Animation Goals

The idea that I’m trying to get across is pixels in 3D space.  A square pixel represented in 3D would, of course, be a cube.  However, I am trying to emulate actual sprite animation, not just pixilated geometry. 

There are a couple of people who have done similar things, most notably 3D Dot Game Heroes for the PS3-

Jump to about 1:08 in the trailer, and you will notice that, though the geometry is built out of cubes, when the geometry rotates, the cubes also rotate, meaning some cubes are at an angle to others.  While this is one way of emulating a look of pixelation, sprites are constructed on a grid and cannot deviate from that, you cannot rotate a pixel in relation to it’s neighbors.

The look that I am going for is to follow a strict grid, while objects can move horizontally and vertically within that grid, they cannot rotate, rotation must be achieved by turning pixels "on and off", drawing a whole new frame of the sprite.

In other words, I am trying to force myself to keep each “pixel” cube perpendicular to the camera at all times and achieve rotation by changing which cubes are where within a 3d grid, rather than rotating the existing cubes in 3D space.

Look at the sprites in my previous post, see how the bottom of his back foot is not flat, it “steps” as if it is aliased.  This is different (and much more difficult) to pull off than simply copying and rotating his front foot, and animating the foot from one position to the other is much more involved than just rotating the foot.