About

Sprite editing, or Spriting has become a very popular hobby for internet users and video game fans. Sprites are small, two-dimensional images or animations that are integrated into a larger scene such as video games.

This is an example of how sprites are used in games. The first is from Pokémon yellow, while the second is from Pokémon Pearl. The two show large differneces in how sprites have changed. As such, Spriting has become more advanced.

Originally, Sprites were a method of integrating unrelated bitmaps so that they appeared to be part of the normal bitmap on a screen, such as creating an animated character that can be moved on a screen without altering the data defining the overall screen. Such sprites can be created by either circuitry or software. One of the most popular sprites to edit comes from the popular Nintendo video game series Pokémon. The first Pokemon sprites came into appearance in North America on September 30, 1998. The two games were Pokemon Red and Blue Versions for the Gameboy, Nintendo’s first portable game system. It wasn’t until 2002 with the release of Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire for the Gameboy Advance that gave way to release of the third generation Pokemon that Pokemon sprite editing became apparent. It is hard to exactly prove this so it is only a theory. Also, the indroduction of the sprite resource has allowed people to easily access sprites without hacking themselves.

Pokefans from all over got on their computers, downloaded a picture of a certain pokemon or trainer sprite, and edited it to their liking. The most popular methods of editing sprites are the use of image editing programs, from the very simple MS Paint to the advanced AdobePhotoshop. Sprites can be used as representatations, be used to make trainer cards and even been used to replace the original sprite images in the Pokemon games themselves by use of ROM Hacking which is the process of modifying a video game ROM image to alter the game's graphics, dialogue, levels, gameplay, or other gameplay elements that can then be played on an emulator. This fad has continued to spread even now through the new DS Pokemon game releases of Diamond and Pearl and is sure to boost with the release of Pokemon Black and White.

The best places to see custom sprites are on media sharing sites such as Deviantart, photobucket and google images.