eBoy and the perfection of pixels

**Eboy: The Art of Pixelated Precision**

In the realm of digital artistry, few names resonate as distinctly as Eboy—three visionary artists who have crafted a unique niche in the world of computer-generated imagery. Their journey began nearly two decades ago, with each pixel meticulously handcrafted using the most rudimentary tool in Photoshop—a single-pixel pen. This labor-intensive process, where every image is built one pixel at a time, has become their signature style, allowing them to create intricate works that span a vast array of subjects, from a sleek chair to iconic figures like Robocop's robot.

### The Formation of Eboy

The trio—Kai, Stefan, and freeze-frame (also known as SpEn)—met in Berlin, the vibrant capital of Germany. This city, renowned for its historical landmarks such as the Brandenburg Gate and the Berlin Wall, was also a hotspot for graffiti artists. The seeds of their artistic collaboration were sown in the mid-90s when Stefan and freeze-frame, then teenagers, encountered Kai, completing the trio.

### A Portfolio of Renowned Clients

Over the years, Eboy has collaborated with an impressive roster of clients, including Adobe, Uniqlo, Honda, Xbox, and Lacoste. Their work extends into various media, from magazine layouts for *Wired* and the *New York Times*, to corporate campaigns for brands like Adidas and Coca-Cola. Despite the acclaim, they view these projects as a means to sustain their livelihood, allowing them to pursue their true passion: constructing pixel cities.

### The Pixel City Project

Eboy's most ambitious endeavor lies in their "pixel cities"—digitally crafted representations of real-world metropolises, each taking two to three years to complete. These cities are not mere replicas; they are stylized interpretations that capture the essence of places like New York, Tokyo, and London. The process involves creating over nine thousand individual components, stored in a vast database for reuse, ensuring modularity and efficiency.

### Isometric Precision

One of the defining features of Eboy's work is their use of isometric perspectives, where elements in the foreground and background maintain consistent scale. This technique allows for seamless integration of various subjects, such as a topless lady or a construction worker, into diverse settings without disrupting the visual harmony.

### The Artistic Philosophy

The artists' approach to their craft is deeply personal. Inspired by Bruegel's intricate paintings, they find solace in creating worlds that offer refuge from life's chaos. Their preference for digital art stems from its reproducibility and shareability, contrasting sharply with the dissatisfaction often encountered in printed works due to color space and printing inconsistencies.

### Berlin Roots and East German Influence

Growing up in East Berlin during the era of the Wall shaped their perspective on creativity and freedom. The constraints of living under a restrictive regime fostered a unique resilience and appreciation for art as an outlet of expression. The fall of the Wall opened new horizons, allowing them to explore previously unimaginable opportunities and immerse themselves in a vibrant cultural landscape.

### A Lifelong Commitment

Eboy's journey is not just about creating art; it's about crafting a lifestyle that balances creativity with sustainability. Their ability to turn their passion into a livelihood has been a stroke of luck, allowing them to focus on what they love while contributing to the broader artistic community.

In conclusion, Eboy's story is one of dedication and innovation. Through their meticulous pixel work and unwavering commitment to their craft, they have redefined digital artistry, creating timeless pieces that continue to inspire and captivate audiences worldwide. Their legacy is a testament to the power of perseverance, collaboration, and the enduring allure of pixelated precision.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enso this is e boy wait hold on this is e boy there are three of them their computer artists or artists that use computers I think we are three guys that work with pixels and make images images like a chair or that robot from Robocop some nude hippies a cool car in the end we do everything with a pencil so it's very I think more the most basic tool in Photoshop is used to draw the each pixel the size of the pen - is just one pixel one by one everything is made like this one pixel at a time so it's really labor-intensive but they've been doing it for nearly 20 years so they've made a lot of stuff like a ton of stuff so here they are again EBU freeze-frame spent KY and Stefan they all met here in Berlin the capital of Germany home of the Brandenburg Gate the Berlin Wall sausage walkers and world-class graffiti Stefan and spent have been friends they were teenagers then when they met Kai in the mid 90s group was complete between the three of them they've made images of Honda Adobe Yahoo total groove armada Uniqlo mountain dew a six xbox Lacoste DKNY a rebo HBO Qudrat we work with Mike a lot o Smith adidas as well with coca-cola New York Times Magazine Wired magazine but that's just to pay the rent I mean what they're really excited about are these giant pixel cities they build in their free time their pixel versions of real cities because people know in New York for example and they see a interpretation of New York and that's always interesting to see something you know how it seemed from from a different side they've actually built a lot of cities Berlin Venice London Cologne New York Tokyo Baltimore Los Angeles Harris RIA and Marseille and they call them pics aramas pixelize stylized versions of cities working in their free time each one takes two or three years to complete and as of today they've created over nine thousand little parts we have a huge database with thousands of of objects in it and everything can be reused the Pyxis and module are modular now this is the key so you can very easily reuse pixels and combine them so like you can get this car and then take this guy out and put this other guy in or take away as high or whatever also everything is isometric so the things that are in front have the same size as the things are that are in the back so I can take this topless lady and have remove all the way over to this construction site or have our hangout at this rooftop barbecue you can move it wherever you want and she'll always be topless always the right scale this is a donor it's a lot like a gyro but it has like different vegetables different sauces donors are delicious there's even a donor place in their Berlin pics or AMA look at all this stuff look at all the detail why would anyone devote their life to building something like this what's funny is that at home we had a picture at from boyhood you know broader and I grew up with it and it's a scene with a lot of people of course Bruegel all those little details that little universe frozen in time could it be that when KY was a kid life outside his home was too complex full of confusion and constantly changing but the world of the painting never changed he could examine it understand it and maybe now that's what he does with our world to be honest I don't think it it has anything to do with what we do is your emergency yeah but I don't think so it turns out it was more practical than that for example you design something on a computer a layout for an image you just do something on your screen then when you go to print you have to deal with a different color space you have it CMYK versus RGB on the screen then you have to deal with the printer who uses some kind of special inks and then you have to deal with a guy that puts more ink or less ink and so the result for me never was I was never happy about anything I printed I could live it with it but more often than not I was like I like to make a thing and then that's the thing but the bad thing about making one thing is that you cannot copy it so I wanted to become an artist at some point but I didn't want to make stuff that is I have to sell to live and then that guy puts it on his wall which might be nice or not I would never see that stuff again I hated to to to leave it alone so that was the reason why digitally was so extremely important being able to share without having to to to leave your work they say a common sign that a pic sarama isn't complete is if you look around it and you can't find anywhere you'd like to be we have a like a theory that there has to be a place where you have to be able to relax so if everything is just in your face I don't want want to be there so if you see that it's not we cannot go into it it might be a source of a problem so for example here you have this scene in a cafe where the guys are sitting with the computers and that's for example place I think everyone from us what I'd love to be there yeah there are all these epidemics working the blue shirts they they did not talk in there they're the jeans yeah their lunch hour I know their coffee Joulies man sure but they didn't always have genius lunches I mean up until the fall of the Berlin Wall both spent in Stefan lived in East Berlin when you get it when you are a teenager and you see that you can't go through the wall you see the wall every day and you can't travel so and you see it unknown Intellivision divest all the cool stuff all the pens played in an invest Belen so you could hit in the radio with but you couldn't go there so if you had some cool stuff going on to like East German bands playing in like churches and stuff like in really strange places it was very very cool as well but that weren't the bands we wanted to see in the first place so but growing up and Estonia was pretty normal that was a bit like a surreal moment and about a sudden you can go to the side of three-d-- was the foil was like a secret hidden world and no it was just possible and it took a while to believe it as it's not normal for me it was like I really ever after the work him down there there was advertising everywhere so back then East Germany was really like black and white everything was kind of the same the I remember I have first went to like a supermarket it was like a like a gallery all those cereal packages and boxes and it is it was so exciting just such a really cheap supermarket here and in this area it seems like everything they're excited about eventually gets immortalized in pixels and given a home in their cities and they're pretty much excited about everything for us it's very important to to have time to to play really setups one to see we are really lucky to have to have met you see it on on bands sometimes it's just luck that somehow they matched and it was a good fit and for us it's just good that we are happy and we can live from it and we enjoy our work and that's quick I guess youso this is e boy wait hold on this is e boy there are three of them their computer artists or artists that use computers I think we are three guys that work with pixels and make images images like a chair or that robot from Robocop some nude hippies a cool car in the end we do everything with a pencil so it's very I think more the most basic tool in Photoshop is used to draw the each pixel the size of the pen - is just one pixel one by one everything is made like this one pixel at a time so it's really labor-intensive but they've been doing it for nearly 20 years so they've made a lot of stuff like a ton of stuff so here they are again EBU freeze-frame spent KY and Stefan they all met here in Berlin the capital of Germany home of the Brandenburg Gate the Berlin Wall sausage walkers and world-class graffiti Stefan and spent have been friends they were teenagers then when they met Kai in the mid 90s group was complete between the three of them they've made images of Honda Adobe Yahoo total groove armada Uniqlo mountain dew a six xbox Lacoste DKNY a rebo HBO Qudrat we work with Mike a lot o Smith adidas as well with coca-cola New York Times Magazine Wired magazine but that's just to pay the rent I mean what they're really excited about are these giant pixel cities they build in their free time their pixel versions of real cities because people know in New York for example and they see a interpretation of New York and that's always interesting to see something you know how it seemed from from a different side they've actually built a lot of cities Berlin Venice London Cologne New York Tokyo Baltimore Los Angeles Harris RIA and Marseille and they call them pics aramas pixelize stylized versions of cities working in their free time each one takes two or three years to complete and as of today they've created over nine thousand little parts we have a huge database with thousands of of objects in it and everything can be reused the Pyxis and module are modular now this is the key so you can very easily reuse pixels and combine them so like you can get this car and then take this guy out and put this other guy in or take away as high or whatever also everything is isometric so the things that are in front have the same size as the things are that are in the back so I can take this topless lady and have remove all the way over to this construction site or have our hangout at this rooftop barbecue you can move it wherever you want and she'll always be topless always the right scale this is a donor it's a lot like a gyro but it has like different vegetables different sauces donors are delicious there's even a donor place in their Berlin pics or AMA look at all this stuff look at all the detail why would anyone devote their life to building something like this what's funny is that at home we had a picture at from boyhood you know broader and I grew up with it and it's a scene with a lot of people of course Bruegel all those little details that little universe frozen in time could it be that when KY was a kid life outside his home was too complex full of confusion and constantly changing but the world of the painting never changed he could examine it understand it and maybe now that's what he does with our world to be honest I don't think it it has anything to do with what we do is your emergency yeah but I don't think so it turns out it was more practical than that for example you design something on a computer a layout for an image you just do something on your screen then when you go to print you have to deal with a different color space you have it CMYK versus RGB on the screen then you have to deal with the printer who uses some kind of special inks and then you have to deal with a guy that puts more ink or less ink and so the result for me never was I was never happy about anything I printed I could live it with it but more often than not I was like I like to make a thing and then that's the thing but the bad thing about making one thing is that you cannot copy it so I wanted to become an artist at some point but I didn't want to make stuff that is I have to sell to live and then that guy puts it on his wall which might be nice or not I would never see that stuff again I hated to to to leave it alone so that was the reason why digitally was so extremely important being able to share without having to to to leave your work they say a common sign that a pic sarama isn't complete is if you look around it and you can't find anywhere you'd like to be we have a like a theory that there has to be a place where you have to be able to relax so if everything is just in your face I don't want want to be there so if you see that it's not we cannot go into it it might be a source of a problem so for example here you have this scene in a cafe where the guys are sitting with the computers and that's for example place I think everyone from us what I'd love to be there yeah there are all these epidemics working the blue shirts they they did not talk in there they're the jeans yeah their lunch hour I know their coffee Joulies man sure but they didn't always have genius lunches I mean up until the fall of the Berlin Wall both spent in Stefan lived in East Berlin when you get it when you are a teenager and you see that you can't go through the wall you see the wall every day and you can't travel so and you see it unknown Intellivision divest all the cool stuff all the pens played in an invest Belen so you could hit in the radio with but you couldn't go there so if you had some cool stuff going on to like East German bands playing in like churches and stuff like in really strange places it was very very cool as well but that weren't the bands we wanted to see in the first place so but growing up and Estonia was pretty normal that was a bit like a surreal moment and about a sudden you can go to the side of three-d-- was the foil was like a secret hidden world and no it was just possible and it took a while to believe it as it's not normal for me it was like I really ever after the work him down there there was advertising everywhere so back then East Germany was really like black and white everything was kind of the same the I remember I have first went to like a supermarket it was like a like a gallery all those cereal packages and boxes and it is it was so exciting just such a really cheap supermarket here and in this area it seems like everything they're excited about eventually gets immortalized in pixels and given a home in their cities and they're pretty much excited about everything for us it's very important to to have time to to play really setups one to see we are really lucky to have to have met you see it on on bands sometimes it's just luck that somehow they matched and it was a good fit and for us it's just good that we are happy and we can live from it and we enjoy our work and that's quick I guess you\n"