How Fusion Sprites Are Generated: Palette Fusion Explained
How our generator repaints the body sprite with the head's colors by brightness, keeps outlines, makes shiny previews and compares with Infinite Fusion.
Pokemon Fusion Pro Team
Our fusion sprites keep the body's shape and repaint it with the head's colors, matched from darkest to lightest. Everything happens in your browser in a fraction of a second, from the official sprites of the 2 Pokemon. This post explains each step, the exact numbers we use, and how the result compares with the sprites in Pokemon Infinite Fusion.
Step 1: Load the 2 Sprites
The generator loads the official front sprite of each Pokemon and draws it on a 96 × 96 pixel canvas, 9,216 pixels in total. Smoothing is turned off, so every pixel stays sharp. For Charigar, the body sprite is Gengar and the color source is Charizard.
Step 2: Build 2 Color Palettes
Each sprite's colors are counted and sorted by brightness. 2 kinds of pixels are left out:
- Transparent pixels: anything less than half opaque (alpha below 128).
- Outlines: very dark pixels with a brightness below 40 out of 255.
Brightness uses the standard luma formula: 0.299 × red + 0.587 × green + 0.114 × blue.
Step 3: Match Colors by Brightness
Each body color gets the head color at the same position in the brightness order, weighted by how many pixels use it. If a body color sits at the darkest 20% of the body's pixels, it gets the head color at the darkest 20% of the head's pixels. Shadows stay shadows and highlights stay highlights, so the body's shading survives.
Step 4: Keep Some of the Body's Shading
35% of the brightness difference between the old and new color is added back. This keeps small details, such as scales or folds, that would vanish if many body colors got the same head color.
Step 5: Keep the Outlines
Dark outline pixels are never repainted. That keeps the silhouette clear, even when the head's colors are pale.
Shiny and Inverted Variants
- Shiny: every visible pixel is rotated 150° around the color wheel after the repaint. It is a preview, not the game's shiny palette.
- Inverted: the 2 Pokemon swap roles, so the head's shape gets the body's colors.
- Download: the PNG is scaled up 4 times, to 384 × 384 pixels, without blurring.
Why Some Fusions Look Better Than Others
- Similar shading works best. Two Pokemon with a similar spread of dark and light colors give a natural result.
- Strong contrast is striking. A dark head on a light body, or the reverse, creates bold new color schemes.
- Single-color heads give flat results. If the head has few colors, many body colors become the same color.
- The face does not move. Only colors change, so the body's face stays; hand-drawn sprites move features too.
Generated Sprites vs Infinite Fusion Sprites
| Our generated sprite | Infinite Fusion auto-generated sprite | Infinite Fusion custom sprite | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shape | Body's sprite | Body's sprite with the head's face | Drawn by an artist |
| Colors | Head's palette by brightness | Head's colors | Chosen by the artist |
| Pokemon covered | All 1,025 | Every fusion in the game | About 55% of fusions |
Find hand-drawn sprites with the Custom Sprite Finder, and preview the 3 variants of any fusion there.
Limits
- The method changes colors only; it cannot add wings, horns or a new face.
- Sprites load from a public sprite library, so the generator needs an internet connection; stats and types still work without it.
- Generated sprites are previews and not official artwork. Credit artists when you share hand-drawn fusion art.
Try it in the Pokemon Fusion Generator, or browse results in the Fusion Art gallery.