:34:26 +0100

Today’s theme of r/SketchDaily is High Society. I interpreted the theme as the 1954 movie with Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, and Frank Sinatra. Pixel art for the Game Boy Advance (240 x 160 pixels, 16 colors). Drawing time a whopping 7u18m, even with tracing and off-model drawing.
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Sat, 12 Aug 2023 12:26:10 +0100

What was I thinking? Work in Progress…
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Fri, 11 Aug 2023 09:11:34 +0100

It’s free draw Friday on r/SketchDaily! I used my own cat photo to do a quick rough sketch from imagination, using the trial version of the ArtStation Pro app on my iPad. Sketch time around ¾ hours. I hope cat toy lasers won’t give cats bad ideas about world domination 🙋‍♂️⚡️🔫🙀

Thu, 10 Aug 2023 12:42:34 +0100

Drawing in pencil without the ability to zoom feels weird. I know I’ll need to have more patience with these live drawings, though the cat was distracted by a fly and stopped posing. Also, it’s a thick pencil lead in the KOH-I-NOOR pencil holder. Exactness is nigh impossible.

Thu, 10 Aug 2023 10:23:23 +0100

My new Reddit avatar is based on the official avatar, upgraded into cute pixel art.
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Thu, 10 Aug 2023 10:03:00 +0100

Today’s theme for r/SketchDaily is Regatta. A search revealed Regatta is an outdoor fashion brand, so I went with that, instead of a boat race. Game Boy pixel artwork (160 by 144 pixels, 4 colors). Drawing time: 2u48m.
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Wed, 09 Aug 2023 13:03:32 +0100

r/SketchDaily alt theme was Gudetama. Small pixel art drawing of this Japanese cartoon character on a Game Boy Advance canvas and a 16-colors palette.
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Tue, 08 Aug 2023 16:59:24 +0100

As most of you may know, the only way to learn something is to commit to it, be it cats, iOS betas, or pixel art. I’m liking my experience with r/SketchDaily, though I realize many of the art subreddits are dead (sometimes no posts since over 3 years). I guess those have gone to Facebook.
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Tue, 08 Aug 2023 10:07:54 +0100

For r/SketchDaily, theme Bump in the Night. Didn’t have much time, so I shrunk it down to 32 by 32 pixels, on my Game Boy compatible canvas (160 x 144 pixels, 4 colors). Drawing time: 1u18m, using Pixaki on 9th gen iPad. I didn’t copy the reference slavishly—it doesn’t work at such a small scale.
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Mon, 07 Aug 2023 16:19:17 +0100

Today’s drawing for r/SketchDaily, theme Moody. Wednesday Addams in front of a decrepit cottage. Reference was heavily used to speed up drawing. Pixel art Game Boy Advance (160 x 140 pixels, 10 colors). Drawing time 3u48m.
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Sun, 06 Aug 2023 10:09:00 +0100

Today’s theme for r/SketchDaily was The Cycle* of Life. I interpreted today’s theme as “young artist” and “mature artist.” Game Boy Advance pixel art 240 x 160, 9 colors. Drawing time 2u58m.
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*Actually, the title was The Circle of Life.

Sat, 05 Aug 2023 17:26:57 +0100

I can remember painting this cat from reference in almost 16 hours straight.

Sat, 05 Aug 2023 14:54:44 +0100

For r/SketchDaily, theme Dusty Old Books. Game Boy Advance pixel art (240 x 160, 11 colors). Titles from a Good Reads list tagged “dusty books.”

Animal Farm, by George Orwell

The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins

The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien

Lord of the Rings; Fellowship of the Ring, by J.R.R. Tolkien

Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, by J.K. Rowling

The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern

Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen

1984, by George Orwell

Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley

Lord of the Flies, by William Golding

Drawing time: 5h02' in 2 sessions.
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Fri, 04 Aug 2023 10:02:07 +0100

Free Draw Friday on r/SketchDaily. Drawn w/ the demo version of ArtStudio Pro on an iPad 9th gen, from a photo of one of my late precious feline friends. This goes sooo much faster than drawing with tiny squares! I can see from tiny errors and overall messiness that I’m a bit rusty, though.

Thu, 03 Aug 2023 15:35:33 +0100

Yep, I can still do traditional art too. Doodling in ArtStudio Pro on iPad, which now has a in-app purchase model, and a life-time purchase too. I’m tempted. The demo version can’t save, but that wasn’t a problem for my mini test-drive.

Thu, 03 Aug 2023 10:39:15 +0100

My daily creations for r/SketchDaily were becoming ridiculously long-winded. Art engagement ≠ art skill. Likes can soon develop into a soul-sucking experience on social media sites. So I simplified. 6 is often enough for one’s art volume. I rather reserve my 11s for special occasions.
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Wed, 02 Aug 2023 15:39:22 +0100

For r/SketchDaily: Puddy Cat and Pepe Le Pew as Romeo and Juliet in disguise. Game Boy pixel art 160 x 144 pixels, 4 colors. Animation frame used as a loose reference.

I am ze locksmith of love, no?

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Tue, 01 Aug 2023 13:44:44 +0100

Finishing up the sandwiches wasn’t really that big of a deal. I suppose that’s my subconscious at work. Still, I worked 7 hours on it in 3 sessions over roughly 17 hours. That’s 10 hours of subconscious internal deliberation. IOW, I slept over my art piece. Next time a bit less intensive, please!
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Mon, 31 Jul 2023 13:52:42 +0100

I drew the microscope from reference (no tracing) and the enlargement of the slide from imagination. I’m particularly proud of the 16 by 16 texture tile made more or less seamless. The microscope and its light and shadows are excellent too, for my usual execution of such objects.
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Sun, 30 Jul 2023 15:41:23 +0100

Instead of running a 26 km long run, I decided to do another sketch for r/SketchDaily. I was feeling somewhat tired and thought it wise to not overreach. The evildoer has won, I guess.
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Sun, 30 Jul 2023 08:16:33 +0100

Despite Reddit being on the fritz, there are still active communities. We artists need challenges to improve, or to just maintain our skill level, even if it means to do the unthinkable (read: surf Reddit with a web browser).
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Sat, 29 Jul 2023 13:21:31 +0100

In about six days I added two more 32 by 32 pixels portraits. These still take about an hour a piece, and I don’t see one minute for a portrait in my future. We will see how things develop, speed-painting wise. I can see progress, though. My pixels aren’t as random as before. That’s good, I think.
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Sat, 29 Jul 2023 09:56:06 +0100

Inspired by a famous British boy-band from the 1960s, I drew this character on a stage, using only four colors at a small screen size (GameBoy portable videogame player from the early 1990s). It wouldn’t be a playable character (96 pixels size), which had to wait until the late 1990s, early 2000s.
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Fri, 28 Jul 2023 11:08:26 +0100

Pixel art portrait from a photo.

The dithering looks wonky, but that’s just inexperience on my part. I need more practice on the drawing fundamentals, specifically for pixel art. Still, it’s the best I could do in a 24 hour period since my previous sketch. So I’m happy 😊
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Thu, 27 Jul 2023 08:52:48 +0100

I wonder… If there would’ve been a descent sketching app on the GameBoy, would I’ve been able to sketch like this? Ah well, it’s a challenge nonetheless, and I hope to get “good” enough to post on there. I’m competing with 4-color pixel art against pencil and paper, after all.
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Wed, 26 Jul 2023 21:19:02 +0100

I drew this on May 11, 2021 on r/SketchDaily, with prompt Quail Quilting Quorum. Too bad Reddit has gone to hell in a hand-basket in the meanwhile, similar to Twitter, now X. I remember drawing the upper left quail from reference and the rest from imagination, based on the reference.
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Wed, 26 Jul 2023 11:15:48 +0100

An attempt at isometric perspective and texture tiling in pixel art. This doesn’t come easy, and requires more practice than a day, obviously.
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Tue, 25 Jul 2023 13:56:46 +0100

MapCrunch.com pixel art shrunken to a tiny scale and only five colors.
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Tue, 25 Jul 2023 09:55:28 +0100

Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall…
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Mon, 24 Jul 2023 15:12:54 +0100

Now I know what to expect, it’s time to tackle some subjects, like this flower, and how to render blurriness with a limited color palette. Let’s say it’s an experiment 😊 Yes, let’s. I’m sure in a year’s time it will look “painfully newbie-ish” to future-me. Until then, I’m happy with the result.
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Mon, 24 Jul 2023 07:44:39 +0100

After more of the tutorial, it’s clear to me that to keep the art interesting, you need to be inventive in every piece, much like in engineering. This is also the case with traditional art, but far less so. Ever pixel piece is practice to learn new techniques, try out new ideas.
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Sun, 23 Jul 2023 09:53:37 +0100

Self-portrait.
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Sat, 22 Jul 2023 14:41:39 +0100

At first I wanted to do one 32x32 pixels portrait per minute, but that turned out to be one per hour. Doing one of these per day shows me how I’m slowly improving my art skills over the days. There’s a lot of zooming in and out, squinting, and cringing over old art involved, as there should be.
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Sat, 22 Jul 2023 09:47:42 +0100

This weekend a pixel art tutorial by former DeviantArtist kiwinuptuo about lines and shading. I plan to extend it with floor shadow and with different drawing techniques. We see how far I’ll get. It’s rather sophisticated, so I’ll take my time. What I won’t do—yet—is texture, nor patterning.
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Fri, 21 Jul 2023 15:01:36 +0100

Call me ignorant for never having heard of Robert Henri before @thatkruegergirl mentioned him in a quote.
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Fri, 21 Jul 2023 09:08:11 +0100

There couldn’t be more opposite movies in cinemas, while two strikes are going on in Hollywood over streaming residuals and a ban on AI script writing. It all is in our heads, in our heads.
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Thu, 20 Jul 2023 08:48:07 +0100

The tv show Mannix was made in the late 1960’s, starring Mike Connors, with theme music by Lalo Schriffin (who also wrote the original Mission Impossible theme, and still composes and performs music at age 91). I traced a screenshot, which isn’t as straigthforward as you would hope at that size.
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Wed, 19 Jul 2023 08:58:10 +0100

For some a promise is just a bunch of words to keep the masses busy with their silly expectations.
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Tue, 18 Jul 2023 07:06:11 +0100

I used to think that the ALT attribute is a kind of image description. Yes it is, but only machine-readable (i.e. for screen readers). For sighted humans, you can use the TITLE attribute or the FIGCAPTION tag, in addition to the ALT attribute. Right-click or long-press to reveal.
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Alt Attribute

Mon, 17 Jul 2023 16:30:14 +0100

Good gracious me, it’s more like 60 minutes than 60 seconds. I have no idea how artists are able to draw so fast. I get lost in details as soon as I pick up a stylus to draw, and forget about any time limit.
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Mon, 17 Jul 2023 08:30:00 +0100

The idea was quick sketches of one minute to speed up my drawing. I failed on the first one, which was more like 30 minutes. Ah well, still 11 to go…
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Sun, 16 Jul 2023 12:54:55 +0100

I suppose I need to practice a lot a lot to even approach the level of a videogame character designer. I comfort myself by stating that, from now on, it only can get better, right?
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Sun, 16 Jul 2023 09:22:09 +0100

I clearly lack the skill and experience of the artists of Street Fighter Alpha, which I need to complete my weekend project 😅 I’m smelling a big F here…
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Sat, 15 Jul 2023 15:14:01 +0100

This work in progress shows I have still a lot to learn. How in tarnation did they draw these game characters? My guess is that this piece of mine will land in the 🗑️ soon enough 😔 Back to the 🎬 I mean.
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Sat, 15 Jul 2023 08:22:12 +0100

Planning my ambitious weekend project of sideline commentary on bulbous sacrilegious smrq* between tech silo ceos.
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*: shameless male raging quibble

Fri, 14 Jul 2023 09:13:57 +0100

I’m trying to draw smaller than 32 by 32, which should teach me to make every pixel have at least one function, as well how to make clumps of pixels be something that can be interpreted through imagination. I still have a long way to go.
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Thu, 13 Jul 2023 10:05:23 +0100

While trying to improve it’s disheartening that the artist lacks an overview of their progress, since they go from artwork to artwork, never seeing a breakthrough, nor an overnight success. What remains is the joy of drawing. Of course, that can easily be had without intent of getting better at it.
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Tue, 11 Jul 2023 10:48:57 +0100

Pixeling on a 32 by 32 pixel canvas is getting easier with every next attempt. Of course, the movie Terminator (1984) has already an 80s look to it, and a 2D platformer on a game console would not surprise me.
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Tue, 11 Jul 2023 07:43:03 +0100

It is said that good artists draw everything. So I drew a bike on a 32 by 32 pixel canvas using a limited color palette. Of course, I used a reference.
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Mon, 10 Jul 2023 15:48:57 +0100

I suppose when taking symbolism too seriously it turns into stereotyping. Here I combined some of the state symbols of Texas ⭐️ into a 16 by 16 pixel character.
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Mon, 10 Jul 2023 08:33:38 +0100

I used a photo reference I took myself of my cat Aziz and tried to recreate a somewhat realistic piece in pixel art on a 32 by 32 canvas. The light is coming from the left and the cat is grounded by a shadow. I’m happy I could capture his cautious nature.
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Fri, 07 Jul 2023 15:53:18 +0100

I don’t put myself above tracing to better understand what I’m drawing. It’s a shortcut used by artists since the invention of the camera obscura, and known to be popular around the second half of the 16th century. It’s like with cheat sheets in school; not needed if you’ve written enough of them.
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Fri, 07 Jul 2023 07:28:55 +0100

Not caring so much about the final result doesn’t always bring greatness, but it brings results which may turn out to be great, or at least descent. Art is as much about the making as it is about showing what you made. Artists, great or not, ship.
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Thu, 06 Jul 2023 09:10:18 +0100

I remember The Man from U.N.C.L.E. as a great spy series from the early 1960’s, starring Robert Vaughn and David McCallum as American Napoleon Solo and Russian Illya Kuryakin. So I drew Solo in pixel art from reference. I haven’t seen it in ages, so I don’t know if it holds up to today’s standards.
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Wed, 05 Jul 2023 15:13:10 +0100

Art used to be an opportunity for self-reflection, art for art’s sake. With mechanical reproduction, art became a commodity, entertainment. With these immersive exhibitions and AI generative art, even the original is nullified. It’s entertainment for entertainment’s sake.

Wed, 05 Jul 2023 14:40:35 +0100

It is sometimes said that practice makes perfect, but a better saying is that practice brings improvement. This is even without a conscience effort—i.e. an art self-critique—to improve. In pixel art readability is always an issue, as with any stylized art. It often relies on shape and contrast.
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Tue, 04 Jul 2023 07:25:13 +0100

The funny thing is how much you need to compromise your art to keep a likeness if your canvas is only 32 by 32 pixels. Still, it IS possible to cram a whole scene into it, if you put your mind to it and squint a lot. I’ll be so happy once I’m able to do that.
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Mon, 03 Jul 2023 07:44:12 +0100

Another pixel portrait, building on some of the art fundamentals I refreshed recently, and really need to do more of to continue. Still using the 16 bit art nouveau palette, which I like a lot. More in the alt description.
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Sun, 02 Jul 2023 16:35:44 +0100

This is still a crude study of a master painting by a 19th century animal painter under the pseudonym “Raphael Olaria”, which I partially painted over with pixel art (256 x 173) on my iPad with a limited color palette called “16 color art nouveau."
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Sun, 02 Jul 2023 15:12:47 +0100

Here’s some simple fan art animation inspired by Leo Laport’s This Week in Tech show I made 14 years ago, and which still makes me jump for joy when I see it.

Sun, 02 Jul 2023 07:35:50 +0100

I suppose one has to start somewhere. My animal drawing is still lacking, especially of those long-haired breeds. Still, I gave it my best attempt. Maybe I need to study some master paintings.
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Sat, 01 Jul 2023 14:46:29 +0100

This one of 32 by 32 pixels took me several hours and two iterations to complete.
👾

Sat, 01 Jul 2023 11:08:36 +0100

Creating portraits in pixel art reminds how important it is to be mindful while making art, not to just follow a recipe or rely on what you’ve done before. Each artwork has to be intuitive at first, then more contemplative as you continue. Then take a break, and start again, using one’s intuition.

Sat, 01 Jul 2023 07:14:20 +0100

More creativity, I suppose?
👾

Fri, 30 Jun 2023 08:54:10 +0100

I suppose it’s good to try being creative…
👾

Mon, 10 Apr 2023 16:33:40 +0100

The Secret to Drawing Overwhelming Detail! by Stephen Travers Art on YT.

The main secret is to draw the effect of detail rather than detail itself.

Thu, 06 Apr 2023 15:16:05 +0100

Drawing from imagination is always a struggle for me, while for some it comes naturally, so it seems. Mind you, I used references, as is the smart thing to do. The hand is drawn mirrored, though, or it’s held on the other side of the head.

Sat, 01 Apr 2023 13:49:58 +0100

Doodling while watching YouTube videos. From my history:

Make ‘Em Laugh, Somewhere Over The Rainbow, Heal The World, Do-Re-Mi, Day-o (Banana Boat Song), A-team theme, Mannix theme, Singing In The Rain, Eye Of The Tiger, The Avengers theme, Adventures of the Gummi Bears theme, Colors of the Wind

Sat, 01 Apr 2023 09:09:55 +0100

So I (sorta) took part in the March 2023 photo challenge of micro.blog. Only I didn’t take photos, but made sketches, mostly with pencil on paper. I did use the prompts. However, I didn’t always post on the appropriate day. Of course, I wasn’t included in the daily grid of photos.

Sat, 01 Apr 2023 08:21:06 +0100

Thu, 30 Mar 2023 21:55:45 +0100

Wed, 29 Mar 2023 08:18:25 +0100

Tue, 28 Mar 2023 14:32:30 +0100

Tue, 28 Mar 2023 07:37:18 +0100

Mon, 27 Mar 2023 07:41:29 +0100

Sat, 25 Mar 2023 09:08:20 +0100

Fri, 24 Mar 2023 15:33:30 +0100

Fri, 24 Mar 2023 08:08:36 +0100

Wed, 22 Mar 2023 10:56:52 +0100

Tue, 21 Mar 2023 12:43:02 +0100

Mon, 20 Mar 2023 07:58:56 +0100

Sun, 19 Mar 2023 19:44:05 +0100

Sat, 18 Mar 2023 08:11:25 +0100

Fri, 17 Mar 2023 08:37:16 +0100

Thu, 16 Mar 2023 08:10:11 +0100

Tue, 14 Mar 2023 20:24:35 +0100

Sketching ought to reach for the sky, while keeping things simple, IOW think big, draw small, tentative, unassuming, approachable. Making things look easy (so the viewer can relate) is hard work, takes time and patience. 🎨

Mon, 13 Mar 2023 13:54:31 +0100

Sun, 12 Mar 2023 17:57:43 +0100

Sat, 11 Mar 2023 10:00:00 +0100

Fri, 10 Mar 2023 13:17:16 +0100

Thu, 09 Mar 2023 08:27:56 +0100

Wed, 08 Mar 2023 08:48:37 +0100

Tue, 07 Mar 2023 15:50:17 +0100

Mon, 06 Mar 2023 13:04:28 +0100

Mon, 06 Mar 2023 08:27:33 +0100

Sat, 04 Mar 2023 13:09:06 +0100

Fri, 03 Mar 2023 20:17:55 +0100

I should keep drawing animals, and slowly my skill should improve.
🎨🐱

Fri, 03 Mar 2023 11:45:16 +0100

Thu, 02 Mar 2023 12:37:00 +0100

Wed, 01 Mar 2023 15:52:45 +0100

Sat, 25 Feb 2023 14:48:09 +0100

I can see that a combination of drawing sloppily and with more intent can have a lasting effect if you do it daily. Having a good order of operations helps too, drawing from big and rough to smaller and more detailed. It’s something an AI can never do, since it doesn’t draw.
🎨

Thu, 23 Feb 2023 16:16:07 +0100

I can see there’s something wrong with this sketch of a cat, and I know why it’s wrong, but not what is wrong. Drawing from reference does not mean copying the thing. Since it’s so below average, I guess it doesn’t matter.
🎨

Wed, 22 Feb 2023 20:47:17 +0100

You say it’s only a paper moon, sailing over a cardboard sea. But it wouldn’t be make believe if you believed in me.

Wed, 22 Feb 2023 15:30:03 +0100

Knowing that what I drew is most likely not very similar to the reference is one thing. Telling myself it isn’t any good is just a silly thing. That it’s different from what I expected, sure, but bad? Excepting one’s shortcomings is tough, especially not wanting to except.
🦆🎨

Tue, 21 Feb 2023 18:02:00 +0100

Drawing skill is mostly an observational skill, be it direct or from imagination. I’ve always noticed that I’m slow; it takes time to absorb information, which means I often get it wrong. Still, practice makes better.
🎨

Mon, 20 Feb 2023 13:59:37 +0100

When I spend considerably more time on a drawing, a few things happen. First I see how horribly off my initial sketch was, because it doesn’t all fit together, nor is there any resemblence. Then I see minimal improvement on what I drew before. Maybe this is how it goes, badly?
🎨

Sat, 18 Feb 2023 12:39:54 +0100

Doodling all these ducks made me realize that these resemble ducks more than for example bears or crabs. Drawing duck-like shapes with intent is perhaps the best to aim for ATM. Making them do something interesting may be still too hard.
🦆🎨

Fri, 17 Feb 2023 15:51:28 +0100

Seeing the flaws 👎 in what’s been drawn is easy; finding ways to prevent 👷 them (read: correct them in your mind before committing to paper), not so much. Here I tried simple shapes (boxes, triangles, ovals) and relative sizes. Still full of mistakes, yet a step up 📈
🐶🎨

Sat, 11 Feb 2023 08:21:19 +0100

The obligatory cat sitting inside and thinking outside the box, ogling for mischief.
🎨🐱📦👿💥🧸🗑

Fri, 10 Feb 2023 14:17:15 +0100

People drawn as chess pieces?
🎨

Tue, 07 Feb 2023 12:53:22 +0100

There’s an idea that any drawings are better than no drawings. This may result in “bad drawings.” That’s a good thing, since it demonstrates taste. Still, these doodles together feel to me like a wall of shame, because I know I could do better (so why aren’t I?).
🎨

Sat, 04 Feb 2023 12:14:37 +0100

Mentioned on the recdiffs podcast 201 Lessons on How to Draw by Hokusai
🎨

Thu, 02 Feb 2023 08:09:47 +0100

I had this idea of combining something I like with something I don’t. It’s a sketch drawing. I liked the texture on the smoking apparatus. Patrick looks quite wonky. I used references but didn’t copy.
⚓️🎨

Wed, 01 Feb 2023 14:16:16 +0100

There’s a tendency in me that says that if I practice hard enough, I can draw anything I want with ease. I think I need to revise that into: if I practice often enough, I don’t mind doing what takes time and effort. Of course, subject matter matters, a lot.
🐭🎨

Tue, 31 Jan 2023 15:09:08 +0100

The last day of the challenge month I tried to do more than usual. If I go by what “serious” artists claim, drawing for an hour a day isn’t going to bring much improvement in skill. Their aim is every waking moment 😨 I am not that serious, TBH. Maybe that’s my problem.
✏️🎨

Mon, 30 Jan 2023 09:09:12 +0100

The sketches below are of the quality I wasn’t willing to share, since they aren’t finished (rendered). However, getting the shape right is important too, and rendering is overestimated most of the times. I tried to start with simple shapes and elaborate on those.
🐰🎨

Sun, 29 Jan 2023 16:30:41 +0100

This month’s art challenge turned out to be a disappointment. Nevertheless, here’s a dog I drew today. It turns out that every artist needs to develop their own way of sketching. Still, drawing from simple shapes is a good way to draw from memory, instead of copying a photo.
🐶🎨

Mon, 16 Jan 2023 13:03:02 +0100

Yesterday I was too tired to draw (or do anything else but rest). Today’s sketches seem so off-model, yet they still resemble somewhat their references. I guess they’re Frankenhorses' severed heads.
🐴🎨

Sat, 14 Jan 2023 19:40:36 +0100

To speed things up, I rushed through the tutorial and quickly sketched a portrait of a beautiful cat. Maybe not the best way to learn how to draw, but it is, after all, a challenge.
🐱🎨

Sat, 14 Jan 2023 14:59:20 +0100

I’m not doing tutorials about how to draw animals. Getting far into a drawing and then realizing your anatomy is off, is both frustrating and enlightening, an opportunity to learn something. I need to get better at simplifying what I see, so I can easily correct it early on.
🐤🎨

Sat, 14 Jan 2023 10:22:00 +0100

I did the bird-in-flight drawing exercise from my art instructional book. The author wrote she based it on a photo, so I guess I should do that as well. Drawing a flying bird from direct observation seems nigh on impossible.
🎨

Fri, 13 Jan 2023 17:29:48 +0100

Although I have little experience with drawing dogs, nor with drawing a long shaggy coat, I’m somewhat pleased with the result. Maybe I should be worried. Am I losing artistic refinement?
🐕🎨

Thu, 12 Jan 2023 21:20:03 +0100

I’m so accustomed to seeing cats and kittens, that I had a hard time accepting the flaws. So I drew stick kittens on top of a printed photo and transfered those onto my drawing as a base. Still seeing those flaws, though 😖 so I skipped the coat markings.
🎨

Wed, 11 Jan 2023 16:29:50 +0100

I’ve sketched dogs before, but only from a photo. To catch up, I didn’t take very much time, so the quality isn’t really there.
🎨

Wed, 11 Jan 2023 09:28:49 +0100

I hadn’t drawn a hedgehog before, and was puzzled by this specimen’s white spines, especially how to draw them. It turns you don’t; you draw the negative space, or, in this case, what’s visible of the black base of each hair. It’s a work in progress.
🎨

Mon, 09 Jan 2023 13:53:20 +0100

I guess I should give up on making the best drawings I can, since that slows me down. OTOH, this sketch resembles a pig, but it very messy, which isn’t making me proud. Then, if only 5% of your creative work makes you proud, you’re top of the line, I’m told.
🎨

Sat, 07 Jan 2023 18:28:43 +0100

I saw a documentary on YT about Darkwing Duck, that was supposed to be called “Double-O-Duck”, as a spinoff of Duck Tales. That inspired me enough to stop the video and start drawing. I have these markers, so I should make use of them, shouldn’t I?
🎨

Sat, 07 Jan 2023 14:50:10 +0100

I experienced the process of internalizing at a small scale when I sketched this Holstein-Frisian cow from a photo reference. In this process, you learn the rules, purposefully forget about them, and do everything as if it comes naturally. Alas, I haven’t drawn cows enough to draw them from memory, using construction and previsualization. I tried it, but failed miserably. So, instead, I more or less copied a photo, not by tracing, but by redrawing. Still, redrawing is a step up, skill-wise, from downright tracing.

It took a few hours, though, to forget what I read about how how to draw cows, how they show off their anatomy, easily stylized as a balloon-bellies suspended as a tent on a skeleton. But then, milk cows, as the over-bred animals they are, tend to be exaggerated versions of their prehistoric counterparts, the aurochs. They are bred to produce milk, and if having a calf wasn’t necessary to start the lactation flow, they wouldn’t even have offspring either.

🎨

(Un)realistic expectations

Fri, 06 Jan 2023 16:31:40 +0100

It turned out the art challenge that I gave myself for January 2023 wasn’t very realistic. Look at what I wanted to make:

animal drawings that are somewhat realistic and colored with markers

I’m not very skilled at drawing animals, realistic or otherwise, nor at coloring with markers.

It turns out that the tutorials about drawing animals aren’t very helpful. The basics of drawing aren’t included in those tutorials, nor are the basics of drawing mammals (which is often meant with “animals”). Luckily, I have some art instructional books that do, but those require study and years of practice.

Am I giving up? No. But I do have to lower my expectations, a lot a lot.

So far I’ve drawn:

sitting cat
mouse
rabbit
horse

Still 30 to go. I should speed up a bit, since the month has only 25 days left.

🎨

Thu, 05 Jan 2023 16:04:58 +0100

I’m struggling to get the 34 animal drawings done in 31 days. It’s already day 5, I’ve studied 3 animals and drawn none so far. I guess it’s the perfectionist in me trying—and succeeding—to interfere with finishing. The sketches are entertaining, though, based on photos.
🎨

Wed, 04 Jan 2023 08:44:34 +0100

The animal after the cat was, of course, the mouse. After doing the tutorial on drawing mice, I tried to draw from photo reference, using the construction method from the tutorial. It’s becoming clear all mammals have a similar body plan: head, front, mid, hind sections, tail.
🎨

Mon, 02 Jan 2023 19:47:26 +0100

I know what this looks like. When I construct the cat, it doesn’t look like the cat in the photo, and when I draw from the photo, it doesn’t look like a cat, but like a photo of a cat. I will move on to the next animal before I get too frustrated. I’m already a day behind. 🎨

Art Challenge for January (?) 2023

Mon, 02 Jan 2023 08:58:07 +0100

The question was if I’m up to the art challenge of drawing animals. Only one way to find out, draw…

So this is the current state of my drawing skills, it seems. It isn’t bad, although it’s easy to see its plentiful flaws. I thought it wasn’t a good enough sketch to create a full colored drawing with markers.

Time to re-evaluate my initial art challenge, learn how to draw animals in the month of January 2023. That seems a setup for failure 😞 So, a more realistic challenge is to use a couple of months to achieve this goal. I want to be at least able to complete a few colored drawings this month. For now I have two of my own cats to draw, one of which is no longer alive (so I can’t draw him from direct observation). It’s only one of the 34 drawings to make, but I’m sticking to it. The important thing is to remember to have fun, not to be a slave to the challenge. Who knows, I might get 34 drawings done this month.

It’s already clear why so many fail at this stage. Not meeting prior expectations is tough. However, it is what it is, and things can only get better from now on. Trust the process. Practice will make better.

Extending a challenge

Sat, 31 Dec 2022 16:08:56 +0100

In November 2022 I did the micro∙blog November blogging challenge, to blog every day of the month. I completed the challenge and received my special achievement pin. Aside from writing a microblog of no more than 280 characters, I also added a drawing from my notebook.

The latter was so much fun, that I decided to continue the challenge—extend it—on my own. I called it my Microblogextended challenge. For all 31 days of December, I drew and wrote, even on Christmas and Boxing day, despite of day trips with my sister. I found the time to do it.

Here is the list:

In the last week I decided I need another challenge to keep me going. This time it will be a pure art challenge, drawing animals from an art instructional book that is out of print. I got that book as a Christmas present.

I’m really proud of myself I finished this challenge, though humbled by the inconsistency in quality and art style. That needs to change.

Sat, 31 Dec 2022 14:55:20 +0100

Base

As a self-taught artist I don’t have a solid foundation in art-making. I’m aware of the art fundamentals, but never studied them thoroughly. Even so, I didn’t want to go out on a whimper, so I gave it all I got.
🎨🍂✍️

Thinking about workflow…

Fri, 30 Dec 2022 14:06:12 +0100

For my January 2023 challenge, I’ll be drawing 34 illustrations of animals with alcohol-based markers. I have Ohuhu pastel color markers, special marker paper and mixed media paper. However, sketching and designing on that paper with pencil leaves a mess, since the pencil marks can’t be fully erased and muddy the marker colors due smearing of graphite by the tip of the marker. It makes much more sense to design on a separate sheet, and then transfer the final version using carbon paper and a ballpoint pen. I could take it even further, and design on an iPad, print it out, and transfer using carbon paper and a ballpoint pen.

Designing and sketching digitally is cheaper and faster than with pencil on paper. I can simply draw the different stages of the sketch in a separate layer while lowering the opacity of the previous layer. In analog you would partially erase the previous stage and draw on top of it. I should try both, and see what works best for me.

I thought about coloring in Procreate on the iPad as well, which would add (unwanted) complications, time and cost. Digital colors differ from analog colors, and the effect of paper is hard to reproduce, I know from past experience. So I will be coloring with alcohol-based markers. I have little personal experience with those, but I’ve seen enough YouTube videos to know how to use them, in principle. I’m sure I’ll be watching loads more videos while coloring. The whole plan, after all, is to learn how to draw by doing and watching how others do it, steal their ideas, in a good way.

Digitizing the analog art is best done with a quality camera on a tripod, except that I don’t own such a camera. I do have a scanner (all-in-one with scanner and monochrome laser printer), though scanned colors tend to look washed out a bit with the bright light. Furthermore, the size is limited to A4, which isn’t a problem for this challenge, since A4 is big enough for drawing individual animals.

Eventually I want to use a light-box for transferring sketches and a budget digital camera for digitizing, so I can work on a larger canvas. Those things cost money, and I’m on a budget. I use what I have and if I start getting more skilled, I could sell some of the art to buy the equipment. Who knows…

After digitizing I need to put it somewhere, so others can see it. For now I’ll be using my Flickr account. I paid for it, so I should definitely use it.

To remove any kinks as soon as possible, it makes sense to first complete a piece before continuing to the next piece. This isn’t factory work; it’s artwork.

I’m also not expecting professional results which could be sold. The only thing I expect is that I’m able to draw animals somewhat convincingly, in the sense that others can recognize what animal it is supposed to be. It doesn’t have to be photorealistic; I’d rather have it be sketchy and loose, more impressionistic, left to the imagination of the viewer.

Only two more days. I’m excited!

Fri, 30 Dec 2022 08:42:34 +0100

Sand

While sand is abundant on the Earth’s surface, it takes a special kind of coarse sand to use for building things, like concrete, silicon wafers, sand castles. It’s finer than pebbles, coarser than silt, so you can grab hold of it, yet not feel individual particles 🏖️
🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 29 Dec 2022 07:30:14 +0100

Examination

The magnifying glass is the staple for the lone sleuth who solves cases the police can’t by lack of intelligence and work ethic. This is, of course, a fantasy version of detective work 🕵️‍♂️
🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 28 Dec 2022 16:01:47 +0100

Parade

When it said “parade”, my imagination went to “marching band”, and the few times in my life (especially when I was in my preteens) I noticed them. They are a lively bunch, attracting immediate attention from the whole neighborhood. In sports events they are a staple.
🎨🍂✍️

Tue, 27 Dec 2022 15:17:44 +0100

One person’s trash is supposedly another person’s Xmas treasure. They were bought on a whim, yet never used. I hope I’ll put them to good use.
🐱🎨📚

Tue, 27 Dec 2022 06:59:52 +0100

Defendant

In my experience, when personal attachments are involved, being impartial is almost impossible. We cannot but be irrational about who (or what) we love. I suppose a certain Christmas present will make me continue doing a challenge about drawing cats.
🎨✍️🍂

Mon, 26 Dec 2022 08:04:51 +0100

Chance

Happy 📦ing Day—day of buying schmancy goods at bargain prices.

Now what’s the probability that I didn’t cheat at this ballpoint pen drawing? I had to mirror (eww!) the baby’s right hand, because I seem to have difficulties remembering what’s left and right 😅
🎨🍂✍️

Sun, 25 Dec 2022 07:41:37 +0100

🌿

The alien PLANT was PLANTed as a disguised PLANT with PLANTs to conquer the world with 🎁 presents and 🥰 love.

H^appy C_hristmas ‼️

Sat, 24 Dec 2022 16:00:43 +0100

Forest

Many authors believe in the statement, show don’t tell. However, saturating the readers minds with an abundance of details will put them off, confuse them to no end. There is such a thing as too much. I’m guilty to this as well. Trimming the fat the good way is hard.
🎨🍂✍️

Fri, 23 Dec 2022 10:24:55 +0100

Fault

Creatives deal with the hard reality that comfort while making, as if by an artisan AI bot, probably is reproducing, not creating. The end product looks so great because of established, proven to work—hence are not creative—workflows. That ”F” teaches us to do better.
🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 22 Dec 2022 20:54:08 +0100

Nationalist

I guess I’m not very patriotic myself. We don’t do a mandatory pledge of allegiance where I live, mostly because of freedom of religion, and separation of church and state. Although populism is certainly a thing here, extreme nationalism is frowned upon.
🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 21 Dec 2022 18:21:40 +0100

Hike

I suppose I never made a long hike. The problem is that I can’t leave my cats alone for longer than a day. Day trips I have done, several times. The longest day hike I can remember was about 60 km in 14 hours, in summer, no water. That was a mistake, as is the drawing.
🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 21 Dec 2022 08:24:06 +0100

The random blogging prompt for December 21 is:

hike

🎨

Tue, 20 Dec 2022 14:58:45 +0100

I tried some Mathologer stuff, and found it very hard to replicate. Often it’s just too hard for me to follow. Maybe I’m just too old or scatterbrained. I’m seriously contemplating to enter my doodles in Doodleaddicts, aka DA, not to be confused with deviantART.
🎨♾✖️➗➕➖🟰

Tue, 20 Dec 2022 12:36:29 +0100

Peasant

I watched a documentary about the European medieval history of peasants and landlords, and how 80 percent of the population worked the land. Some (70%) were serfs, and not all were poor, as you might expect. They were mostly neglected, though.
🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 19 Dec 2022 15:56:16 +0100

Dribble

Knowledge and experience are similar in the sense that they both come in small quantities and accumulate over time. It makes me realize how little I know, and that I can’t possibly know it all. And then there are things we can never know nor live through.
🎨🍂✍️

Sun, 18 Dec 2022 21:12:43 +0100

Drawn in French Girls App on August 20, 2016. Even back then, there were “technical difficulties”. Apparently, few things have changed since then.
🎨

Sun, 18 Dec 2022 10:40:48 +0100

Brain

Literature often returns to this mysterious organ on top of our bodies. Be it Frankenstein who got a bad one, or the scarecrow from Oz who had one after all (spoiler!). Alas, its response often makes no sense, hence the mysteriousness.
🧠🎨🍂✍️

Sat, 17 Dec 2022 15:51:58 +0100

Lump

Recent developments with AI on online artists communities (DeviantArt and ArtStation) make clear that art and artists are denied any deference for their key role in society. No consent is deemed necessary. So sad 😞
🎨🍂✍️

Fri, 16 Dec 2022 08:53:31 +0100

Sticky

When you’re on a web service that’s full of fun and interesting people, that service tends to be sticky in a nice way. When that service turns sour from misbehavior, it’s sticky in an uncomfortable way. You might even call it fishy, since it reeks from discontent.
🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 15 Dec 2022 18:33:30 +0100

Split

The guys from the Connected podcast left Twitter en masse, because they couldn’t take the verbal attacks, bigotry and downright neo-nazism anymore. I can only hope they will become happier by no longer reading what a bunch of close-minded idiots think is free speech.
🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 14 Dec 2022 17:33:02 +0100

The question remains if I should explore ballpoint pen art, knowing my failure rate at pursuing such topics has been 100%. Well, actually, I was too passionate and burned out before I approached anything like mastering. I should pace myself.
🎨🖊

Wed, 14 Dec 2022 10:28:51 +0100

attic

There’s a place in many houses where stuff is stored, or, more accurately stated, stowed away until people move house (and sometimes not even then). Up and away out of people’s minds.
🎨🍂✍️

Tue, 13 Dec 2022 09:31:37 +0100

I grew up in the era of the Apollo space program, and see it as how human explore space. Of course, robotic space exploration is much safer for humans and requires less onboard support. Therefore, robots have gone further into deep space than human ever would or could.
🚀🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 12 Dec 2022 12:40:08 +0100

Instead of a mastadon, they could’ve opted for another trumpeting being, the swan or goose. »hôngk«
🎨🦢

I suppose they call it a computer 🐁 mouse, not a computer 🐀 rat (or 🐹 hamster), for good reasons?

Who knows?

Mon, 12 Dec 2022 08:29:45 +0100

Regular

Today is a swanny kind of day—normal in any other sense. I tried to do something different than I’m used to, because I never could follow instructions anyway, and loathe going the same route every day. Not very smart, though, getting myself in awkward situations.
🎨🍂✍️

Sun, 11 Dec 2022 18:46:08 +0100

Chimpanzee

On July 14, 1960 Jane Goodall began her 6 year study on the human-like behavior of chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania. Since all species closely related to humans are extinct, the endangered chimpanzee is now evolutionary the closest to us.
🎨🍂✍️

Sat, 10 Dec 2022 17:52:03 +0100

Average

My art has it written all over it. It’s the mean value of a set of numbers, yet originally derived from the Arabic averie, which means the damage after a ship has been wrecked. Re my art, I just have to keep pushing, not give up. Eventually it will improve.
🎨🍂✍️

Fri, 09 Dec 2022 18:54:47 +0100

Fence

I had such a great sketch in mind… Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea after all. Sometime you need to adjust an ambitious plan. Anyway, I need to sketch more from reference, without downright copying, see the big shapes, and copy those.
🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 08 Dec 2022 14:20:17 +0100

Squash

I highly recommend against an image search on this word, since you cannot unsee when what seems funny in a cartoon world has happened in real life. More disgusting is that someone actually photographed and uploaded it. This is why we can’t have nice things ☹️
👶🏏😱📸🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 07 Dec 2022 11:34:04 +0100

Hip

Not in any way an admirer of fast fashion, I’m pretty unaware what is fashionable and trendy. It seems all so exploitative and wasteful. The idea seems to be to wear something for a few weeks, then throw it away and buy something else. It’s very trendy with the youth.
🐑🎨🍂✍️

Tue, 06 Dec 2022 15:33:06 +0100

Auto-NomNom-Y

Many want cars that drive themselves, so they can munch while being transported. It’s like Elon’s DC against Nikola’s AC, yet not at all, and certainly impossible when there are people involved, some of whom feel more equal than those who are not (like) them.
🐖🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 05 Dec 2022 08:26:01 +0100

Seat

The red and blue chair, designed by Gerrit Rietveld between 1919 and 1922. It was an attempt to make good minimalist furniture available to the masses. It was priced in 1923 at ƒ15 (± €126 nowadays). Professionally made replicas retail for €1500 and up.
🤑🪑🎨🍂✍️👾

Sun, 04 Dec 2022 16:40:07 +0100

Proportion

I always had problems with measuring; I was never very exact with it. For drawing it meant that likeness required more work and more attention. Even though it doesn’t look like it, the sketch took me over 90 minutes and still it’s all wrong, wrong, wrong!
😖🎨🍂✍️

Sat, 03 Dec 2022 08:22:57 +0100

.is

Iceland is an altogether unique island state which an active volcano and stunning landscapes, and a surprising temperate climate for its Northern latitude, so close to the arctic circle.
🎨🍂✍️

Fri, 02 Dec 2022 16:23:54 +0100

Occupy

People can take over prominent places for a peacefully protest against the growing embarrassment of riches. Similarly can a cartoon character embarrass an artist by pointing at some rather off-model mugshots, despite many hours of preparatory sketches.
😅🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 01 Dec 2022 08:34:14 +0100

Jest(est)

When I think of a comedian, Buster Keaton comes to mind. He’s supposed to be the master of physical comedy (slapstick), yet I know so little about him. I’m sure most of his work is in the public domain, so studying it should be easy enough.
🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 30 Nov 2022 20:01:02 +0100

A quick test. There will be a learning curve. But hey, learning new stuff is fun.
🎨🖊

Wed, 30 Nov 2022 09:28:36 +0100

Safety

Most security IRL is based on inconvenience rather than impenetrability. Locks can be picked. A locked door inconveniences more than an unlocked door (since a lock requires a key or knowledge and equipment to pick that lock). More locks inconvenience more, duh!
🔒🎨🍂✍️

Tue, 29 Nov 2022 19:01:19 +0100

I always wondered why my cats are so strong…
💪🐱🎨

My Microblogvember 2022 (so far…)

Tue, 29 Nov 2022 15:35:15 +0100

I didn’t compete in the very first microblogvember in 2019. It’s a self-challenge to blog every day on the timeline of micro∙blog for the month of November. This year, 2022, will be my first attempt to beat any procrastination to create that might come up during a month. I’ve done 29 of the 29 days so far, with only one day to go. I think I’ll manage the last one.

Here are 29 word prompts (and my solutions):

Figure (Musk buying twitter)
Feast (guinea pigs)
License (Micro∙camp)
Admiration (Gollum)
Exemption (House owners)
Echo (Beethoven)
Insight (spacecraft)
Consensus (superheroes)
Certain (Sherlock Holmes)
Minister (TV series)
Display (Adrian Black)
Suspicion (Hitchcock)
Adjust (heating)
Leave (of senses)
Aluminium (the chemical)
Franchise (Superman)
Barrel (beer vat)
Tire (kitten from playing)
Novel (fantasy)
Repeat (Commodore 64)
Ice (age)
Graze (box)
Update (Microblog News)
Retain (Medieval prison)
Ritual (Black Friday)
Commitment (Hunchback of Notre Dame)
Motivation (Willy Wonka)
Trend (life lesson)
Fish (barracuda)

Mind you, I’m not stopping when November 30 ends. I will keep going, from “November 31” up to and including “November 61” 🤣 After the last official prompt for November 2022 from the @challenges@micro.blog account, I’ll continue with randomwordgenerator on my own. Hopefully by then I’ll have colored ballpoint pens, so I can make it more interesting to look at.

So, my self-challenge ends with the year 2022. Until then, it’ll be nose to the grindstone and solve the current daily prompt with a sketch and some words. I guess I’ll evaluate how it went in the New Year.

If you’re asking yourself why I drew in a notebook with lines, it’s a self-depreciation built in, so I can’t worry about such silly thoughts. It’s already bad for drawing to begin with. I can only make it better.

✍️

Tue, 29 Nov 2022 08:29:36 +0100

Fish

When Jacques-Yves Cousteau wanted to swim with the fishes, he had to invent self-contained underwater breathing apparatus (S.C.U.B.A.). What he saw made him want to protect it, since we humans were (and still are) destroying it with our exploitation of the sea.
🐟🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 28 Nov 2022 08:19:44 +0100

Trend

I can see my (hobbyist) art getting better with each year I practice, yet still have ebbs and flows in both quality and quantity. It’s frustrating to seemingly have crossed a threshold, only to see my enthusiasm wane because of some outside force or event.
🎨🍂✍️

Sun, 27 Nov 2022 08:58:40 +0100

Motivation

The little people don’t need much to make them do what you want them to do. Refined sugar will often do it, hyperactively so.
🍭🎨🍂✍️

Sat, 26 Nov 2022 22:27:30 +0100

I’ve done some research on drawing with a ballpoint pen, and it seems it’s in the indelible nature of the medium that practice is quintessential.
🎨🖊️

Sat, 26 Nov 2022 07:40:14 +0100

Commitment

Romantic involvement often doesn’t lead to immediate engagement or even infatuation, maybe a slight tolerance of being close at best. It’s recipe for disappointment and tragedy as life put its claws into a budding relationship.
💍🎭💀🎨🍂✍️

Fri, 25 Nov 2022 07:45:13 +0100

Ritual

It is said all things come in threes. Black in the numbers, black in the thoughts and black (and blue) in the face. Online buyers, beware of all kinds of shenanigans today!
🎁😈🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 24 Nov 2022 07:09:19 +0100

Retain

How do you keep your employees in your failing social media company? Well, those who aren’t bound with feudal bonds as foreign workers you lock up with strict contracts under NDA, and throw away the key. It seems ye olden days of cruel overlords are back, baby.
🏰🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 23 Nov 2022 07:11:47 +0100

Update

We get the latest news about micro∙blog from @manton@manton.org.
🎨🍂✍️

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 15:42:49 +0100

I guess there are lessons to be learned here.

Keep that point clean!
Spend more time on analyzing the big shapes, then carefully draft then looking at the reference, not the drawing.

Other than that, I’m pleased with this messy drawing, for now.
🎨✍️

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 11:54:49 +0100

Great ballpoint drawing tips from Jess Karp on YT. The most important:

forget it’s a ballpoint pen; treat it as a pencil
use a paper scrap to regularly clean the tip
build your values in layers

Inspired me to sketch some faces from the micro∙blog Discovery Tab.
🎨

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 08:00:34 +0100

As per that previous post for microblogvember, I need to teach myself to draw everyday objects to a level that it’s recognizable as the object. Random scribbles aren’t going to cut it.
🎨

Tue, 22 Nov 2022 07:51:28 +0100

Graze

I had no idea there were boxes filled with delicious food you can mindlessly eat from, like a sheep in a meadow.
🐑🍱🥳🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 21 Nov 2022 08:03:40 +0100

Ice

Her frozen lips felt odd. Days she had been looking for her herd. There’s warmth and safety in numbers. More eyes see further. The biting wind makes it hard to think. Soon sleep will come, everlasting slumber.
🦣🧊🥶🎨🍂✍️

Sun, 20 Nov 2022 07:54:45 +0100

Repeat

In the olden days we all could still write computer programs to illustrate today’s prompt. It isn’t old, though, but retro. It was a brief period when one person could still fully grasp every aspect of their computer and create carefree.
🎨🍂✍️👨‍💻

Sat, 19 Nov 2022 08:33:52 +0100

Novel

Tell me a story, one you haven’t told me before and can be read in a book or any medium stories are told in. Make it a good story I can get lost in.
🎨🍂✍️

Fri, 18 Nov 2022 08:05:45 +0100

Tire

It delivers a cushioned ride after so much exhaustion that a towel was thrown.
🛞😩😼🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 17 Nov 2022 07:53:46 +0100

Barrel

Some people like to enter a scene unannounced for dramatic effect, to draw attention to themselves. It inevitably results in a lot of eye rolling and sighs. It all looks so natural on TV, but in real life, not so much.
🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 16 Nov 2022 15:50:50 +0100

Since this month I’m doing ballpoint sketches in my notebook, it makes only sense to upload a selfie in a similar style.
🎨

Wed, 16 Nov 2022 09:08:05 +0100

Franchise

As the sole survivor of a planetary accident, you’ve gotta accessorize and establish a brand before expanding into broader ventures.
😆🎯™️🎨🍂✍️

Tue, 15 Nov 2022 07:33:30 +0100

Aluminium

Very energy intensive to make, cheap enough for 500 kg on average per person per year to be consumed in foil, cans, cars, airplanes, and what not. It’s so reactive, that it forms a dull layer of oxide on its surface almost immediately, in turn pretty inert.
🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 14 Nov 2022 06:47:54 +0100

Leave

With all this financial brouhaha going on in my life, the urge to let go of my sanity is rising rapidly. So what to ditch and what to keep? Since I’m likely not the only one, lay-offs are inevitable. First-world problems, for certain. Why can’t that Russian idiot go?
😜🎨🍂✍️

Sun, 13 Nov 2022 06:01:51 +0100

Adjust

With the falling of the leaves I had to turn on the heat in my home. It wasn’t as carefree as in yesteryears, because fuel prices have risen spectacularly, especially of natural gas. I blame Russia.
🎨🍂✍️

Sat, 12 Nov 2022 06:32:03 +0100

Suspicion

Isn’t it rather odd that a well-dressed man has a third class train ticket in a first class compartment, lending money from a passenger for the surcharge? He obviously is not to be trusted…
🎨🎬🍂✍️

Fri, 11 Nov 2022 08:11:49 +0100

Cathode Ray Tube Display

As Adrian Black often explains on his retro computer YouTube channel, cathode ray tubes are disposables, meaning they wear with use. Either they are dim or don’t work at all, but can be revived sometimes, making Adrian exclaim with enthusiasm.
🎨👨‍💻🍂✍️

Thu, 10 Nov 2022 07:41:10 +0100

Yes Minister

A British political satire sitcom aired on BBC2 from 1980 to 1984. It follows the ministerial career of Jim Hacker in his struggle to govern in opposition of a conservative civil service, personified by permanent secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby.
🎨📺🍂✍️

Wed, 09 Nov 2022 08:09:22 +0100

Certain

There seem to be no absolutes in the world we inhabit.
🎨🍂✍️

Tue, 08 Nov 2022 09:06:36 +0100

Consensus

For people to agree on anything, they all first need to know what to do, why to do it, and who it’s for.
🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 07 Nov 2022 14:26:30 +0100

InSight

This lander-explorer is packed with instruments to probe the interior of the Red Planet.
🚀🎨🍂✍️

Sun, 06 Nov 2022 08:17:03 +0100

Echo chamber of greatness

dun-dun-dun-dunnn

Thusly most remember the famous fifth symphony by Ludwig Von Beethoven. It’s part of Western culture, and it sounds through everything we do so much, we don’t even hear it anymore.
🎨🎵🍂✍️

Sat, 05 Nov 2022 08:18:14 +0100

Exempt

As a home renter I wasn’t aware of the protection home owners get in certain states of the USA.
🎨🍂✍️

Fri, 04 Nov 2022 07:53:25 +0100

Admiration

If we admit it or not, we all have our role models, people we look up to and would want to emulate to better ourselves, be it race car driver, teacher or a tech entrepreneur. Our society wouldn’t be as great as it is if we couldn’t imagine a better world.
🎨🍂✍️

Thu, 03 Nov 2022 08:14:02 +0100

License

Gatekeepers think that creatives need them to make precious goods, are even owed eternal gratitude and 30 percent payment of anything third parties produce. That didn’t stop some to still make their own stuff, despite rules and restrictions of the big guys.
🎨🍂✍️

Wed, 02 Nov 2022 08:05:34 +0100

Feast

Behold in the beast’s eye the celebration of what’s to come.
🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 31 Oct 2022 20:08:04 +0100

Figure

A certain multi-billionaire bought a social media site for a large sum of money. The impression he left was of a bull in a china shop, guessing he could get away with it, like 3, 2, 1 … liftoff!
🎨🍂✍️

Mon, 17 Oct 2022 14:25:16 +0100

I suppose as long as I’m still worried about the result rather than enjoying the process, I can’t but be patient until my inner voice shuts the h*$!l up. Until it does, I should only draw when I feel like drawing, not to fulfill some imagined daily duty to draw 🎨 Inktober Fail.

Mon, 26 Sep 2022 12:37:35 +0100

Silly idea in pixel art 🎨 for a Strava profile pic. I won’t be using it, though.
👾

Aside from the clear spelling error.

Sat, 24 Sep 2022 05:56:04 +0100

And the struggle continues. Only 7 days left for Inktober Classic and only a poor observational skill to help me through 31 drawings from direct observation. It won’t be pretty, nor (even remotely) compete with established pen artists on Instagram, if I even knew who they were. 🎨

Tue, 20 Sep 2022 06:18:42 +0100

Based on a fuzzy photo in the rain, this morning I used it as a reference for this pencil sketch. The result is what it is, but it’s a result despite the fear of failure. The latter is silly 🙃 since nothing is threatening me, nor has failing real consequences. 🎨

Tue, 13 Sep 2022 12:28:33 +0100

Today’s ballpoint pen sketch from observation. It’s still hard to get into the mood of drawing, especially if there’s so much noise around to distract me 🎨

Mon, 12 Sep 2022 15:09:58 +0100

Observational sketch with ballpoint pen in a notebook 🎨

Sat, 10 Sep 2022 07:33:46 +0100

More experimenting. I made a frame of 120 x 108 mm on paper in my notebook and sketched a fox from a photo reference with ballpoint pen. Next I scanned it and tried to create a pixel art outline, which I filled with flat colors. 🎨 It’s too many steps to feel “easy to do."
👾

Fri, 09 Sep 2022 15:23:41 +0100

So perhaps I should do some urban sketching with a notebook and a pen. Here’s two sketches of my two Bengal cats in low-low resolution (16x16) 🎨🐱Perhaps the resolution should be more like 64x64 pixels for better recognizability, or even higher, 160x144. So more experiments…
👾

Fri, 09 Sep 2022 14:01:56 +0100

So swordtember turned out to be a big failure. It seems I’m really bad at routine and habit forming. Nevertheless, I turned to Reddit gets Drawn, and drew this woman 🎨 No idea if I can keep this up. I haven’t posted it on Reddit, because I don’t like it myself, so why would she?
👾

Mon, 05 Sep 2022 09:47:04 +0100

This month I’m doing swordtember. Number 1 is the longsword, done as pixel art
👾🎨

Mon, 05 Sep 2022 08:26:44 +0100

I like the design esthetics of this pixel art drawing I made in August. After being burnt out from self-challenges earlier this year, maybe I should pick up my Apple Pencil again, and join one of the many online suggestions for artistic self-challenges, only more selective this time. If a criterium (draw every day) becomes a target, it loses its usefulness
👾🎨

Wed, 18 May 2022 08:04:45 +0100

Another reason for me to avoid challenges, or, at least, put a strict limit on the number of challenges. I can really break down mentally. Ah well, we do what we can, don’t we? I’m happy I caught it and acted appropriately. No more challenges for a couple of months for me.
👾

Wed, 11 May 2022 12:27:42 +0100

Micro∙blog May challenge day 11, “maroon.” Marooned with a tricylce on a maroon colored brick wall.
👾 📷🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 10 May 2022 11:57:24 +0100

Pixel Dailies for 8 May 2022 was a quicky, because I was behind. The theme was “organic.” Playing organ with fruit in my mind.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 10 May 2022 07:23:25 +0100

Micro∙blog May challenge, day 10, “pot.” As usual, words have different meanings, be it a jar or a herb.
👾 📷🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 09 May 2022 12:42:37 +0100

Day 9 of micro∙blog May challenge #mbm, “bloom.” I have added two kinds of “bloom.” The third is made of iron.
👾 📷🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 08 May 2022 10:50:34 +0100

Day 8 of the micro∙blog May challenge, “union.” 👯‍♂️🐱📷🎨

Sun, 08 May 2022 07:10:57 +0100

Today’s prompt for Pixel Dailies was “clock.” I chose a water clock, the most ancient version of a timepiece, assumably, as an artifact over 6000 years old.
👾⏱🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 07 May 2022 11:44:00 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies task was to “pixel a set of units for a Tower Defense game.” I had to look that up, because I had no clue of what was meant, and now I do, nor what I was supposed to draw.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 07 May 2022 07:54:21 +0100

Today’s prompt for the micro∙blog May challenge #mbm was “park.” I recently visited the chapel dedicated to Saint Gertrude of Nivelles, and added some pixel art.
👾 📷🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 06 May 2022 08:19:00 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “mario64.” I had this complicated fake 3D walk cycle in mind, when I remembered the slogan “think big, draw small.” This usually works when in time constraint.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 05 May 2022 23:12:21 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 What have I set myself up to for the Pixel Dailies challenge? This may take more hours than there are in a single day.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 05 May 2022 10:51:00 +0100

Today’s micro∙blog May challenge was “earth.” I tried to imagine how Shovel Knight would do a workout in his free time. He moves earth… with a shovel.
👾 📷🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 05 May 2022 07:20:03 +0100

The theme for today’s Pixel Dailies was “split.” I loosely based my drawing on the James Bond character Oddjob.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 04 May 2022 11:05:00 +0100

The fourth day of the micro∙blog May challenge was hard, because I had too many solutions. People afraid of burglars can get in a thorny situation when people cutting their hands in a nightly climbing exercise sue the owners for damages, like cuts.
👾 📷🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 03 May 2022 16:24:04 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was isolated, and I chose Worf’s discommendation (from Star Trek NG s03e17 “Sins of the Father."
👾🖖 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 03 May 2022 07:52:00 +0100

Micro∙blog May challenge, day 3, prompt “experimental.” This is an experimental flying carpet, clearly.
👾 😸🦄📷🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 02 May 2022 17:56:00 +0100

My entry for the MB May challenge, day 1, prompt “switch.” The switch is connected to the lamp in the pixel drawing. #mbmay
👾

Mon, 02 May 2022 16:22:20 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “Treasure Hunter.”
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 01 May 2022 16:56:57 +0100

Pixel Dailies for 1 May 2022, theme “Treasure Guardian."
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Pixel Dailies for the month of April 2022

Sat, 30 Apr 2022 19:05:56 +0100

I titled this month April Fool’s Month, to extend the first day of April to a whole month of pranks and fun. It was also the month Elon Musk tried to buy Twitter, with the premise that “free speech” would be his overall theme for changing the social media service.

Like so many with me, I’ve weaned myself from Twitter (and Facebook). The only exceptions for me are the Pixel_Dailies account, and daily theme bot PD_Theme. Those accounts kept me there for my daily pixel art prompt. My reasoning was that if I want to improve my pixel art, I should do it more often. Spending many hours every day on pushing pixels in the Pixaki app on my regular (non-pro) iPad would certainly do that!

Judging from the 30 pixel art drawings below, I think I reached a next skill level. More importantly, I kept at it. All too often with previous challenges I gave up, didn’t take it seriously anymore, because that it the easy way to deal with a challenge. In the past month I regularly had to give myself a talking to motivate myself to pick up the iPad and start drawing.

If Twitter eventually changes into a place I no longer can identify with, there are other avenues for art prompts, specifically for pixel art. And if even that wouldn’t work, I can always go back to drawing with a pencil on paper.

Now I’ve tasted a modicum of success, I want more!

I also discovered why artists keep their intermediate steps to themselves. It spoils the surprise. Presentation is an important part of enjoying art, so the artist needs to make it as impactful as possible. I certainly am a novice when it comes to presenting my art.

Then there’s learning the tricks of the trade, art as a skill, instead of a vision. As usual, there are many approaches, and not every approach suits every artist. However, the human vision system is as it is, and using it to the artist’s advantage is a basic ability every artist worth their efforts should apply to their art.

Pixel art is limited by its small size, so placing pixels of the correct color in a meaningful pattern is rather important, if not crucial to the art form. It makes it highly suggestive and imaginative, and that is especially why it appeals to me. The tedium of likeness of more traditional art can bore the art maker so that they try to find stylistic shortcuts to avoid it, leaving out details the eye expects and can infer from what’s already there. Room for interpretation by the beholder is as old as the cave paintings of the Stone Age. Pixel art is no different in that respect. Still, there’s a lot to learn here for me.

There are certainly art styles, personal and cultural preferences of how to implement an artistic vision, as I discovered, but I haven’t scratched the surface on those either. Since I couldn’t find much publicly available in writing about pixel art style specifically, I guess I have to use insights of art teachers and critics in other art disciplines. There certainly are lesson plans available, but those are mostly restricted to a (local) educational system behind a paywall.

As is often claimed by experienced artists: “Art as a field is both wide and deep.” Even veterans in pixel art keep learning new things, improving their skills. It’s impossible to know everything and no longer improve as an artist.

Ah, there’s no end to this, bliss!
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 30 Apr 2022 16:52:00 +0100

Pixel art animation for the final day of April Fool’s Month 2022, using Pixel Dailies and the theme “Loop.” I could’ve gone allout, but decided to apply “think big, draw small."
👾 🐥🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 30 Apr 2022 08:55:06 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 It’s the ultimate day of April Fool’s Month. I was inspired to draw one of the Terminators in the border. Will it be a dystopian future of abandonment, or will I start a new chapter in my artistic journey? Only time will tell…
👾 🎭😉🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 29 Apr 2022 16:28:00 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies on the penultimate day of April Fool’s Month, themed “paperweight.” I searched for Ghibli cat and got among others a plushy, which I used as reference.
👾🐥🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 28 Apr 2022 20:20:40 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies on the 28th day of April Fool’s Month, using the theme “dive.” I went for a cartoon duck diving into a swimming pool, because silliness? Anyway, loads of fun making this one .
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 27 Apr 2022 18:23:00 +0100

Pixel art. Today is the 27th day of April Fool’s Month and the Pixel Dailies theme was “skewer.” It’s Kuroko Shirai from the Anime series “A Certain Scientific Railgun”, a 13 year old level 4 teleport master, who can teleport those spikes into baddies.
👾 🐥🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 27 Apr 2022 12:22:51 +0100

I don’t yet know what today’s theme will be for Pixel Dailies. I do know that day 27 of April Fool’s Month is Kingsday here in the Netherlands, or, as we call it: “Koningsdag.” It’s one of those oddities in a parliamentary monarchy.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 26 Apr 2022 15:47:03 +0100

Pixel art animation. On the 26th day of April Fool’s Month the Pixel Dailies theme was “phonebooth.” It immediately reminded me of the S-guy.
👾 🦸‍♂️🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 26 Apr 2022 07:06:57 +0100

Pixel art. I suppose an abandonned family pet best illustrated today’s Pixel Dailies theme “bleak."
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 25 Apr 2022 10:05:16 +0100

Pixel art. I spent too much time on this piece. One thing I learned is that lettering in perspective is hard and the result rather disappointing. I suppose it’s best to avoid it, whenever possible.
👾 🍭🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 24 Apr 2022 15:13:06 +0100

Pixel art. The 24th day of April Fool’s Month had a Pixel Dailies theme “table.” I tried to make it a fancy table in isometric perspective.
👾 🪑🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 23 Apr 2022 17:59:32 +0100

Pixel art. On day 23 of April Fool’s Month the Pixel Dailies theme was “sea food.” I interpreted as “sea banquet”, which is a kind of chocolate delicatessen in the shapes of stylized sea creatures.
👾 🍫🐥🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 23 Apr 2022 08:43:20 +0100

Pixel art. I made this piece to practice design and lettering, both subjects that need practicing a lot in my case (I’m weak in these). My inspiration were the Viking myths. FYI, horned helmets on warriors were never a thing in reality, nor would they’ve been practical.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 22 Apr 2022 16:28:00 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “garnish.” I combined it with the feisty Evanlyn from John Fanagan’s The Ranger’s Apprentice medieval fantasy series.
👾 🐥🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 22 Apr 2022 11:42:34 +0100

Pixel art. I made a black and white drawing with Grafx2 on my Raspberry Pi 400, using a mouse. I refined it on my iPad using Pixaki, and created a simple (though crude) animation.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 21 Apr 2022 15:47:36 +0100

Pixel art. The Pixel Dailies theme for day 21 of April Fool’s Month is “prize”, which I interpreted as a token for a final position in a competition (in this case, first place).
👾 🥇🖥👨‍🎨🎨🐥

Thu, 21 Apr 2022 06:18:49 +0100

Pixel art. For the 20th day of April Fool’s Month the Pixel Dailies theme was “Healing Item.” I’m pretty sure this is a fantasy videogame thing, so I went for a more mundane solution, a band-aid.
👾 🩹🐥🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 19 Apr 2022 21:59:00 +0100

Pixel art for the 19th day of April Fool’s Month. I suppose this piece got “shatnered.” It’s today’s theme of Pixel Dailies, “shattered” which I basterdized with some James T. Kirk.
👾 🖖🖥👨‍🎨🎨🐥

Mon, 18 Apr 2022 18:59:17 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s theme of Pixel Dailies was “Heavy Machinery.” This truck came out of my youthful imagination.
👾 🏗🖥👨‍🎨🎨🐥

Sun, 17 Apr 2022 19:42:00 +0100

Pixel art. On the 17th day of April Fool’s Month the Pixel Dailies theme was “Isometric Room.” You can shift around furniture without bothering about redrawing perspective 🪑🖥👨‍🎨🎨

PS The next morning I redrew part of the room, fixing mistakes I made.
👾

Sat, 16 Apr 2022 19:58:58 +0100

Pixel art on the 16th day of April Fool’s Month for Pixel Dailies. Today’s theme was “elephant."
👾 🐘🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 15 Apr 2022 15:55:39 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies. First person perspective is hard, because we know it so well, we see any and every flaw, especially if it’s with hands.
👾 🔫🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 15 Apr 2022 12:54:02 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 My cat was sleeping, so I tried to use his shape for my pixel drawing. Now waiting for Pixel Dailies at the halfway point of April Fool’s Month.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 14 Apr 2022 18:57:34 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “hair accessory.” I simply drew closely to the photo reference, though not copying, rather re-interpreting the photo.
👾 💇‍♀️🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 14 Apr 2022 09:20:00 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 As a warmup for day 14 of April Fool’s Month, featuring Pixel Dailies, I’m following a YT tutorial on a stylized aquatic bird man. I got as far as these two guides.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 13 Apr 2022 19:26:35 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “exploded view.” I made an animation of a running shoe in such a view.
👾👟🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 13 Apr 2022 10:38:12 +0100

Pixel art animation. Practicing sub-pixel animation with a 32x32 pixels canvas. It’s supposed to illustrate “storm.” It all started with the umbrella. Don’t many story ideas do? Umbrellas are magical story devices, protecting us from the elements and possible assailants.
👾 🌂 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 12 Apr 2022 14:15:39 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies, theme “trash.” I threw in two half-eaten apples, some crumpled up paper, a soda can, an Oscar statue, and some indistinguishable bits.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 12 Apr 2022 12:00:30 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 I searched for llama and tried to sketch one in pixels without tracing 🦙 Now waiting for today’s Pixel Dailies theme.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 12 Apr 2022 08:18:47 +0100

Practicing pixel art animation.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 11 Apr 2022 16:09:16 +0100

Pixel art for today’s Pixel Dailies in April Fool’s Month. The theme was “pirate”.
👾 🏴‍☠️🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 11 Apr 2022 08:35:17 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 Grasping at straws for ideas on the 11th day of April Fool’s Month is bringing out the honking 🤡 stereotypes. Practicing for Pixel Dailies, later today.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 10 Apr 2022 17:06:00 +0100

Pixel art. Wow, this was rather complicated to make! Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “puzzle.” I made a solvable jigsaw puzzle of Qbert
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 10 Apr 2022 13:40:01 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 I suppose I drew a horse-drawn “mobile home,” aka gipsy caravan.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 10 Apr 2022 08:58:00 +0100

Pixel art. Now I’ve included the description of the Pixel Dailies theme daily in every piece for some time, I suppose it’s time to develop my own (more readable) pixel font. I had an impromptu font, but it wasn’t all that good. This one is—or seems to be—a lot better.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 09 Apr 2022 17:18:08 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies, theme “rainbow tree.” I never heard before of an Eucalyptus deglupta, aka rainbow tree.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 09 Apr 2022 13:40:00 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 Today’s practice piece is probably again more elaborate than the actual Pixel Dailies piece. This one is based on Vicky the Viking.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 09 Apr 2022 08:54:00 +0100

Pixel art. There’s a lot to know 🙇‍♂️ about lines—curves in general—in this art form, as it is a basic component of drawing and drafting, and the separation the human vision system perceives between differently colored blocks. Smoothing is done selectively with anti-aliasing.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 08 Apr 2022 20:13:00 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was rather late (hence I had to rush it), and called “cute but deadly.” I opted for a cute knife with a curly pink heft.
👾 🥹🔪🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 08 Apr 2022 17:27:26 +0100

While waiting for the new Pixel Dailies theme, I explored the magic of bitmapped text, as applied to pixel art. I wrote in Adobe Fresco, posterized to 5 levels, then pixeled the letters pixel-by-pixel, with imagination. It hasn’t received anti-aliasing, which is tricky.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 08 Apr 2022 13:04:51 +0100

Pixel art. I refined the previous drawing, and made it into a funny statement. It’s a non-serious 😉 Star Wars/Trek 🌌🖖 crossover. I find it curious how publishing makes me see any flaws I didn’t notice beforehand.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 08 Apr 2022 10:54:50 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 So this is my practice piece for today, being the 8th day of April Fool’s Month. It’s called “Obi-Wan 💩🪐” It was a lot of running around, but I’m still pleased with it, in a funny way.
👾 🤪 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 08 Apr 2022 09:14:48 +0100

Pixel art 👾🚧 On the 8th day of April Fool’s Month I chose Obi-Wan to be my only hope 🌌 It’s not finished, but the head is. I didn’t trace, which explains why it took 2.5 hours to draw it. It’s drawn in Pixaki, an iPad app.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 07 Apr 2022 20:10:09 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “robes.” I know little of clothing, so this was an impossible challenge for me. Ah well.
👾 😅🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 07 Apr 2022 09:43:34 +0100

Pixel art 👾🚧 Intuitively, both Idefix and Apple’s quote seemed appropriate for the 7th day of April Fool’s Month. BTW, I’m still waiting for today’s Pixel Dailies theme.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 06 Apr 2022 15:13:41 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “tower.” The restriction of exact dimensions didn’t feel restrictive, so I added animation in the 20x60 pixels frame.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 06 Apr 2022 09:48:00 +0100

Pixel art WIP 👾 🚧 On the 6th day of April 🤡 Fool’s month, I’m sure the Pixel Dailies art prompt will be challenging and grand.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 05 Apr 2022 17:43:08 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s theme of Pixel Dailies was “embankment.” I kept it simple.
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Tue, 05 Apr 2022 10:59:00 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 Continuing April Fool’s Dayish silliness. Not knowing what today’s PD theme will be is perhaps twice as fun as knowing.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

I don't like likes

Tue, 05 Apr 2022 08:35:00 +0100

I’m still present on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, but I don’t frequent those places anymore, for various reasons. One common reason is that they use public bookmarks, also known as “likes.” Because of the glyph (heart or thumbs up), people seem to equate this feature to a token of appreciation, or even approval. While this is great for the platform owner (read: user engagement and stickiness of the platform), and the giver of said tokens (positive social interaction and a feeling of accomplishment), for the receiver these tokens are rather impersonal and meaningless.

At the moment, I’m trying to improve my skills on pixel art. Unlike traditional art, there doesn’t seem to exist a formal education for this art form (some even don’t consider it art, but that’s another story). So most pixel artists are self-taught, which is totally fine. However, artists need feedback about their art, which they can get from other artists, by example. By studying other artists you can learn a lot about the art in general, technique, subject matter, etc.

So I joined Pixel Dailies on Twitter. This is a daily art prompt (called a theme) for pixel art. You can post your attempt on Twitter with a hashtag #pixel_dailies So I did, for more than a month. I noticed some (slow) change in my behavior. I kept looking for statistics, specifically how many likes each piece got. I didn’t look at other artists' pieces, just at how many likes my piece got. I suppose this is how Twitter tries to draw people in, by an obsession over empty social interaction.

So I stopped, cold turkey. This wasn’t helping me at all. Now I need to wean myself (again) of an addiction to likes.

Likes are, in my opinion, meaningless and hollow because of lack of context. Likes can be out of pity or even habit. They can be a sign of approval, and withholding likes can be seen as a micro-critique. I just don’t know, unless the like goes with a comment. The only comments I got were similar to like your work. While this is encouraging, sweet and polite, no word about what specifically they liked about my work and what they possibly didn’t like, so I could possibly focus on that next time, if I agreed.

The problem, of course, is that people feel tongue-tied because all conversation on Twitter is in public. All too often a gentle back-and-forth between two people is spoiled by bystanders (and bots) who use it to create a debate, or—hopefully in their thinking—drama, as to relieve boredom (supposedly, because I don’t know them and their circumstances either). So hitting the “like” button is safer for everyone, but, because it’s rather meaningless in low specificity, the effect is the opposite from what the sender might expect. It annoys the artist, specifically this artist.

Perhaps I’m expecting too much from places like Twitter. Twitter isn’t an artists' community, of course, but rather a hen house, a place where like-minded people seek confirmation of their thoughts and ideas, or act out their petty behavior towards fellow humans.

Anyway, this piece of text was about likes, and how I came to experience that I don’t like them. If you don’t want to interact with specifics, only through empty tokens, why interact at all, aside from addiction to likes?

Likes on social networks, in my experience, are a bug, not a feature.

I’ll keep using Twitter for the daily art prompt, and look at other artists' art, but I’m no longer posting pixel art that is taxing my artistic skills. Sure, once I’ve established myself, I might again use Twitter to interact with art lovers. However, that’s far into the future. Right now I need to focus on my skills and how to improve them. Spending hours on Twitter isn’t going to accomplish that, I’m afraid..
👾

Mon, 04 Apr 2022 18:52:34 +0100

Pixel art. Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “wild”, which I interpreted as a “wild man”, reaching from my wild imagination.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 04 Apr 2022 09:01:00 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 While waiting for today’s PD theme, I sketched Robot Archie. I always thought of him (it?) as a modern day knight, with a remote.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 03 Apr 2022 20:31:06 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art theme was Castle In The Sky, or Laputa. I based it on the original, by Jonathan Swift, not the adaptation by Studio Ghibli.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Sun, 03 Apr 2022 07:57:21 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 The PD theme has yet to be announced, so I can better be squarely 🧽 ready for third 🤡 April Fool’s day.
👾 🤪🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Sat, 02 Apr 2022 16:59:49 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art theme on second April’s Fools day was 🦇🤦‍♂️ Batman 🤔 but which one, the one bitten by a ☢️🕷radioactive spider, perhaps?
👾 🙃🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Sat, 02 Apr 2022 08:18:54 +0100

Pixel art practicing anti-aliasing. Based on the ebook I bought recently.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Fri, 01 Apr 2022 21:12:58 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies, which seemed like a joke theme. I took it seriously, though.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Fri, 01 Apr 2022 18:10:51 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 I guess PD is pulling our legs with this theme on the day after March 31.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Fri, 01 Apr 2022 12:26:00 +0100

Trying to apply my new knowledge to pixel art.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Thu, 31 Mar 2022 17:19:00 +0100

Pixel art. Before I looked it up, I had no idea what today’s Pixel Dailies theme warp pad was.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Thu, 31 Mar 2022 07:27:32 +0100

Animating still pixel art is certainly the next level up, which I have yet to reach. All the elements are there, just not the execution. Creating strong key poses is a big leap, in between poses probably even more so.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Wed, 30 Mar 2022 17:02:33 +0100

Today’s (second) pixel art theme of Pixel Dailies is shopping mall, a place I prefer to avoid whenever possible.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Wed, 30 Mar 2022 07:41:28 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art theme was “seal.” I chose the cuter meaning of that word.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Tue, 29 Mar 2022 12:24:47 +0100

Pixel art. The stay-at-home sea pirate needed a lot more than a hat. I’m putting this project on hold, for it’s too complicated for a quick fix.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Tue, 29 Mar 2022 11:04:00 +0100

Pixel art. Testing my new Twitter avatar, inspired by the old stay-at-home sea pirate. I think he still needs a hat worthy of a captain.
👾 🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Mon, 28 Mar 2022 19:57:45 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art theme was all about the bird’s eye view perspective. Lots of new things I had to invent here.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 27 Mar 2022 19:19:50 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art theme “construction” I interpreted as repair work, which I assume is a kind of construction, although sometimes it feels more like wrecking, especially how I do my repairs (badly).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

PS Notice my totally Freudian artist’s slip of two left hands.

Sun, 27 Mar 2022 09:37:45 +0100

Pixel art animation at only 24x24 pixels.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 26 Mar 2022 18:41:00 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art theme was “shrub.” I felt inspired by the Knights who say “Ni.” Made a typo, tho.
👾 😬 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 26 Mar 2022 12:38:12 +0100

Pixel art with GrafX2 on Raspberry Pi OS. I did some tweaking in Pixaki on the iPad. An elderly pixel editor like GrafX2 certainly has its own look and feel.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 26 Mar 2022 09:08:29 +0100

Pixel art. Some C64 multicolor high resolution graphics. Well, it was hires for the time, 320 x 200 pixels, reduced to 160 x 200 double pixels in m.c. hires.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 25 Mar 2022 19:28:26 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art had the theme Kirby. I know not of any Kirby, videogame, vacuum cleaner, or otherwise.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 25 Mar 2022 08:41:04 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art was hard to come up with, easy enough to implement. Of course, everything is easy once you know what to do.
👾 😬😎 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 24 Mar 2022 09:58:33 +0100

Pixel art. A modest cup of coffee.
👾 ☕️🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 23 Mar 2022 22:37:46 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “smear frame.” I had no idea how to implement this, but I finally arrived at this solution for pixel art.
👾

Wed, 23 Mar 2022 14:36:00 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 This must be a videogame term, since I never heard of the term smear frame.
👾

Tue, 22 Mar 2022 23:15:13 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies prompt was “flyer.” I had to fold an actual airplane out of paper to be able to make the animation.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 22 Mar 2022 15:15:00 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies for the prompt “Red Panda.” This was, again, a lot a lot of work and fiddling, yet rewarding in the end.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 22 Mar 2022 09:38:00 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 Today’s PD prompt is Red Panda. I finished the border and background in roughly four hours, and I still haven’t done the actual panda(s). It wouldn’t surprise me if I needed at least a similar amount of time to finish this piece—much too long for a daily prompt.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 21 Mar 2022 21:40:00 +0100

I shrunk down a pixel art piece I did earlier today (lunchbox) from 160 x 144 to 32 x32 oixels, to its bare essentials, I hope.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 21 Mar 2022 17:34:22 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies, with the prompt “lunch box.” It’s like it takes me longer every time to make one of these. Some of these are more popular than others on Twitter, but that might just be the algorithm trying to lure me into spending more time on Twitter.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 21 Mar 2022 08:18:46 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 I only hope spending two hours on the frame, not the content, was time spent well, probably not.
👾 😂 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 20 Mar 2022 09:19:30 +0100

Pixel art. Get set, ready, go-o-o! Just for fun.
👾 😄 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 19 Mar 2022 21:12:02 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies, prompt “Rusty.” My take was the good Dalek from the Peter Capaldi era (Doctor Who).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 19 Mar 2022 16:29:43 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 I want this to be a more elaborate piece, so I’ll be taking my sweet time. The rectangles are for designing two characters interacting semi-hostile. The brunt of the art will be in setting the mood with props and background.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 19 Mar 2022 11:19:57 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art prompt was “treasure map."
👾 🏴‍☠Arrr!! 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 18 Mar 2022 12:35:11 +0100

Pixel art. 1-bit battle cry.
👾 ⚔️😂🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 18 Mar 2022 10:26:39 +0100

Pixel art. I asked myself, am I good enough to demo my pixel art making on Twitch, despite most artists using a Mac or Windows? To test, I video screenshot my creation of a sprite in Pixaki on iPad, sped up the video 10 times. I guess not yet, too slow.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 17 Mar 2022 23:17:00 +0100

Pixel art texturing a pineapple.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 17 Mar 2022 17:15:23 +0100

Today’s pixel art for Pixel Dailies has the prompt “avery.” Sometimes the literal interpretation is the only I can come up with.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 17 Mar 2022 09:54:00 +0100

In pixel art, so I’m lectured, the artist has control over single pixels. To test this statement, I created a pixel portrait of Fred Astaire from a black and white photo reference. I guess it’s a work in progress.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 16 Mar 2022 22:41:00 +0100

Pixel art for the Pixel Dailies prompt “gold.” I’m working in advance, since the PD account tweeter is on UK time, close to my local CET time zone.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 16 Mar 2022 12:13:15 +0100

Pixel art for today’s Pixel Dailies required a rough sketch before pixeling. The prompt was garland, which is distinct from wreath and laurel, so you know (well, I didn’t beforehand).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 15 Mar 2022 12:31:36 +0100

Pixel art Today’s Pixel Dailies prompt “windswept” I interpreted as a sailing boat in a storm.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 15 Mar 2022 09:15:29 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 The ship is designed, scaled and rendered, despite a severe lack of ship design knowledge. My inspiration was the Heron from John Flanagan’s The Brotherband Chronicles, a fantasy Middle Ages young adult story about fictional Vikings, called Scandians.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 14 Mar 2022 20:08:23 +0100

Pixel art for tomorrow. The way to get better at a skill is to think big and execute small, so you’ll have to make it up as you go.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 14 Mar 2022 13:06:48 +0100

Pixel art. I always seem to post my images before they’re done. For some reason they don’t seem real until they’re published. No idea why that is.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 14 Mar 2022 12:13:40 +0100

Pixel art, Pixel Dailies with an old-timey palette of muted colors.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 13 Mar 2022 11:16:14 +0100

Pixel art gradients are best done by hand, not with an automated tool. That much is clear, and that it’s time-consuming.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 13 Mar 2022 08:33:00 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art has gone piscine.
👾 🐟🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 12 Mar 2022 18:11:00 +0100

Second pixel art entry for Pixel Dailies. I’m sure this is the warped reality for any parent or pet parent.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 12 Mar 2022 09:51:57 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art theme is in the shadows.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 11 Mar 2022 10:28:00 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art turned out quite different than I had imagined yesterday. I also did a little sketch beforehand.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 10 Mar 2022 22:43:34 +0100

Pixel art. Can’t hurt to practice portraits. This one is from imagination, because I’ve drawn so many portraits already in the past twenty years.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 10 Mar 2022 22:32:47 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 Experimenting with walk animation to see if an 16x16 px character is big enough for my purposes. I guess I want more canvas, though I know a tough restriction is good for the artist’s soul. Pixaki is sluggish and power hungry, as if I need a bigger iPad.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 10 Mar 2022 10:01:00 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art has a 🎂 note.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 09 Mar 2022 12:25:36 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art was a bit more involved. I took fungus to mean mushroom, and limited my set to three.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 09 Mar 2022 08:44:15 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 for today’s Pixel Dailies. For size reference I drew Toad. I also embellished the border a bit. Now I “only” need to pixel some fungi.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 08 Mar 2022 21:19:00 +0100

Tomorrow’s Pixel Dailies pixel art will give Toad some friends.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 08 Mar 2022 14:06:04 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art was easy enough to grasp, but how to illustrate it? This was my take.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 08 Mar 2022 08:41:00 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 for Pixel Dailies. I already have a box to put the 🍕 in.
👾😁 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 07 Mar 2022 14:44:02 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies prompt I implemented somewhat cartoony.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 07 Mar 2022 08:49:00 +0100

Pixel art. One thing that needed change desperately was the frame around my 160 x 144 pixels artwork. Other than that, there’s today’s Pixel Dailies prompt. I have some ideas, and an inkling of a visual story.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 06 Mar 2022 14:21:10 +0100

Pixel art, 64x64px. Combining a guinea pig and the look of its caretaker.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 06 Mar 2022 08:29:45 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art went to Mars.
👾 🚀🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 05 Mar 2022 16:04:28 +0100

I’m already preparing for tomorrow’s Pixel Dailies pixel art, using photography from NASA’s JPL missions to the Red Planet.
👾 🚀🪐🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 05 Mar 2022 10:50:00 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies was relatively quick. It was only 30 x 24 pixels, but also a lot of squinting.
👾 😖🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 05 Mar 2022 08:30:30 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies is a challenge, since it’s such a small canvas. A further restriction I put on myself is a 6-color palette called snail village.
👾 🚧🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 04 Mar 2022 18:52:00 +0100

Pixel art. Practicing textures in isometric perspective.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 04 Mar 2022 10:27:08 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies in isometric perspective.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 03 Mar 2022 15:47:14 +0100

Pixel art isometric perspective starts to make more sense now.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 03 Mar 2022 09:42:13 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies was a tough one for me. I suppose it’s as tough as you make it, though.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 02 Mar 2022 15:28:22 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies pixel art took like forever😞
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 01 Mar 2022 16:20:38 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies prompt was not easy. My pixel art interpretation of a gathering of vases🏺Alas, I didn’t have time to shade it.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 01 Mar 2022 08:13:29 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 Instead of going for the obvious for video gamers, I’m going for a collection of vases for today’s Pixel Dailies prompt 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

PS I have remind myself it’s a challenge, not a popularity contest.
👾

Mon, 28 Feb 2022 18:28:24 +0100

Pixel art (animated). How things evolve, or maybe put a “d” in front of that verb.
👾 😄 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 28 Feb 2022 08:21:51 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies prompt and lack of time made this a relatively quick exercise (2 hours instead of 8).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 27 Feb 2022 16:29:30 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies was rather involved as pixel art. I had to be inventive.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 27 Feb 2022 12:59:00 +0100

Before I can tarnish a beautiful object, I have to draw it in pristine state, roughly 🚧🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 27 Feb 2022 07:32:27 +0100

Gathering ideas for today’s Pixel Dailies prompt. Tarnished is the title of a 1950 American action movie. It also means: “dulled the luster of”, “spoiled”, “disgraced.” The disgusting looking C64 is from Adrian’s Digital Basement on YouTube. Think big, draw small, y’know. 🚧🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 26 Feb 2022 17:08:00 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies. Link grew in size and complexity over the years. Gameboy sized canvas and color palette.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 26 Feb 2022 08:48:03 +0100

Pixel art 🚧 Not at all representative of the end result. I used the 4-color Gameboy color palette, even though most of the originals are full-color. Also, the pixel count of all but the two smallest sprites is twice that of mine. It’s study for inspiration and growth… ISWTDT.
👾

Fri, 25 Feb 2022 23:25:11 +0100

I’m so excited about tomorrow’s art prompt by Pixel Dailies.
👾🎨

Fri, 25 Feb 2022 14:35:00 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies. Some prompts are more challenging, and I guess that’s why this kind of exercise is referred to as a challenge.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 24 Feb 2022 17:07:50 +0100

Today’s prompt in the Draw Every Day app was “picture.” Pixel art, 256 x 192 pixels.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 24 Feb 2022 13:34:00 +0100

Banging out pixel art for Pixel Dailies.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 23 Feb 2022 15:25:03 +0100

One thing leading to another. Pixel art (160 x 144 pixel).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 23 Feb 2022 10:13:00 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies, a bloody ‘bard’s business (160 x 144 pixels).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 23 Feb 2022 08:08:22 +0100

So Pixel Dailies. A halberd (aka halbard) is a spear on top of an axe, mounted on a long pole, with opposite to the axe a hook to grab soldiers on horseback. It’s approximately the length of a footsoldier’s height.
👾

Tue, 22 Feb 2022 16:39:00 +0100

Pixel art for Pixel Dailies. Okay, it’s possible to create a shape that can be tessellated so, that it’s still possible to recognize an animal in it. Well, I tried.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 22 Feb 2022 15:00:23 +0100

I’m pretty sure this doesn’t qualify. Still, why use such fancy words if you want people to participate? Pixel art.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 22 Feb 2022 10:18:48 +0100

Pixel art. It seems visual storytelling is a thing, and it requires constant practice. So setting myself this challenge can’t be bad, can it? Gameboy resolution (160 x 144 pixels).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 21 Feb 2022 13:55:37 +0100

At least I’m not shooting myself in the foot with this pixel art walk animation.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 21 Feb 2022 08:53:46 +0100

Pixel art. A first attempt at a living room in top down perspective.
👾 🤭 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 20 Feb 2022 08:31:00 +0100

Pixel art. Some simplified human anatomy to better understand how it works while moving.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 19 Feb 2022 17:27:39 +0100

Pixel art. Refinement of an animation I did earlier today. I’m pleased with the result, even as crude as it is.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 19 Feb 2022 11:04:58 +0100

Quick project, I thought, a pixel art walk cycle. Now it’s 3 hours later, anything but completed. 🤔 Huh?
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 16 Feb 2022 08:36:49 +0100

Pixel art, narcissus.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 15 Feb 2022 08:35:00 +0100

Pixel art, for single awareness day (for realz this time).
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 14 Feb 2022 10:59:00 +0100

A pixel art begonia in isometric perspective. Happy Valentines Day, aka (day before) singles awareness day.
👾 😘🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 13 Feb 2022 10:11:00 +0100

Cat and mouse pixel art.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 12 Feb 2022 15:55:17 +0100

I’m missing an essential insight about character design in isometric perspective, probably more than one.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 12 Feb 2022 08:16:38 +0100

Pixel art. I suppose it can only go up from here 😉 — 🖥👨‍🎨🎨👾

Thu, 10 Feb 2022 12:42:22 +0100

Exploring rotation in isometric perspective. It seems there are rules to make it seem more convincing. Interesting…
👾

Tue, 08 Feb 2022 12:07:51 +0100

Writing in isometric perspective; it’s rather tricky with pixel art.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 07 Feb 2022 17:07:29 +0100

More isometric pixel art practice, a hello-world? It seems so easy, until you implement it.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 07 Feb 2022 10:59:00 +0100

I constructed my first house in isometric perspective pixel art. It’s rather tedious and error prone, as you may spot here and there. I suppose practice will bring improvement.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 06 Feb 2022 10:38:04 +0100

Pixel art practice. Six basic emotions of the human face.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 05 Feb 2022 09:32:44 +0100

Pixel art, seasonal affective disorder.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 04 Feb 2022 12:00:52 +0100

Pixel art based on a sketched idea.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 03 Feb 2022 09:51:21 +0100

Today I turned the traced image into a top view. This will enable me to create an isometric perspective view tomorrow. The animation shows the workflow I want to use: trace 👉 floorplan 👉 isometric view. There’s some creative license with only one reference photo.
👾

Wed, 02 Feb 2022 16:35:00 +0100

I traced architecture in pixel art as a study. I wanted to create an isometric perspective, but realized I’m still too inexperienced in architecture drawing to pull it off.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 01 Feb 2022 11:36:33 +0100

Isometric chess horse.
👾🐴♟🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 31 Jan 2022 12:20:11 +0100

Isometric jam session. Pixel art.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 30 Jan 2022 09:35:00 +0100

Sunday morning pixel art doodles.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 28 Jan 2022 21:37:47 +0100

I suppose most screens nowadays are 16:9, so perhaps I should use that as well. Pixel art at 320 x 180 pixels.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 28 Jan 2022 15:47:33 +0100

Practicing isometric perspective with a rhino. Pixel art 160 x144.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 28 Jan 2022 11:20:11 +0100

For isometric perspective pixel art sprites, there are (hardware) restrictions to what can be drawn, and (geometry) rules for how to draw. Both can be bent, but at a cost, either in performance or artistically. The clear benefit is a 3D look without perspective scaling.
👾🎨🖥👨‍🎨

Thu, 27 Jan 2022 15:08:28 +0100

It took me more time than I wished to create a rough animation of the same character pose from eight different directions. iPad OS clearly lacks the functionality of a full-blown desktop OS, especially for easy creation of animation.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Thu, 27 Jan 2022 09:18:03 +0100

From the AdamCYounis YouTube channel I got some important insights about character design with pixel art:

smaller canvases are harder
topdown is like looking down at 45°
horizontal and vertical lines are key for coherent look
clear pose beats realism

👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 26 Jan 2022 17:01:13 +0100

Today’s pixel art self-prompt was cuteness.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 24 Jan 2022 09:17:57 +0100

Converting a “normal” perspective drawing into an isometric perspective drawing proves to be more challenging than I expected. Muttering 😖 on thru this pixel art mud.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 23 Jan 2022 09:20:22 +0100

Many things are to be considered when drawing pixel art in isometric perspective. I should practice it, since it’s a prevalent perspective in 2D games nowadays, as far as I can see from following pixel artists online.
👾

Sat, 22 Jan 2022 10:10:25 +0100

I suppose pixel art is best described as an art form where pixel placement matters most. Unlike digital natural medium art, in pixel art what you say and how you say it are the same.
👾

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 09:06:00 +0100

Some simplistic pixel art animations I made in the past two days.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Tue, 18 Jan 2022 11:25:50 +0100

I’m not sure why it takes so long, but I guess that goes with the creative process; it’s not as straightforward as one would want.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sun, 16 Jan 2022 11:32:00 +0100

Cat walk as 2-frames pixel art animation. Took me long enough.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

I suppose 3 frames is the minimum.

Sat, 15 Jan 2022 18:37:14 +0100

I picked one of the pencil sketches and turned it into pixel art, as practice.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 15 Jan 2022 15:55:08 +0100

Progress on my character design is slow, yet steady. 🎨

Sat, 15 Jan 2022 11:38:55 +0100

Character design doesn’t come in a flash with me. It always has been a slow process, rather discouraging imo. I guess I’m not a glutton for details, which is a big drawback for creativity. 🎨

Fri, 14 Jan 2022 12:59:33 +0100

Scaling down often means (partially) redrawing a pixel art drawing.
👾👨‍🎨🖥🎨

Fri, 14 Jan 2022 11:19:59 +0100

Donkey Kong on C64 (VICE on Raspberry Pi OS) 🕹💻👾🦍🗝

Fri, 14 Jan 2022 08:43:19 +0100

My flatbed scanner isn’t functional anymore, so I had to scan with iOS. After importing the doodle as a reference, I drew this critter in Pixaki.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Wed, 12 Jan 2022 14:46:15 +0100

Great Scott, BTTF inspired pixel art, started on Linux GrafX2, completed on iPad Pixaki app. 160x144 px, 6 colors.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨🤓

Wed, 12 Jan 2022 13:11:42 +0100

I made a 32x32 pixel image with GrafX2 on Linux, imported it via the Secure ShellFish app to my iPad, and refined it with the Pixaki app.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Mon, 10 Jan 2022 12:06:55 +0100

Stylized cat in a hero pose.
👾🖥👨‍🎨🎨🐱 96px²

Sun, 09 Jan 2022 09:50:00 +0100

🐱 pixel art 🖥👨‍🎨🎨👾

Thu, 06 Jan 2022 10:31:00 +0100

I wish y’all a happy 2022!
👾🖥🎨👨‍🎨

Mon, 03 Jan 2022 11:47:46 +0100

Tracing still feels like cheating. Pixel art.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Sat, 01 Jan 2022 14:45:57 +0100

I suppose understanding a face is half the (artistic) battle. Pixel art.
👾 🖥👨‍🎨🎨

Fri, 31 Dec 2021 16:29:10 +0100

🤔 Good enough for now. I need to be less critical on myself while learning pixel art.
👾 🖥👨‍🎓🎨👨‍🎨

Fri, 31 Dec 2021 09:41:43 +0100

I wonder if it’s worth to continue working on the pixel portrait.
👾🎨

Wed, 29 Dec 2021 12:09:47 +0100

Another approach for another day.
👾 🎨

Tue, 28 Dec 2021 19:03:00 +0100

I suppose every obscure famous person (fame is ephemeral) has a fansite. I just draw ‘em in pixels.
👾🎨

Tue, 24 Aug 2021 16:34:00 +0100

Not sure if this qualifies as a favicon. It’s 32 x 32 pixels.
👾🎨

Wed, 23 Jun 2021 20:16:37 +0100

And here’s my 24 x 24 pixel art IRL (6 cm x 6 cm, 4 mm² per pixel mosaic brick).
👾 🏠🎨

Wed, 23 Jun 2021 11:44:53 +0100

Here’s a concept of how a piece of pixel art could brighten up a boring bathroom door. The materials for creating said art have yet to arrive, and the door still needs a layer of paint. Well, one can dream of the result, can’t one?
👾 🏠🎨

Mon, 21 Jun 2021 09:50:29 +0100

Couldn’t find a 32 x 32 baseplate for pixel art with beads, but I did find a 24 x 24 baseplate. So I adjusted my design for the bathroom door.
👾 🏠🎨

Mon, 21 Jun 2021 07:45:15 +0100

Wanted a decoration for my bathroom door, but the only things I could find was either from a sketchy company (possibly a swindler on Amazon.nl) or from far away (high shipping costs). So I guess I’ll have to craft my own, from beads.
👾 🎨🏠

Sun, 13 Jun 2021 16:11:16 +0100

New profile picture. 🎨 64 x 64 px, 3 colors.
👾

Tue, 18 May 2021 19:33:00 +0100

Xena Xantippes. Pixel art 🎨 160x144px, 12 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Xena xeroxes xenarthra x-rays.”
👾

Mon, 17 May 2021 18:23:00 +0100

Worrywart. Pixel art 🎨 160x144px, 10 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Worried woman wrestles with wild wombat.”
👾

Sun, 16 May 2021 17:02:06 +0100

Ve nice bye nite. Pixel art 🎨 160x144px, 7 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Vacationing vampire vandalizes Venice.”
👾

Sat, 15 May 2021 13:43:00 +0100

Savvy with balloons. Pixel art, 160x144px, 7 colors. 🎨

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Upset urial undermines ugly unicorn.”
👾

Fri, 14 May 2021 18:28:30 +0100

.·´¯^(>▂<)^´¯·. Pixel art Gameboy (160x144px, 4 colors) 🎨

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Timid tarantula tries to tickle tired tiger, triggering tremendous terror.”

Thu, 13 May 2021 19:05:23 +0100

Peanuts winter wonderland. Pixel art, Gameboy (160x144px, 4 colors) 🎨

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Shocked Snoopy surveys sensual snowmen.”
👾

Wed, 12 May 2021 16:15:58 +0100

Round robin ruffle. Pixel art 🎨 Gameboy, 160x144px, 4 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Religious reindeer relentlessly rejects rowdy robin’s ridiculous rap."
👾

Wed, 12 May 2021 12:13:26 +0100

Two things I know little to nothing about, religion and rap. Or is that latter one wrap? Who’s to say in their righteous rapturing reasonless mind? WIP 🎨 pixel art for the subreddit Sketch Daily.
👾

Tue, 11 May 2021 19:21:56 +0100

Quail Quilting Quorum 🐦 🖌 Gameboy pixel art (160x144px, 4 colors)

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Quarreling Quail Quibble Quietly, Questioning Quilting Qualifications."
👾

Mon, 10 May 2021 16:12:26 +0100

Da-da-da-daaah! 🐼 🎹 Gameboy pixel art 📺 160x144 🎨 4 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Pleasantly plump panda plans possible piano performance.”
👾

Sun, 09 May 2021 13:47:52 +0100

Herding Ocelots. Gameboy Pixel art 📺 160x144 🎨 4 colors

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Overwhelmed owl officiates over ornery ocelots.”
👾

Sat, 08 May 2021 18:46:32 +0100

Presumed prehistoric pixelated picture 📺 160x144 🎨 10 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Nattering neighbors nauseate nearby neanderthal."

Fri, 07 May 2021 09:50:53 +0100

And done! Gameboy pixel art 📺 160x144 🎨 4 colors. 👾

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Merry mongoose makes moaning mallard mailbox.”

Thu, 06 May 2021 13:26:56 +0100

Lemming launcher? 📺 160x144 🎨 6 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Loathsome lemur laughs, loads lemming launcher."
👾

Wed, 05 May 2021 17:22:01 +0100

Koala knight and pirate kakapo. 📺 160x144px 🎨 18 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Knightly koala kicks knavish kakapo kid."
👾

Tue, 04 May 2021 15:16:04 +0100

Jackal joyriding. Pixel art. 📺 160x144px, 🎨 18 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Jittery jackal jeopardizes journey jumpstarting joyride.”
👾

Mon, 03 May 2021 09:06:49 +0100

Crazy Conspiracy Concept. Pixel art 📺 160x144px 🎨 19 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Injured iguana inconveniently illustrates ideal illuminati infiltration.”
👾

Sun, 02 May 2021 15:31:03 +0100

Ancient Greece themed harpies 🦅🧚‍♀️ and hamsters 🐹 Pixel art, Gameboy compatible (📺160x144px 🎨4 colors).

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Hallucinating harpies haunt horrified hamsters."
👾

Sun, 02 May 2021 08:40:31 +0100

Today’s theme on the Sketch Daily subreddit and the reference photos I’ll be using on a 160x144px canvas, 4 color palette, compatible with Nintendo Gameboy. It’s a lot.
👾 🎨

Sat, 01 May 2021 14:22:37 +0100

Recycling goblin. Pixel art, 🎨 Sweetie-16, 160x144px, 13 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “Green Goblin gentrifies grumpy geese, gratifying glistening goldfish."
👾

Sat, 01 May 2021 08:57:45 +0100

Rich Uncle Pennybags. Pixel art 🎨 Sweetie-16, 160x144px, 7 colors.

For r/SketchDaily, theme: “The guy from Monopoly."
👾

Thu, 29 Apr 2021 11:04:10 +0100

Quick and dirty (unedited) self-portrait, based on a rapid 2-minutes pencil sketch. Pixel 🎨 Gameboy (160x144px, 4 colors).

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “portrait.”
👾

Wed, 28 Apr 2021 20:05:19 +0100

The little shop of horrors (1960). Pixel 🎨 Gameboy (160x144px, 4 colors).

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “shop.”
👾

Tue, 27 Apr 2021 08:50:00 +0100

GET TO DA CHOPPA! Pixel 🎨 Gameboy (160x144px, 4 colors).

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “helicopter.”
👾

Mon, 26 Apr 2021 11:23:01 +0100

Cobra Bubbles from the Lilo and Stitch movie. Pixel 🎨 160x144px, 12 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “bubble.”

Sun, 25 Apr 2021 08:52:59 +0100

Karaoke in the desert. Pixel 🎨 160x144px, 8 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “karaoke.”

Sat, 24 Apr 2021 10:35:34 +0100

It’s pollen season. Pixel 🎨 160x144, 6 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “microscope.”

Fri, 23 Apr 2021 17:03:46 +0100

SF ray. Gameboy pixel 🎨 160x144px, 4 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “ray.”

Thu, 22 Apr 2021 10:39:55 +0100

Commodore 64 multicolor pixel 🎨 drawing, 320x200px, 12 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt chance.

Wed, 21 Apr 2021 10:56:28 +0100

A factory of factories of factories of factories. Pixel 🎨 160x144px, 11 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “factory.”

Tue, 20 Apr 2021 13:30:03 +0100

Pixel 🎨 160x144px, 9 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “cereal.”

Mon, 19 Apr 2021 19:21:58 +0100

Future tribe. Pixel 🎨 160x144 px, 16 colors

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt tribe.

Sun, 18 Apr 2021 15:05:20 +0100

A more painterly approach with pixel 🎨. 160x144px, 14 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt tulips.

Fri, 16 Apr 2021 15:31:23 +0100

Shoo, git, scram…ble. Or s’mthing 🤷

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt scramble. Pixel 🎨 160x144px, 12 colors.

Thu, 15 Apr 2021 14:24:47 +0100

Mechanics keep our world working.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt mechanic. Pixel 🎨 64x64px, 11 colors.

Tue, 13 Apr 2021 12:57:37 +0100

Go glove, GO!

Drawn for the Sketch a Day app, pixel 🎨 64x64px, 11 colors.

Mon, 12 Apr 2021 12:24:27 +0100

Alternative parking road sign. Pixel art, 64x64px, 10 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app, prompt “parking."
👾

Sun, 11 Apr 2021 14:15:43 +0100

A counting Count Von Count. Pixel 🎨 sprites are 48x48px, 4 colors.

Sun, 11 Apr 2021 07:56:50 +0100

Pixel 🎨 64x64px, 4 colors. Drawn for the Sketch a Day app, prompt “loud.” Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler is pretty loud.

Sat, 10 Apr 2021 20:42:48 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was “Gate.” Pixel 🎨 160x90px, 10 colors.

Fri, 09 Apr 2021 18:58:00 +0100

Today’s theme for Pixel Dailies was “whirlpool.” Pixel 🎨 64x64px, 5 colors.

Fri, 09 Apr 2021 07:40:00 +0100

For the Sketch a Day app. The concept “sharp” as pixel art, 32x32px, 7 colors.
👾 🎨

Thu, 08 Apr 2021 12:11:00 +0100

A man rag of reserve. Pixel art 32x32px, 11 colors. 🎨 For the Sketch a Day app.
👾

Wed, 07 Apr 2021 21:17:00 +0100

I love 1950’s SF movies and their low budget look. This pixel 🎨 was prompted by today’s Pixel Dailies theme “mole.” It’s 48x48px, 4 colors.

Wed, 07 Apr 2021 12:26:00 +0100

Spongebob Squarepants inspired pixel 🎨 240x160px, 14 colors.

Drawn for the Sketch a Day app. Today’s prompt was “reef.”

Wed, 07 Apr 2021 09:16:00 +0100

This pixel 🎨 WIP shows that it pays to work a little longer at a piece before taking a break. After 2 hours or so, I really needed a break, so I exported both versions and put them on top of each other, to see the difference.

It’s not done yet, though, not by a long shot.

Tue, 06 Apr 2021 20:42:00 +0100

Today’s theme for Pixel Dailies was punchcard. This is a still frame of an animated GIF, 32x32px, 4 Gameboy colors. 🎨

Tue, 06 Apr 2021 16:02:00 +0100

I’ve gone with the unconfirmed etymology of the word, mountain valley village. Drawn for the Sketch a Day app, prompt Nepal.

Pixel 🎨 240x160px, 16 colors.

Tue, 06 Apr 2021 07:53:58 +0100

When I really, really want to make something awesome, I need strip down an idea to its essentials, and then add what I need. That’s what I did in this basic design of a mountain valley village, the supposed etymology of the word Nepal. Pixel 🎨 WiP, 240x160px.

Mon, 05 Apr 2021 11:21:35 +0100

If you’re not on the floor, squirming in laughter, I can totally understand. I now appreciate the existence of the laugh track for reruns of unfunny tv shows. I’m looking at you, Happy Days, after the Fonz jumped the 🦈 Aaayyy!

Nintendo Gameboy pixel 🎨 160x144px, 2 colors.

Mon, 05 Apr 2021 08:43:52 +0100

Not sure if this qualifies, but it’s a drawing.

Drawn for the Sketch a Day app. Today’s prompt was “funny.”

Pixel 🎨 Nintendo Gameboy resolution, 160x144px, 8 colors.

Sun, 04 Apr 2021 08:58:34 +0100

I needed that earlier bread bun for what I actually wanted to draw, a bunny made of bun, just for fun, and the pun.

It was drawn for today’s prompt (bunny if you hadn’t guessed) for the Sketch a Day app. Pixel 🎨 64x64px, 6 colors.

Sun, 04 Apr 2021 07:58:10 +0100

I made this isometric perspective bun for PixelJoint, 64x64px, 5 colors.

pixel 🎨

Sat, 03 Apr 2021 10:21:49 +0100

A delicate balance indeed! Pixel 🎨 20 colors.

For the Sketch a Day app. Today’s prompt was delicate.

Fri, 02 Apr 2021 20:48:29 +0100

My contributions for PixelJoint are often more considered, since it is a community of such excellent artists, making me want to do just a little bit more effort. This one is called: “Early Catch.” It’s 60 x 48 pixels, 10 colors and pixel.
👾 🎨

Fri, 02 Apr 2021 19:37:28 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was cobblestone, and I cobbled it together in isometric perspective 😅 pixel 🎨

Fri, 02 Apr 2021 14:26:31 +0100

Fresh from the isometric digital pixel 🎨 oven…

Drawn, reluctantly (since my art is allowed grudgingly, it seems, not being traditional in nature, like pencil on paper) for the Sketch a Day app.

I keep setting myself up for failure, as a non-conformist, so it appears.

Thu, 01 Apr 2021 20:33:42 +0100

Another one for April Fools Day, a Carrot Kar, they are terrible to drive in, and are generally driven by fools. Drawn for Pixel Dailies, in jest, pixel 🎨

Thu, 01 Apr 2021 14:36:33 +0100

It isn’t really cross-stitched, but I came close (enough) to the real thing by some photo manipulation in Procreate on a pixel 🎨 image I did earlier today. I could do more, but then it’s easier (and faster) to do the real thing instead.

Thu, 01 Apr 2021 10:23:04 +0100

I couldn’t settle on a color palette, so I didn’t. Happy April Fools!

Drawn for the Sketch a Day app in Pixaki on iPad. I used four color palettes: Cold-23, Ministeck-24, Sweetie-16, and Jellyfish-16. If I had Lego bricks, I could build a 32 x 32 pixel 🎨

Wed, 31 Mar 2021 10:27:00 +0100

That’s some hairdo! 🎨 Drawn for the Sketch a Day app, today’s prompt majestic.

Mon, 29 Mar 2021 22:07:00 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was Daffodils. I added a unicorn called Daffodil.
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Mon, 29 Mar 2021 11:03:22 +0100

For the Sketch-a-Day app, prompt fox. Pixel 🎨 32x32, 10 colors.

Sun, 28 Mar 2021 19:30:57 +0100

Today’s Pixel Dailies theme was CardGame, restriction 5 colors max. Pixel 🎨 64x64, 5 colors.

Sun, 28 Mar 2021 09:16:16 +0100

DDC 2308, pixel 🎨 64x64, 4 colors. Last one on FB, alas. IG was already off my list a few days ago. Goodbye for now, Facebook 🙁

Sat, 27 Mar 2021 09:09:13 +0100

For the Sketch-a-Day app, pixel 🎨 32x32, 2 colors. The prompt was fast.

Fri, 26 Mar 2021 19:47:34 +0100

Today’s theme of Pixel Dailies was sea plane 🎨

Fri, 26 Mar 2021 12:14:15 +0100

Pixel art, 32 x 32, 2 colors, inspired by 1984 Mac OS icons. For Sketch-a-Day app, prompt “dive”.
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Fri, 26 Mar 2021 09:16:11 +0100

DDC 2306. Pixel art, 16x16, 2 colors. Inspired by the very first pixel artist, Susan Kare, designer of 1984 Mac OS' B+W desktop icons on a 32x32 grid. She was able to provide clarity and whimsy. I tried to give this octopus some personality within the limits. (enlarged 4x).
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Thu, 25 Mar 2021 17:58:17 +0100

DDC 2305, pixel art, 64 x 64 pixels, 13 colors.
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Thu, 25 Mar 2021 15:11:29 +0100

Pixel art, 160 x 90 pixels, 8 colors. Abstract arabic scribblings on a crab.
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