alex.mullr.net/blog

On the train back to York from Last.fm’s Hack Day last year, Alice introduced me to pixel art (her post on Guess Who is a great example of this style). At the time, I remember making some comment about how she’d effectively ruined my degree because making pictures of people from dots of colour would be my life from then on. To be honest, it never really caught on with me - I think I’m just naturally crap at drawing people.

However, that’s all just changed. I found a thread on a music site entitled “MS Paint Your Favorite Album”, encouraging users to recreate the front covers of iconic or important albums (to them) using the standard Paint included with Windows.

If you’ve got thirty minutes or an hour spare, it’s a really great way to spend some time. I wanted something simple to start with, and I think this turned out pretty well.

So, give it a go: Microsoft Paint if you’re on Windows, the open source Paintbrush if you’re on a Mac. No layers, no fancy text tools, no nothing. Brush, line tool, eraser… and get to it, without forgetting to post the results somewhere.

Comments

By Michael Henley on 29 April 2009 at 13:11:

You know that this is going to suck up so much more of my time than it should, and the results will be total and utter balls. It’s like being 7 again and trying to draw cool stuff in paint. As vpjayant would say: ‘epic fail’

By zethraeus on 29 April 2009 at 19:31:

That’s awesome. What music site? I’m intrigued…

By Alex Muller on 29 April 2009 at 22:40:

The mirage: forums.php?action=viewthread&threadid=46663

By zethraeus on 29 April 2009 at 23:29:

right. should have called that.