Funding Overview

Supamural is a conceptual art project which has only been done once  before (by a penguin). The project seeks to re-create scenes from classic videogames using stencils and stop motion photography. But this is more than just an art project. It's also a challenge to whichever group is doing it. 

Funding will go towards the personal time expended for the project, as well as for supplies and materials.  Time invested will be the equivalent of 4 full work weeks.  Additional support will go towards additional murals.  

Computers have evolved rapidly in the past 20 years. The computers of today are now more than 150,000 times faster in processor speed, with 15,000 times as much random access memory than their predecessors. Processing speed and RAM have evolved tremendously. It makes it still more amazing that game designers in the 80's were capable of creating the games they made, considering the limitations.

Screen resolution has improved immensely. On an old Nintendo Game, you were able to use only 13 colors at a time. This was to fit in a 256 by 256 canvas. Whereas today, a videogame can have millions of colors, on a screen with millions of pixels.

The most basic level of any computer image, regardless of when it was created, is thepixel. It's a single colored square.

You should seriously consider helping to fund this project.
Because videogames have been evolving with the rest of the technology.

Hyper-Realism is when something computer generated looks more real than something in real life. Here is an actual tank in Syria. Note how adding pixellated 8 bit graphics takes away from the hyper-realism.

There's something called "Conceptual Art." That's where you create a set of plans for people to follow. Meaning that you create not just an art project for yourself, but something that can be repeated by other groups.

The goal is to produce an educational film about videogames. As well as to produce a conceptual art project for groups to re-create. It will contain original 8 bit graphics that people can identify. Files will be made so that these images can be cut out by a plotter cutter on sheets to be used as stencils.

Participants will also learn about game design and game theory. And game design. For example the Galaga ship is only 16 pixels by 16 pixels in 3 colors.

The project goal is to re-enact a scene from a classic videogame. But the wall needs to be essentially "programmed" the same way the game is in order for the stop motion video to work correctly. All parameters must be taken into consideration.

It's a regimented series of tasks, from extracting graphics, to cutting shapes, to organizing the stencils. That's just the preparation work. A background needs to be prepared, and the end result will be a video we can use to help promote and encourage young people to try these awesome classic games.

This won't be an easy task, however. It will involve lots of organizing and planning. For example, the frame of each object and the position of that image relative to its previous position must be carefully planned, for every object on screen in order for the entire video to appear to be fully animated.

This is the right time for this, too. Right now, if you were born in 1970, you're about 40 or so. If you had kids in your 30's they're probably just entering their teens. Classic games are making the transition from retro to vintage right now as we speak.

This is the right time for this, too. Nothing beautifies a neighborhood like an 8-bit flying fish. And the minds of our youth today are trapped in some kind of guarded fortress. We must develop a strategy to bring them out into a safer environment.

This project won't cost a fortune. $2500 should be enough to get one done correctly. More funding will result in better work, certainly, but if there is enough support, we'll do more of these. There are some pretty cool rewards available.

We'd like to make these plans available to art teachers around the country, for teachers who are interested in creating something of the same caliber and quality. All that you need are the instructions, and that's what conceptual art is. Let's educate kids and fight back against hyper-realistic ultraviolent games with 8bit classic memories of a time when life was simpler and games were still just as fun.