I'm a new-comer here at Deviant Art, and most of you don't know me, so I should probably start by giving you a little bit of background information.

My name's Iain Peregrine, the first website I ever got involved in was cavesofnarshe.com, R51's baby (a great website, too, check it out later). I spent all my time trying to learn how to make the 8bit graphics I had produced fly around the screen. I soon learned that this was called programing, and I've wasted a good portion of my life since doing just that.

I remain an artist first, though. I've been making video game art since I had a Mac SE running system 6. Black and White sprites, good times. My art has always imitated one of three styles: 4bit, 16bit, or most commonly 8bit. I always choose a style for any given project, and then stick to it. If I choose 8bit, that means that I can use graphics of size 16px square, with four colors (one of those can be a transparency), and only 16 colors displayed on the screen at any one time. There are more rules I follow for 8bit styled projects, but they're not important at the moment.

I've always shared my art with my fellow game developers at BYOND.com, but I've recently felt a need to join a community of artists, to have other dedicated artists critiquing my work. So I joined DA, and have enjoyed the little time I spent here.

However, I keep getting strange vibes as I visit other people's galleries and journals; I'm reading stuff that disheartens me as an old-school pixel artist (pixel art, by the way, is a term I've only adopted for my art recently; I had never before considered titles other than '8bit', etc.). I've always thought, and still believe, that my art is the closest to it's 8bit roots that it can be: I've spent a good deal of time studying the 'masters', and I don't do anything I consider outside the realm of pure pixel art. However, other people seem to be insisting on arbitrary, and non-historical, constraints on the art... not just for their own art (which would be fine) but on the term "pixel art" as a whole. For instance, I read someone saying that "only these pure lines" could be used in pixel art, and they had a diagram with sixteen easy to use pixel lines. Sure, these are nice to use, but come on, only is a strong word.

Let me get to the heart of the matter. In 16bit games (some of the best pixel art in existence) alpha transparency was allowed. Let's get this straight: not as a method to blend images so as to produce a final image, or several layers compacted on top of each other to produce a final piece of art -- I agree that either of those two examples wouldn't be pixel art. What we're talking about is entries in the color palette that are then mapped to a grid, and some of those entries have alpha values; no blending ever occurs in the creation of the image, only once that image is placed onto a background. Think of this as the green-screen technique used in filming, except that pixel artists get to use an imaginary color called "alpha" instead of green. A sprite is a piece of art with alpha colored "green screen", only when it gets put into a game (or a web page, or some other multimedia context) does blending ever occur, but never in the actual piece of art itself.

A lot of people calling themselves pixel artists, including most of those who are up in arms about the recent mandate regarding transparency, don't yet understand this difference. However, it is so crucial. Transparencies as a tool in creation of an image, via blending of multiple layers, has always been a no-no in the creation of pixel art, simply because it doesn't have a place when working with a very limited color palette (so we're in agreement here). However, alpha values in the color table of a finished image are completely valid 16bit pixel art.

To deny this is to cut out a large portion, and arguably the best portion, of our heritage as pixel artists. It places a completely arbitrary restriction where one has not traditionally been, stunts artists wishing to take part in this tradition, and removes us so far from our roots. I understand the desire to not have people blending layers and calling it pixel art, but these are two different things; to lump them together and then insist that this is "true pixel art" is a travesty.

I want to be part of a pixel art community, but I will not be part of any community which shuns it's roots, especially the 8bit and 16bit eras. Make your iso blocks, use your twelve pure lines, dither to your hearts content, but don't tell me that my 16bit images are not true pixel art. I'm torn. There's a lot of good people here, and I would really like to stay and take part in a good community, but I don't see a pixel art community. I don't know what to call this. Esoteric digital imagery, perhaps; certainly a subset of pixel art, I can agree. But "the only pixel art" or "pure pixel art"? Either you don't know what you're talking about, or you feel it's easier to throw out the wheat with the chaff. I can forgive the former to a certain extent.

Anyone know of a good pixel art community I can join?


P.S. There's no emoticon for Indignant. What's with that?