Animated Narratives Week 1 | Character, Location, Interaction - Scientist

"A plane carrying plant samples from the Amazon becomes overrun by a parasitic. A scientist who lost her arm in the attack and replaced it with mechanical shears must stop its growth before the plane crashes into the city."

Responding to this premise pieced together from a few other premises posted, I created this character to capture as much of the story details as possible in the smallest amount of space. With the limitations at the core of pixel art, where every component of the artwork is considered and directly controlled, artists are forced to break down an image to its essential components. This conciseness is seen in the art of games like The Last Door and Superbrothers. Even though they have been reduced to a small collection of pixels, the characters remain readable at glance and with just enough detail to be animated. By placing limitations on the colour palette, scale, and scope, I find pixel art pushes me to think more about communicating concept and the subject itself, rather than the mechanical, hand/eye techniques of moving a brush, pencil, or cursor.