I am totally new to dotstars, and i wondered if there is a way I can do a simple fade up to a color and fade off, a specific range of pixels in sequence?
Yeah, there’s definitely a way. 
What have you tried?
Familiar with how HSV colors work? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HSL_and_HSV
Define a color as CHSV(hue, saturation, value). 0 for hue is red. 255 for full saturation (red vs white). Start with 0 for value and you’ll get black (unlit LEDs). Incrementally increase value to get brighter and more red.