Turning 2D Sprites Into Pixel Beads For Fun, Profit

Thanks to Insert Credit for its feature discussing making real-life 'pixelbead' sculptures out of classic 2D videogame sprites, strictly for fun. The author explains the "process of recreating a sprite or any other form of pixel-art with beads" by using a pegboard, noting: "Do keep in mind that recreating pixel-art this way gets the best results on low-color art. 4 to 8 color characters (NES quality) generally look a lot better than the mess 16-bit (Snes, GBA, MD/Genesis etc.) characters often are", also explaining you'll need to "make your beads melt and fuse" with an iron and ironing paper to get to the finished result. The piece shows '3D' Metroids and a large variety of Mega Man characters as examples of this arts-and-crafts incursion into videogaming - elsewhere, the more expensive but more malleable PixelBlocks have also been used to "make your own 2D and 3D pixel art objects."

Re:For Profit?

[Anonymous Coward]

*cough* Fair use.

Don't be a dick... he's not selling these things.. RTFA

Re:For Profit?

[ClosedSource]

How did the word "profit" end up in the summary?Perhaps the Slashdot editors should start RTFA.

Re:For Profit?

[Anonymous Coward]

from the not-so-much-with-the-profit dept.

retard.

Sheesh.

[Apiakun]

What a dork! I wonder if the craft store is still open...

Hm

[Snowspinner]

I wonder why they'd melt the beads when you can get a smoother image through bead weaving (Since you don't get those holes on the top of the bead that interrupt the color flow?) Plenty of programs to convert pictures to bead patterns, too, so this seems like it would be the easier way to do it...

Re:Hm

[Sparr0]

if you weave them they arent as strong, and its much more difficult to do 3D weaving. once you melt the edges together you have effectively a solid plastic object

I believe the topic title missed a step

[Anonymous Coward]

It's supposed to be

1. Turning 2D Sprites Into Pixel Beads For Fun
2. ????????
3. Profit.

How and Why (didn't I think of it first)

[Rayonic]

It's such a simple and neat idea, it's a wonder I've heard of it only now. I could even see a no-artistic-talent hack like myself making a few of these.

Which brings me to my question, anyone have recommendations for bead types? I should probably just head down to the local arts-and-crafts store.

Not that.......

[metalhed77]

Not that I don't think this is awesome.

It's just that two incredibly dorky hobbies coliding like this is unprecedented.

Re:Not that.......

[torpor]

i'd like to see a robot that can take those beads and 'form print a 3 d scultpure' with them, placing and heating 3 or 4 beads at a time, then 'heat-gluing' them together, gradually, over time.

i'd do it from the bottom, up, so the whole thing just grows.

-that would rock, and there'd be bonus points for using mindstorm, i suppose ...

Pixel art in yet another form!

[thamaht]

I've seen people use pixel art in other non computer related methods as well.
Megaman, painted! [img11.exs.cx]

See also...

[Bagels]

embroidery - samplers and the like. Seriously, almost every technique used in pixel art was pioneered in embroidery at some point. Plenty of old embroidered things that I've seen make use of various forms of dithering, for example. Pixel-based fonts used in 8-bit games could have been taken right off of some of those old samplers. I suppose these entrepreneurs settled on beads rather than thread because it seemed to hit their stereotypical target audience better.

Better get this out of the way already

[LGagnon]

1. Make 2D sprites into pixel beads
2. have fun
3. ???
4. Profit!

Next up...

[tyoob]

I'd like to see some Legend of Zelda cross-stitch samplers.

BFD

[ziggy_zero]

How about an entire KITCHEN [sjmusart.org] made of beads?

I've seen that thing in person, it's great. They even did water coming out of the faucet, and stuff like cereal boxes and bottles of Budweiser.

Mechanized Pixel-Bead warriors!

[Zarf]

Take your Pixel-Bead figures and set them up in animatronic dioramas recreating the video-game in REAL LIFE! Mechanical gears and poll-arms making Metroid and Mario characters dance and fight controlled by mechanical levers all powered by steam engine or wind-up motor! Oh the anachronistic joy!

http://www.misterministeck.com/

[Hank Chinaski]

you want to check out http://www.misterministeck.com/ [misterministeck.com]. He does the same thing for many years and is far better at it too.

I apologize in advance...

[mindaktiviti]

BUT IT MUST BE DONE:

Here goes....

Graham: Galstaff, you have entered the door to the North, you are now by yourself standing in a dark room. The pungent smell of mildew emanates from the wet dungeon walls
2: WHERE ARE THE CHEETOS?!?!
Graham: They're right next to you
Galstaff: I cast a spell
2: Where's the mountain dew?
Graham: In the fridge, DUH!
Galstaff: I wanna cast a spell!
2: CAN I HAVE A MOUNTAIN DEW?!?!
Graham: Yes, you can have a mountain dew just go get it
Galstaff: I can cast any of these right, on the l

Word.

[qoa]

I wish I'd have thought of this. I do pixelart a lot and the transition between two seems obvious. I'm going to look out for those things at the store now. A lot of NeoGeo Pocket fighters have some excellent sprites to work with. Patterns are for sissies though.