Using photoshop I can make sprites in seconds

open your character JPG
change the pic from RGB into index...a little box will prompt on what options to choose, pic local adaptive, and if you want your sprite to be 16 colors choose 16 colors, I recommend 32 colors.

the rest would be just cleaning up the edges, it will be easy cause you are now only working with 32 colors that adapted to the actual colors on the drawing.

Than again what is a sprite apart from a jpg? It's just a drawing with limited colors.

that's all

That's known as color reducing a photo, and it is NOT pixel art in any shape way, or form.

It's the same thing as if I where to make a drawing color it, and do the technique I explained....that has to be called a sprite.

than tell me what makes it be a sprite?

yes its indeed can be used as sprite
but it is not a sprite done in a pixelart way
where you have to place each pixel by hand.

hmm... forgery, copying, un-imaginative, useless, plagerism, formless.... do any of these terms ring a bell? They should, they all describe your method. This is what defines an artist from a machine. Artists have the ability to create things that have never been created and in ways that have never been seen before. This is called imagination. This is whats called 'art'. What you are describing is nothing more than a crappier replica of another image. Please tell me what the use in that is. You can go ahead and do this if you want, but I wouldn't consider it 'art' at all and it will get you no-where in your personal development or life.

and what teej is saying when he says "...where you have to place each pixel by hand." is only half of the truth. It's more of hand placing the pixels in such a way that a computer simply could not create. Computers dont make art, people do. Just because it has a low colour count doesn't make it a worth-while sprite. -But being able to place those pixels in such an effective manner to create a beautiful composition within those restrictions....that definately does makes a worthy sprite.

the purpose of having low color counts was never just for the sake of having them low. It was limitations placed on certain platforms. The purpose of pixelart was to make the absolute best of those restrictions. Computers can't effectively do this at all. have you ever viewed a High res photo at 256 colors or less? Looks grainy and formless - but a hand pixelled background within those same restrictions definately does not look as such. It has flow, form, and artistic expression

make any sense to you?

I tottally agree whats the point of being able to pixel, if the n00bs who because they made a good image with this technique think they're better than the true artists, and that is nowhere near trueful and then the talent is pointless and nobody will be willing to learn then, so I hate stuff like this and things that make art easy, it's just sickening

BTW I wasn't saying I was good there either and by this I'm not saying Im crap either just so you know

I said I made a picture from free hand
just like the pro's do....in street fighter 3 they draw it first with their imagination...than fixed the image by reducing the colors to 32 colors or 16, and you cant tell me that's not a sprite

you are an idiot if you are making your sprites from scratch Indigo
it's kinda zen like.

"And it will get you no-where in your personal development or life"

Wtf? um indigo what does pixel art have anything to do with that....lol

they did not colour reduce images to make their street fighter 3 sprites. They did however draw sketches of poses and such with pencil, then hand-pixelled them based on the sketches. (as any decent pixel artist can tell you)

It's not a good idea to call someone an idiot. Hand pixelling is the only way to get the level of quality needed with high restrictions. Colour-reducing cannot do this. It is not for the sake of zen.

as for that last part you quoted me on - by "personal development" and "life" I was referring directly to art. You are not going to develope yourself into a talented artist by colour reducing (personal development) and you are not going to end up making a living from colour reducing either.(life)

and although creating a high-resolution image yourself before color reducing is still creative in your favor, it is still not effective in anyway to get the most out of the colour restrictions. and if there are no restrictions to begin with, you might as well leave it as a high-res pic because it will look better that way

next time try not to be so offensive, you'll find yourself banned

I see your point now, now at days I see that happening with Game boy advanced titles, they just color reduce the images they put in the game.

they do look grainy and the colors are odd and they are not placed well.

^_^; it's kida like the results I get

No. Gameboy sprites are made by hand too.

nah, alot of GBA titles had really crappy artists that just used colour reduced crap. dhelfin is right. All of the GBA games worth mentioning though were hand-made pixels. I could pull up some examples if you want to, but i'm just too lazy right now and i've gotta go to school

an example would be, TLoZ:the minish cap

This might be a good method (I don't know, I haven't tried it), but just don't call it Pixel Art, cos it's not.