Painted Pixels<p><strong>Pixel Prints and Other Gaming Crafty Things</strong></p><p>Sometimes (a lot of the time) I’ll look back at my blog posts and realize that there’s some really big thing I’ve been doing or working on that would have made for an interesting blog post, and while I might post about them on my socials, like Mastodon or Tumblr, I won’t ever remember to mention them here. This is going to be one of those topics, and there may be several more that I go back to shortly. In this case, I started having fun converting pixel art into vector art a while ago, and then converting the vector art to 3D that could then be sent to a 3D printer. For a while I was doing it just to have fun and print cool things for me, but after a while I thought maybe other people would be interested too, and made an Etsy shop, Minus World Prints.</p><p></p><p>A while ago I found <a href="https://youtu.be/pIhw0pk0vgA?si=ATuf_mZ7gCa0PEE3" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">this video by YouTuber Kari</a> detailing how to take a video game sprite and make a 3D print out of it. I started with the example that she does, first with the Atari E.T. sprite, and then with Mario. My first Mario was just a solid color, as the 3D printer I’m using can only print one color at a time. But after a while I figured out that the slicer program I’m using can actually pause my print to change out the color at designated times. It’s a bit of a chore to manually change out the colors, but the results are pretty good. I have to carefully consider which sprites I’m going to make into 3D prints, as more colors means more work, and also each one needs to be a different height, so if you have too many colors things will start to look weirdly stacked. And then I also have to consider if I have a PLA plastic color that closely resembles the sprite.</p><p>NES sprites in general are pretty good for these limitations, as traditional NES sprites only have three colors. Although after a while people started getting fancy and figuring out ways around that limitation, by stacking two sprites on top of each other essentially. So far I’ve been doing whatever suites my fancy, so they’re kinda of all over the place, from Link and Mario to all four ninja turtles from the first TMNT game, and even Indiana Jones from the Atari 2600 version of Raiders of the Lost Ark (which I had to add a background to, because otherwise parts of him that are diagonal wouldn’t have anything to adhere to). </p><p>After a while of doing straight pixel sprites from games, I started experimenting a bit, first by editing existing sprites, then by making some original ones. I did a slight edit on Jason from the Friday the 13th game, as the pose I liked him in didn’t have both feet on the ground, so he wouldn’t be able to stand. I edited the sprite a bit to adjust for that. Then I decided to edit Link’s sprite in a more Halloweeny fashion, by changing his colors to be more spooky, and replacing the cross on his shield with a stalfos skull! </p><p>From there I tried some completely original sprites, like a Halloween jack-o-lantern that has a Pikachu face carved on it. My latest one so far is an 8-bit version of the Flyers mascot Gritty. I’m really pleased with how these two turned out, and I’m looking forward to making more original pixel art. </p> <p>Besides a 3D printer, I also have access to a laser cutter/engraver, and I’ve been trying to design something that I thought would be an interesting item to sell on Etsy with that. I’ve come up with a sort of layered, ‘shadow box’ style scene of the NES Zelda. The front layer has Link and Zelda, and the title, the middle is the triforce, and the back layer is the overworld map. It’s all cut from birch wood, and I like the combination of electronic pixel art being depicted with a natural material like wood. I’m hoping I make some sales on this one, because I think the style would work so well with so many NES games! I want to do Metroid, Final Fantasy and many more using this pattern. Fingers crossed. </p> <p>Maybe one day I’ll get a 3D printer that can print multiple colors at once so I won’t have to do the stacking thing, but until then I think these have been coming out pretty good. They make fun decorations around my computer desk and I like looking at a physical space version of a pixel sprite that I’m used to seeing on my TV screen. If anyone is interested in checking out what I’ve got so far, the store is <a href="http://minusworldprints.etsy.com" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Minus World Prints</a>.</p><p></p><p><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/3d-printer/" target="_blank">#3dPrinter</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/3d-printing/" target="_blank">#3dPrinting</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/3d-printing-game-sprites/" target="_blank">#3dPrintingGameSprites</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/art/" target="_blank">#art</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/gaming/" target="_blank">#gaming</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/lasercutter/" target="_blank">#lasercutter</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/nintendo/" target="_blank">#nintendo</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/pixel-art/" target="_blank">#pixelArt</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/retro-games/" target="_blank">#retroGames</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/sprites/" target="_blank">#sprites</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/video-game-sprites/" target="_blank">#videoGameSprites</a> <a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" class="hashtag u-tag u-category" href="https://paintedpixelsblog.wordpress.com/tag/video-games/" target="_blank">#videoGames</a></p>