[Sprite Sculpture] Senior Thesis Project
 

I'm a senior at the Corcoran College of Art + Design and I recently had a senior thesis show with 5 other students. While my focus has always been web design and illustration, I decided to run with an idea I originally had back in 2004. Sprite sculpture.

The following sculptures are made from 1" wooden cubes and painted with acyrlics. While I had to take some liberties with the backs (The front "shape" didn't always match up with the back "shape), I like to think they are fairly correct. While most of the sculptures are Nintendo based, there are a few from my favorite webcomic (Kid Radd) and some of my own creations. I hope you all enjoy this work because really, all I care about are happiness and smiles. Yay!

To cut to the chase of 8-Bit Theater... I thought you all would like to see the sculpture of Black Mage I did.
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp..._BlackMage.jpg

Arranged in chronological order of creation:
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...prite_Radd.jpg - (Web) Radd
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...ndifferent.jpg - (Original) Indifferent the Duck
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...rite_Mario.jpg - (NES) Mario
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...prite_Link.jpg - (NES) Link
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...rite_Bogey.jpg - (Web) Bogey
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...prite_Ness.jpg - (SNES) Ness
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...e_Portable.jpg - (Original) Portable
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...rite_Celes.jpg - (SNES) Celes Chere
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...SuperMario.jpg - (SNES) Super Mario
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...te_MegaMan.jpg - (NES) Mega Man
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...ite_Schala.jpg - (SNES) Schala Zeal
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...pammington.jpg - (Original) Spammington the Alien

The concludes the first part of the thesis, appropriation. The second part dealt with an entirely original creation. A to scale screen cap of a video game that doesn't exist:
http://www.bwish.com/http://www.bwis...ite_Thesis.jpg
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Sculp...ite_Thesis.jpg

To get an idea of scale and how the show looked:
http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Thesi...2/IMG_5249.JPG
I had wanted them to be scattered around the gallery frollicking around... But museum rules got in the way. Curses!

I hope you enjoy this project!
For more information including thumbnails, a gallery of pictures of sculptures and from the opening reception, and my artist statement, feel free to check out my thesis page.

http://www.bwish.com/ArtJustin/Thesi.../lizzart47.jpg
Don't keep a secret! Tell your friends!

This... is... freakin'... AWESOME!!

I've always wondered what Black Mage looked like from the back, and constructing them out of cubes (each cube having representing a pixel) was a sweet idea.

Megaman, Mario, Black Mage, Link, Celes, freakin' NESS... wow. These are just too awesome. I second your opinion that museum rules suck - having them frolicking about the room in various places would have been SO much cooler.

I kinda like your Spammington the Alien and Portable designs. Portable's just cute.

See that guy up there next to my name? Imagine him, doing this :D , and you have me right now.

Daym.......But you know, it makes sense. Really, what are pixals but squares? Now those are real life versions of the sprites.

I am currently drooling over these life-size sprites. Oh yes. You even have Celes! And Schala and Mario and Megaman and Black Mage and-*faints*.

I'm a lover of sprites- being the things of nostalgia, being colourful and good to look at and so full of atmosphere... so seeing this makes me happy. Totally.

Wow! I love you.

I hope you don't mind me taking inspiration from this. That is too fucking cool. I have to try it out.

You're going to make a game with those originals, right?

Please?


Pretty please?

That is very cool. Marvelous. Awesome. It was a great idea to make sculptures of those little 8-bit and 16-bit guys. If I could buy one, I'd buy two.

Damn you, museum rules...damn you, I say!

Lucis: Thank you! ^^

Flarecobra: And they're terrifying! They can hide behind flag poles and attack without warning!

Art of Hilt: hehe Thank you! I love the sprite aesthetic as well. This gave me a chance to study styles and technique of different sprite artists to hopefully better my own spriting skills. I just love the hand crafted nature of them (Unlike our scaled down 3D models. It's just lazy! Even though New Super Mario Bros. will be awesome, I'm still sad it's not hand sprited).

Arlia Janet: hehe I'd like to see you try ;) Thanks!

CHICAGO¤lollie: I hope so! That'd be neat. It's been discussed with a few of my CS friends hehe

Seran: hehe Thank you!

DUDE! Just...DUDE! You are god!

Now careful, DarkCORN!, I hope Christians don't take offense to that. Not that I have anything against them, but I don't want religion to get involved.
*Excuse the off-topic reply, but I was worried.

Now then. Do you have any other plans involving such sculptures, Bwishey? I mean, these are obviously very lovely works of art. Sure the characters weren't created from pure imagination, but they're there all the same. Are you going to make more, or do something with these?