Sam Interviews Sam
Ever since the dawn of art itself there have always been attempts to return to the golden past. Alas, nobody can agree exactly when that golden past was. If you are a Pre-Raphaelite it was—believe it or not—before Raphael. If you are a Renaissance Man or a Neoclassicist it was Rome and Greece at the height of their power. And if you ask Sam Keddy, it was that magical span of time between the Atari and the Nintendo DS, when you could still see the individual pixels.
Pixel art has developed into its own fully fledged art movement, complete with all the expected best practices, countercultures around rejecting said best practices, schisms, baggage, etc. that any good art movement has. The average joe seems to think of pixel art as the easy escape hatch indie developers reach for when they need low-effort assets for their game. It’s not an entirely unfair characterization—there are basically no mainstream big budget games with purposefully lo-fi graphics (except Octopath Traveler?)—but as anyone who has ever tried to pick up pixel art can tell you, it’s not really that easy! Some art fundamentals carry over to it, but a tiny resolution does not straightforwardly translate to less work. Representing something readably and with suitable appeal under color and space constraints is a real puzzle.
Despite the number of high profile pixely games that have come out in the last two decades (and in the preceding era where every game was a pixely game), nobody in the broader pixelverse has really attained mainstream fame. There are ambassadors to the uninitiated public, like Brandon James Greer. There are talented artists that are highly regarded within the niche, like Cyangmou and Fool. And then there’s Sam Keddy, better known on the web as skeddles. Though he’s clearly a talented artist, where he has truly made a name for himself is authoring resources and building communities. He’s the developer behind Lospec, a website that grew from a humble user-populated palette list to a full fledged gallery—like an Instagram exclusively for “low-spec” art—with a highly active community.
He also built Pixel School, a rich multimedia course to assist beginning and intermediate artists in mastering the peculiar fundamentals of this medium.
He’s also someone I consider a dear friend of mine, though we’ve only ever interacted online. We’re not quite soulmates, for there are many ways we diverge and disagree, but I’ve always felt a unique harmony with his sensibilities, an admiration for his accomplishments and his mettle. And I think he’s underrated and underexposed. Somebody ought to interview him! I guess that somebody is me.
So here goes my short interview with Sam Keddy: Creator of Lospec, Dean of Pixel School, Head Developer of Azlädor, ex-moderator of r/pixelart and r/blender, pixel artist, musician, modeler, programmer, creative extraordinaire!
How did you first get into pixel art?
In middle school. My friend Derek and I were obsessed with video games, particularly Pokemon and Sonic on the Gameboy Advance. One day we discovered you could find “sprites” (little pieces of the character art) ripped from these games on the internet. You could then download them into MS Paint and play around with them: changing colors, merging two together, turning them into your own custom characters, making comics, etc. We also discovered a program called GameMaker which let you create your own computer games using sprites. We spent a lot of time just having fun making sprites and games. I eventually found my way to my first online community, The Mystical Forest Zone, which was a website that hosted Sonic sprite sheets and comics made from them, as well as a forum. There I learned to improve my sprites, and eventually learned about “Pixel Art” (which at the time I thought just meant big sprites), which led me to the PixelJoint community.
How did you first get the idea for Lospec? What was it like working on v1.0 of the site?
I was an extremely active member on PixelJoint from 2006-2010, as it was really the main meeting spot for pixel artists at that time. It was (and is) a great site, but it was designed in the early 2000s and didn’t get updated often. I got into web development and design, and wanted to try giving it a modern redesign, which I made in Photoshop and posted to their forums.
I was a bit disappointed when I realized the site would probably never get an update and started thinking about making my own version. I also thought it was a bit sad that other similar artforms like voxel art didn’t have their own “Voxel Joint”, so it would be cool to give them a section on this website too. On the pixel art forum Pixelation they had a section for “low-spec” art forms other than pixel art, so I created the name Lospec based off that. I played around with designs for a while and eventually started working on the website.
I decided to greatly simplify the design to keep the focus on the art. Previously I had used ASP and PHP to run my web servers, but they were complicated and never worked that well for me. In 2016 I learned about Node.js, which lets you write in javascript, which I already knew well, so it seemed perfect. I started Lospec as my first Node.js project, figuring it out as I went. When it launched in 2017 it was extremely simple: no gallery or even accounts, the only pages were the palette list, pixel art software list, and a very simple version of the Lospec Pixel Editor. There were very few options for web-based pixel art software at that time, and no good repository for pixel art palettes. I wanted to include the gallery, as that was the initial idea, but I knew that would be a huge undertaking, so instead decided to hold off for launch, and work towards it one feature at a time over the next few years.
Skeddles funded the gallery with a Kickstarter (which I donated to), quit his day job, and fully launched it on Halloween of 2022. While it hasn’t absolutely taken over the zone, the gallery has accumulated almost 20k pieces in only four years, and good pieces usually get at least a handful of likes and comments.
Had PixelJoint not existed, do you think you would’ve made it here by some other way? Are you in some sense fated to do low spec art, or do you see a parallel universe skeddles as diving into some other artistic discipline, or something besides art entirely?
I’m more of a butterfly effect kind of guy. Without PixelJoint I would most likely not be a pixel artist, and Lospec definitely would not exist. I would have still started spriting, but I don’t think I would have increased my skills and grown as attached to it without PixelJoint’s community and contests. PixelJoint was small enough that everyone knew each other, and it felt like anyone could win the contests if they just did well enough (though it took me a lot of participation badges before I managed to place). PixelJoint also had a culture of everyone providing unsolicited critique. Some people found this harsh or rude, but I think critique is extremely important, and artists need to be able to let go of their ego if they want to improve. I received tons of great critique over the years and it definitely taught me a lot.
I think most artists who cut their teeth at PixelJoint would say the same thing. It’s one of those unique genius factories that has never been recreated, like pre-exit PayPal, or prewar Budapest.
What is the story behind your pseudonym and avatar?
When I first started posting pixel art, I just used my Runescape username, “flameruler13”. I was a 13 year old edgelord.
And as a 13 year old edgelord I was obnoxious and lacked social awareness. After posting some rude comments on other people’s art on PixelJoint, my account was banned. But this was the best thing that could have happened to me as it forced me to acknowledge and change my behavior. Since I loved PixelJoint and couldn’t stay away, I secretly created a new account called “skeddles”, using a nickname my friends jokingly came up with as my rapper name (based off Eminem, but with Sam Keddy / skittles). Since I never got banned again, that name stuck and I continued using it across other sites. I could never really decide on a good avatar for “skeddles”. Flameruler13 had much stronger branding! I cycled through a few, usually changing it to my most recent character. One day I drew a weird bird in my notebook, then scanned it and created a pixel art of it, titled “awkward bird”, and made it my avatar. I changed to other avatars after that, but I kept returning to the awkward bird as it just felt more right. Years later when I started using social media to share my pixel art, I created an updated version of the awkward bird, and from there it was solidified as my persona. I wish I had picked something cooler, but at this point it’s how people recognize me, and anything else would just feel phony.
Lospec’s discord is surprisingly kid friendly (to the point of automuting people for swearing!) and it has caused some tension with others that prefer more mature spaces. The gallery also doesn’t allow NSFW art. Skeddles has been consistent in going to bat for younger users and trying to make them feel welcome, and his own story gives us some insight why that might be.
I like to try to find “preoccupations” in my favorite artists, and try to understand where they came from. You know, flying machines for Miyazaki, nonlinear time for Nolan. For you it seems like your principal preoccupation is grassy hills.
Do you remember when and why you started drawing so many grassy hills, where that fixation came from?
I have a lot of fond memories of being a teenager and hanging out with my friends while we sat in a dark room and stared at the Windows XP default wallpaper. Seriously I think that’s where it started. Everyone had that wallpaper and it was so nice that people frequently didn’t change it, so it became a familiar comfort. XP was the tool of choice through my teenage years, and that’s when I started making pixel art, so naturally the two comingled. It was probably then reinforced by Adventure Time, in particular the pilot which I was weirdly obsessed with before it got turned into the show (and it’s now one of my favorite shows of all time). Probably some other media contributed too such as the Pokemon Anime, Sonic Adventure 2’s chao garden, Animal Crossing, Neopets, Miyazaki. Grass and sky became my default landscape and the most comfortable to draw. I don’t think I’ve perfectly captured the essence of grassy hills and sky yet, so expect more to come.
His grassy hills are my favorite pieces. Other preoccupations that went unmentioned: monster pets (I suspect this one stems from Pokemon and Neopets), castles, ancient Egypt, vampires.
Do you ever feel underappreciated? Even resentful? It seems like your audience are asking you for yet more free labor far more often than they are thanking you for the free labor you have already delivered.
I know a lot of people appreciate Lospec, I’m just disappointed it’s not enough for most to support it financially. My original dream was that I could make a free website that people would support because they appreciate it. But it turns out people want goods and services in exchange for their cash (who knew?). I partially blame Patreon for inventing this unrealistic dream, since in reality the most successful patreons are the ones who give people things in return rather than supporting creators you like. Patreon and Kickstarter are really just other ways to buy things. Thankfully we’ve had enough support to keep the servers running over the years, which is what really matters. I just yearn for an economic system where everything isn’t forced to be capitalized with exclusive products or manipulative advertising. I’m a bad businessman, and I don’t want to be a good one.
I think I might be the number one lifetime donor to Lospec. I wish more people would join at the 1 or 5 dollar tier, but it’s also not obvious how to structure it to make that enticing.
I hear people apply the term “niche internet microcelebrity” overly broadly, but if such a thing even exists then you certainly qualify as one. With that status and visibility has come a number of controversies. Clearly these are super stressful events that the average netizen never has to deal with. Any of us putting our work out there could draw the Eye of Sauron at any time, grow our own audience of haters. What is your advice for a first time victim of the web mob?
Delete your posts, then don’t engage. Don’t reply, like, or even block them. Any response you give is just fighting fire with gasoline. Step away and stop checking your notifications for a few weeks. Then talk to some normal, sane, rational friends who can put things in perspective. When it’s all over, consider never going back to places that have “communities” where everyone is essentially anonymous and content is scored based on virality (Twitter, Reddit). Just don’t post opinions on the open internet. You aren’t changing anyone’s mind or making the world a better place. You’re just finding people who already agree with you or asking people who disagree to attack you. Spend more time in small communities where you actually get to know people and have mutual respect.
Very few of us can say we’ve had multiple manifestos written about us. And that’s not even to mention the mobs that drove him off of moderating two separate subreddits for not allowing NSFW art, and of course the spectre of AI has been a constant source of outrage and division in the broader art community.
Who are some of your favorite pixel artists and games with prominent pixel art?
My favorite pixel artists are my friends, the people I chat with or see in the same places most days. It’s more fun to see your friends making cool things than random strangers, it just means more. I do still appreciate great pieces of art and look at art by strangers every day, but I tend to separate the art from the artist. I love the individual pieces more than the artists. There are just too many amazing pixel artists for me to even pick a top 25, or remember who created what masterpiece, and I’m sure if I made a list I would leave out more than I remembered. As I’ve gotten older I’ve also stopped really caring about “favorites”, you can appreciate things without having to rank them numerically. But if I have to list a few: cure, snake, deceiver, night, PxTommi, hby, nauris, vested, cyangmou, franek, mechabarbarian, batfeula, noion, zaebucca, dethrood, vierbit, clay, greenguy, carrion, ventique, biff, pixeldoshi, Henk Nieborg, Paul Robertson, slym. I don’t have good taste in games, but some I like are Trials of Mana, Sword of Mana, Breath of Fire 4, Pokemon Gold/Ruby, Sonic Advance, Songs of Conquest, Minish Cap, Chrono Trigger, Owlboy.
I know nobody asked me but I really like Makrustic and Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP!
The best part about skeddles is that you know he’s cooking something right this second. Every day he’s in the lab creating something new. Word on the street is that a new course is coming to Pixel School, as well as a revamp of the palette list, a new voting system for palette approvals to clear out that pesky backed up queue, and of course Azlädor! So follow both him and the official Lospec account on Bluesky to be the first to see what his bird brain dreams up next.
Though most of the sites skeddles mentions from this era are offline, PixelJoint is still kicking! It has a bit of a legendary status in the pixel art community, with extremely high quality standards and an intensely critical commenting culture leading it to be top-heavy with great artists, but maybe overly hostile to beginners.