Special thanks to user blakespot for posting my article on HackerNews (+110 comments, +470 upvotes). As always, my deep gratitude goes to PSEnough for including this article in his Demo Report on Youtube (at min. 22:45).
Much appreciated!

Boris Vallejo and the Pixel Art of the Demoscene

Boris Vallejo is a renowned fantasy painter who has had a significant influence on fantasy book covers, computer game box art, and even the demoscene. Over the decades, his works have often been replicated by pixel artists, sparking controversy. I rediscovered Vallejo’s impressive work for myself, explored the demoscene’s admiration for his art, and decided to recreate one of his paintings using only four colors, recording the process on video. This article features fantasy art history, demoscene drama, and plenty of pixel art fun.

October 2024 Mildly NSFW

On the left, the original painting "Gillkarth's Odyssey" by Boris Vallejo. On the right, is my line art recreation using only four colors. I call it "Wrath of the Vallerian" (after Boris Vallejo).

Recently, I was going through the historical results of the Revision demoparty, as you do. I was looking for a subject to draw for a new pixel art piece. I had learned to appreciate the color limitations during the old-school graphics competition at Evoke, where we could only use a predefined color palette. The first time I submitted an entry in 2022, I hated it. The second time, in 2023, I came to accept the limited color palette as a problem to solve. And by 2024, I actually started to enjoy the challenge.

I wanted to create a new piece outside of competition ("out of compo") and was looking for inspiration.

In the results.txt file of Revision 2013, I found an interesting phrase. Right above the list of results for the graphics competition, it said:

"GRAPHICS COMPETITIONS HAVEN'T BEEN
THE SAME EVER SINCE PEOPLE STOPPED
RIPPING BORIS VALLEJO AND SORAYAMA"

Whatever Happened to Boris Vallejo?

I hadn't thought of Peruvian artist Boris Vallejo in ages. I remembered his slick fantasy artwork, featuring idealistically rendered warriors and princesses, muscular and scantily clad (but not indecent). If they weren't battling monsters, the figures wouldn't look out of place in a romance novel. Vallejo's paintings were always beautifully done, but they're a bit out of fashion these days.

Boris Vallejo, "Dragon Riders", 1982

Pixel artists copied his work in the late 1980s and 1990s. Vallejo's visual aesthetic was one that many demoscene groups sought to replicate or pay homage to on the new 16-bit platforms like the Commodore Amiga, the Atari ST, and the PC with its wonderful VGA graphics.

Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell, "John Carter of Mars", 2009

Vallejo's art was filled with heroic characters, often set in mythical or alien worlds, similar to the themes explored in many demoscene productions. Demos in the 1990s, especially on platforms like the Amiga, frequently featured surreal landscapes, epic narratives, and fantastical characters reminiscent of Vallejo's paintings.

There was a time when I loved Vallejo's art. It was a fascinating blend of imagination and breathtaking realism, with vivid portrayals of fantasy worlds populated by powerful, heroic figures and fantastical creatures. Vallejo's mastery of anatomy and attention to detail brought his subjects to life. I used to feel a true sense of awe and wonder when looking at his paintings. Back then, I felt that his work struck a balance between strength and beauty, craftsmanship and adventure.

Left: One of Boris Vallejo's early works from 1977, the cover of "Tarnsman of Gor". Right: A recent painting by Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell from 2023: "Tenacious D".

These days, I'm not so sure. I've grown older, and my tastes have changed. I still admire Vallejo's work, but now I find it a bit too slick, idealized, and repetitive. I've come to appreciate rougher, more abstract, and more experimental art styles.

I looked up Boris Vallejo, and by all accounts, he is in his 80s, alive and well. He collaborates with his artist wife Julie Bell, continues to produce and successfully sell their artwork online at borisjulie.com.

Yet, while reminiscing about Vallejo's paintings, I realized I might have found a topic for a drawing.

The Appropriation of Popular Art by Sceners

As of September 2024, around 35 images submitted by sceners on Demozoo are tagged with "boris-vallejo" though the tagging is probably not comprehensive. Given his significant influence on the demoscene, Boris Vallejo even has entries on both demozoo.org and janeway.exotica.org.

Left: Boris Vallejo's art as found in the Hardwired demo by The Silents and Kefrens Right: Vallejo's orignal cover of the book "Edge of Tomorrow" by Isaac Asimov

The other artist mentioned in the results.txt was the Japanese artist Hajime Sorayama. He is best known for his hyper-realistic erotic robots and cyborgs. His work explores the fusion of man and machine, often focusing on eroticism, fetishism, and the beauty of artificial forms. Sorayama rose to international fame in the 1980s and has influenced various fields, from fine art to commercial design, including contributions to film, music, and fashion. For the young men in the demoscene, this was a perfect combination.

On the Left: the pixel art copy on the Amiga of the original painting by Sorayama on the right.

Over the years, Boris Vallejo and his long-time collaborator Julie Bell had other intersections with computers in the 1990s. They painted box art for computer and video games such as the fantasy role-playing game Dragon Wars, the platform shooter Turrican, the side-scrolling fantasy beat-'em-up Golden Axe, and the delightful underwater adventure Ecco the Dolphin. Here is a list of computer and video game box art credits by Boris Vallejo.

Vallejo's influence on sceners was unquestionable. Below are more examples of Vallejo's artwork used in demoscene productions. Many of these artworks were digitized or scanned, which doesn't require any artistry. It's a cheap and easy way to get good graphics for a demo.

The Fantasy Slideshow by Turtletronic has a number of obvious scans (left) of paintings, e.g. Vallejo's Antecorn (right). Turtletronic could pull off this scan or capture because their slideshow uses Amiga's HAM mode that allows the nearly unrestricted use of all of the Amiga's 4,096 color.

I feel that Peachy's recreation (on the left) of a painting by Boris Vallejo (on the right) looks to be hand-pixelled and not a scan. The slightly different angle of the front leg and the bark on the tree trunk look different.

I also believe that Archmage (left) recreated the painting by Boris Vallejo (right) by hand-pixelling it in a painting program. The face of the woman in the center is angled differently and trees in the background look differnt.

Scanned paintings are quite controversial in the scene. In a blog post by a scener called Danny, who used to work for the computer game company Eidos Interactive, he does not like the practice of using scanned images of paintings and then declaring them as your own work. But he also does not find critics great who condemn sceners who copy paintings but openly admit that they are copies. He even wrote that it is the main reason he left the scene and would no longer submit any graphics for competitions. His post, Disintegration Of The Old Graphics Scene, is worth reading. He wrote it in 1998, making it a reflection of that time period in the demoscene.

Some of Danny's arguments sound distressingly familiar nowadays in the context of AI-generated art. In his post, he wrote:

"There are quite a number of artists (even some famous ones that get much respect) that have practiced so long on making a scanned image look hand drawn, that their lame efforts have become almost undetectable. There is almost no way of telling if the image is created through blood, sweat, and tears, or the powers of modern-day technology.

Danny does not outright condemn or defend copying. He just does not fully discount its value in a hobbyist community like the demoscene as long as it is clear that a work is a reproduction of another work. This is for me the culmination of his text:

"My point is that everybody copies. Some do it to learn, others do it to grasp a bit of fame in a very challenging environment. It's not just the artists that copy, it's the whole bloody scene. And everyone that makes any form of art. Artists just get all the crap for it because it's easiest to spot."

The history of the Amiga demoscene is paved with Vallejo immitations.

Some graphics based on Vallejo paintings were actually pixel painted by the sceners, as can be seen in this article in Demoscene: the Amiga Years. Volume 1 1984-1993 by Éditions64k. This requires artistry and dedication.

The Éditions64K book features three pages about the process that Suny used to hand-pixel a recreation of a Vallejo painting on the Commodore Amiga.

It is amazing how many demoscene pixel artists in the 1990s got their inspiration or motives from Boris Vallejo. Suny wrote in the Éditions64K book about the Amiga demoscene:

"My main influence was Boris Vallejo who seems to have inspired a lot of artists at the time. I then got interested in design, photography, painting and animation."

Then Suny went on to close out his section of the Éditions64K book with the following:

"With time, I realized I was not a real artist. I had reached a very good technical level and could reproduce an existing image perfectly. However, this is not the definition of an artist, and I am not super creative. This is why I became a Technical Artist in the video game industry, and now I am working at Apple."

This started out somewhat discouraging, but then we see that his meticulous reproductions of Vallejo’s work and other pixel art helped him find his strengths and discover new professional roles.

Some sceners only use parts of a Vallejo painting, like in this example by Facet from the Hardcore demo.

In a post on pouet.net, user friol asked what the point of re-drawing paintings by others actually is. He even specifically referred to sceners who copy Boris Vallejo's work:

"Oh well... I knew the demoscene was ripping Boris Vallejo, but not that much (we are talking of at least of one hundred pictures). But while some pictures are... I would call them "re-elaborations", others are 1-1 copies.
What's the point of that?"

Another user, gaspode, replied to friol's post:

"That's the dark side of the scene, I think. I can not understand why obviously talented people copy pictures nearly 1:1. Even if they were re-drawn or re-pixeled or whatever, they are still copys for me (because the idea, colors and structure was stolen). Other people apparently don't have problems with that but for me everytime I discover such a thing my respect for the copying artist decreases and first of all I cannot enjoy their future artworks anymore, cause I always think they could have been copied."

This opinion is well-supported by many sceners. User ok3anos pointed out that there is another side to copying artwork as long as the original artist gets credited:

"Well, consider this: In painting, masters have always been copied by the apprentices to let them learn the basis techniques.
It does not disturb me at all to see pixel artists copying Boris Vallejo or others to increase their pixel technique as long as the original artist is credited in a way or another.
Would be more annoying if some of the works were just simple scans reworked a bit (which I suspect some...)

ok3anos reply can be interpreted as a defense of copying artwork as long as the scener remains honest. A link can be found in this thread on pouet that points to the No-Copy site. You can find a gallery of images created by sceners but copied from other artists. There are a lot of examples of swiped Vallejo art.

The No-Copy website. If we disregard for a moment that there are so many examples of swipes of Vallejo's merman and mermaid image, and look closely at this particular copy, then we can see that it looks like an actual painstaking recreation and not a scan (though this is only my personal feeling).

The first thing that strikes me, just looking at the swipes on the No-Copy site, is how often Vallejo's painting of the merman and the mermaid was copied. I never wanted to know what it looks like when merpeople have sex. The second thing that strikes me is that many of the graphics definitely look like full scans or collages of partial scans.

Yet, I think some of them are not scans but incredible reproductions. If my suspicion is true, I personally believe it takes a lot of craft to reproduce a painting as pixel art with the comparatively low resolution and limited color palette of a Commodore Amiga or a PC with VGA graphics. The most commonly used graphics mode for a regular Amiga was 320 x 256 with 32 colors (or 64 colors if extra halfbrite mode was used). The later AGA chipset in the Amiga 1200 and 4000 had a graphics mode comparable to the PC's VGA graphics. When the No-Copy site was published in the second half of the 1990s, the most common VGA mode used for pixel graphics was 320 x 240 with 256 colors, though some people used the higher resolution of 640 x 480, also with 256 colors. It takes patience and a lot of precision to copy Vallejo's art in a pixel paint program like Deluxe Paint or Brilliance.

My journey through Vallejo's influence on the demoscene brought me to the essay An Original Picture written in 2007 by Lars Ghandy Sobiraj, the main editor of the longest running Amiga diskmag Jurassic Pack. He is very critical of pixel artists and graphicians who copy art or photos. He not only condemns scans but even folks who hand-pixel their graphics based on someone else's paintings.

He mentions a traditional, analog technique in which a grid is overlaid on both the original image and the drawing surface. This allows the copying artist to focus on replicating one small part at a time. This method ensured accurate proportions and alignment, helping the artist recreate the image in precise detail. However, he does not consider this technique to be high art.

Lars Sobiraj writes:

"The biggest shame with copied motives are the artists never telling others if it was copied or not. They just secretly hope not to be discovered by the scene police."

I actually support this statement. If you copy something, then make it clear what you have done. This is the bile-filled finale of Lars Sobiraj's essay, like a necromancer's curse thrown upon copying artists (the spelling is unchanged from the original):

"Here is a last message from me: You took the express road for your success. But you are worthless peace of junk. No own fantasies, using grids, copying ideas. Damn lame. You will never develop yourself, and even if you get place #1 in the charts or by your scene friends, that is nothing compared to real life true graphicians based on the bigger world outside the scene.
(b)lame yourself"

I understand the feeling of betrayal one might feel when confronted with artists who so obviously cheat. Yet I feel that this is also a bit too harsh.

All that being said, I don't think copying Vallejo's art is reprehensible as long as you credit the original artist and learn something from the recreation, perhaps by altering it enough to make it distinct.

Criticizing other artists for copying the works of Boris Vallejo becomes somewhat ironic when we consider Vallejo's own creative process. Vallejo often uses models and bodybuilders as references, photographing them in specific poses, and then using these images as a foundation for his paintings. In this way, imitation plays a significant role even in his artistic method.

However, what distinguishes Vallejo is his remarkable ability to synthesize and transform these real-life references into something new and beautiful through his extraordinary skill with paint and brush. His artistry lies not just in copying but in elevating these references into highly imaginative and dynamic works, blending realism with fantasy. This process shows that while imitation may be part of art, true creativity comes from how those references are interpreted and reimagined.

How I Learned Not To Worry And Love Color Limitations

I wanted to copy a Vallejo painting in my own style, using a super limited color palette. And, of course, I'd give credit to good ole Boris! But first, I need to wax poetic about the beauty of limited color palettes.

I chose to use only these four colors for my recreation of a Vallejo painting.

I used to paint pixel art on an Atari ST, which was limited to 16 colors on screen at the same time from a palette of 512 available shades. I always found this limiting and frustrating, especially considering that the Atari ST's main competitor, the Commodore Amiga, could display 32 and even 64 colors from 4,096 available shades.

Then, I started participating in graphics competitions at demoparties, using ridiculously limited six- to eight-color palettes. That's when I discovered an interesting challenge.

There's something exciting about working within a limited color palette. I found that the constraints forced me to focus more on composition, shapes, and contrast. I had to make the most of the few colors I had.

It might be unfair to call the limited color palette required for the Evoke graphics compo "old school" (or "old skool," if you're too cool for "school"). There are no restrictions on resolution, meaning I can use much higher resolutions than any retro "old school" machine was capable of. The results can look quite modern, and the style can be deliberately atmospheric due to the limited color palette.

Video Walkthrough of Line Art Drawing

A full walkthrough of the process of painting the picture.

Drawing A Vallejo in Line Art and Four Colors

So I decided to challenge myself by limiting a drawing to four colors. As a callback to the old days of the demoscene, I used a Boris Vallejo painting as my model. I chose Vallejo's Gillkarth's Odyssey (The Axe Man) from 1998. I used Procreate on my iPad Pro with the Apple Pencil. I absolutely adore Procreate. It is a phenomenally frictionless and intuitive painting tool.

I ended up quite happy with my copy of it as line art. After a few dead ends in coloring, I was also pleased with how it turned out using only four colors.

There was one odd thing I only realized while making the drawing: I have no idea what the barbarian fellow in the center is swinging his axe at. It might be that he's trying to chop into the snake, which is actually facing away from him and minding its own business. Or maybe he's attacking the viewer of the image. It could even be that he's being influenced by the two demon-like creatures behind him to attack. In the original image, his eyes are red, as though he's possessed. To this day, I don't know what this person is up to.

I actually only learned that he's not Conan after I had started the drawing. I asked on the Conan Reddit, if anyone had more information about the painting, and I was quickly corrected. Reddit user mattmirth provided the painting's real name. And another user wrote the following comment and got the most upvotes:

"Every Boris Vallejo painting is Conan, he just doesn't know it. /s"."

I had a lot of fun drawing this piece. I learned a lot about working within color limitations and how to make the most of them. Here's my "out of compo release" on Demozoo.

It also rekindled my appreciation for the art of Boris Vallejo. While I might not be a super fan of his work anymore, I can see why he was so popular and influential. I understand why so many pixel artists copied his work.

And here is my final line art version of Vallejo's Axe Man from "Gillkarth's Odyssey" called Wrath of the Vallerian (after Boris Vallejo).

Rights Disclaimer

The original image "Gillkarth's Odyssey" by Boris Vallejo is used as a reference for the drawing. The original image is copyrighted by Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell. No infringement is intended through this reproduction and no claim of ownership is made by the creator of this derivative work. The drawing is a fair-use work of fandom created for fun and not for profit. It is not intended for commercial use. The drawing itself is not endorsed by Boris Vallejo or Julie Bell (and they might even think it totally sucks, which is fine by me.)

Another drawing using a limited palette of eight colors, this time not based on the work of Boris Vallejo.