Welcome to the Pixel Art world !!!
Looking backward , we have realistic oil painting, a lot of artist spending their whole life, reserching the painting which is true to life , just like the High Quality realistic looking VR/Games we have nowardays .We spending a lot of money on the hardware, better Graphic Cards, CPUs, memories just for making artworks more realistic looking ,and the software as well , we have Z-Brush , as the result, more artists become sculptors.That's the thing we are proud of , truly never tired of , because we thinking the next-big-thing in that way.
However , there is always someone who has nothing to do with the next-big-thing , like me , I believe that if there is always a next-big-thing, then there is no next-big-thing, at least it is not big anymore.
Why Pixel?
Face to pixel art, everybody is equal, you can learn how to do, you can copy what others doing.(sprite comic – game cinematic / mock-up / animation web comics / mini movie clip/ RPG MAKER/ Cross Stitch/),game assets are not only for games but also, for the audiences who love the pixel game character and , help them to make their own art even if they know nothing about drawing.
For artists who is doing character design, in my advice, introducing your characters by using pixel art is a very efficient way to make your characters well known.
For game assets
compared with “pop up” or good silhouette, I prefer to say , doing more different kind of game assets will be more important (for example, main character has emotions on special UI panels ).Good thing is, you could fininsh all of your assets by just using pixel images.
The ideology
Most people think that pixel is a spicific style, I don't agree with that point, pixel is the tool of making different styles of art, like the oil painting and water color, you can never say oil style painting or water color style because, these are different materials , different languages of interpatation.
The way of pixel artist thinking .... well you'll never know unless you get into it. I would like to say, full of confidence of a simple pixel .. imagine a singer with a guitar in his hand.
"Take piano: keys begin, keys end. You know there are 88 of them. Nobody can tell you any different. They are not infinite. You're infinite... And on those keys, the music that you can make... is infinite. I like that. That I can live by..." the legend of 1900