Turn your Images into Spreadsheet Art

This time-lapse video captures how the Google Docs team turned an online spreadsheet into sort of a painting canvas by filling individual cells of the sheet with different colors simultaneously.

It might have take them several days to plan and draw the whole thing but luckily, you get to enjoy the process in under 60 seconds.

How to Paint in an Excel Spreadsheet?

If you want to create your own spreadsheet art but don’t have the time (or patience) to carefully paint every single square cell manually, here’s a nice shortcut.

Go to boydevlin.com and download their free Excel Art program. It’s a standalone utility that will convert any bitmap image into a spreadsheet that you then open in Microsoft Excel or even Google Docs. You don’t need Excel to use Excel art.

Excel as a Pixel Drawing Tool

For instance, here’re pixel portraits of painter Vincent van Gogh (Google Docs) and Mona Lisa all created with Excel Art. The conversion might appear a little pixelated from close but its beautiful nonetheless.

Thanks Richard Devlin for the tip.

Turn your Images into Spreadsheet Art