Pixelorama
Unleash your creativity with Pixelorama, a powerful and accessible open-source pixel art multitool. Whether you want to create sprites, tiles, animations, or just express yourself in the language of pixel art, this software will realize your pixel-perfect dreams with a vast toolbox of features.
Do you need help on how to start, or are you stuck somewhere? You can refer to Pixelorama's official documentation.
Current features:
- A variety of different tools to help you create, with the ability to dynamically map each one on the left and the right mouse buttons with a single click.
- Animation support with a timeline composed of layers and frames, with onion skinning, frame tags and the ability to draw while the animation is playing.
- Pixel perfect mode for perfect pixel lines.
- Clipping masks.
- Pre-made palettes as well as many palette importing options.
- Multiple image manipulation effects.
- Non-destructive and fully customizable layer effects, such as outline, gradient map, drop shadow and palettize.
- A powerful drawing canvas with guides, a rectangular and an isometric grid, and tile mode for easier seamless pattern creation.
- Autosave support, with data recovery in case of a software crash.
- Comprehensive user interface with many customizability options.
- Export to PNG and other image and video formats, as well as spritesheets, GIFs, animated PNGs etc.
- Import spritesheets, multiple images as separate frames, as well as GIFs and videos.
- Various rotation and scaling algorithms tailored for pixel art, such as cleanEdge, OmniScale and rotxel.
- 3D layers that allow you to bring 3D shapes and models into your 2D canvas.
- A command line interface for automated file exporting.
- Custom user data for projects, layers, frames, frame tags and cels, allowing you to attach metadata for game development.
- Various free community-made extensions, such as tools that automatically convert your 2D pixels into 3D voxels.
- Fully open source with free updates, forever!
Make sure to visit our website for more information and join our Discord community server!
Find the source code on GitHub!
And if you like, consider helping us by donating, or becoming a Patreon!
Make sure to read the Troubleshooting page if you are experiencing any issues. Especially if you are a Mac user.
Download
Click download now to get access to the following files:
Development log
- Pixelorama v1.0.5 is out!6 days ago
- Pixelorama v1.0.4 is out!30 days ago
- Pixelorama v1.0.3 is out!72 days ago
- Pixelorama v1.0.2 is out!95 days ago
- Pixelorama v1.0.1 is out!Aug 05, 2024
- Pixelorama v1.0 is finally out!Jul 29, 2024
- Pixelorama is coming to Steam!Apr 24, 2024
- Pixelorama v0.11.4 is out!Apr 17, 2024
Comments
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How do you update? Do I need to download it again?
See https://itch.io/post/11408179 :)
if I had some money I would donate. Amazing app.
Thank you! We appreciate the thought, but you don't have to donate if you can't afford to. We are still grateful that you use our software and for your kind words!
np :3
Hi there! I’m using the Flatpack on Fedora 41, and the “Save As” dialog never appears. Other File menu choices all seem to work.
Hy 👋, thanks for reporting 😃, this may likely be the same as this issue here:
https://github.com/Orama-Interactive/Pixelorama/issues/1115
As a workaround, you can try the other version (portable)
Looks like it, and I can confirm using the boring regular version does in fact work ;)
Related feature request, I guess: when you install via the itch.io desktop app, you end up with a folder containing a zip file, and not something you can just run. It’d be cool if you could make that work! Some apps that I’ve seen work this way are Ditherdragon and Crocotile3D (in addition to a bunch of games)
Hello,
I'm encountering an issue when launching the tool on certain devices, specifically on my Samsung tablet in Firefox. When I try to open it, it just reloads the product page in fullscreen rather than launching the tool. Oddly, it works fine on my Samsung Z Fold when using Firefox, and it also launches correctly on my tablet if I switch to Chrome. I’m not sure if the problem lies with my tablet or Firefox, but I wanted to report it since it’s a bit frustrating. I prefer not to use Chrome. I didn’t see this issue mentioned in the troubleshooting guide, so perhaps others are experiencing it too.
By the way, I'm really enjoying the app so far. It’s a strong competitor to Pixel Studio with its toolset, and I especially appreciate the shading tool. I’d love to see an Android version someday and would be happy to pay for it!
Thank you!
Hello, thank you for reporting the issue! This is very weird, I just tried launching it on Firefox on an Android phone and it run fine. Perhaps it is some kind of issue with the mobile version of Firefox happening on certain devices, but I'm not sure why. We'll definitely keep this issue in mind though.
Thank you for the kind words as well, and we have plans on making an Android version sometime but it's not yet sure when, because right now we're focusing on improving the desktop and web versions a bit more, before having another version to maintain. But it will definitely happen some day, so stay tuned!
Incredible easy, good looking, practical and sexy tool.
Thank you so much!
one of the best pixelart tools ive ever used
Thank you very much!
Hi! I've been closely monitoring this app since release and by the time Index Map was introduced I've decided to give it a try - Loving it so far. I do have a few suggestions:
- I would like to use integer zoom but it only scrolling in increments of 100% at very high zoom levels (3200% and over) makes it very slow to zoom in or out. The default zoom setting seems a bit uncontrollable as zooming in and out once produces different results. In my case, zooming out is slightly stronger than zooming in.
- A "center sprite to view" button would be great. Functionally it's best described as what happens when a new sprite is made.
- An "Erase" layer blend mode or effect would easily skip a step of manual labor when, for example, making opaque shapes with transparent icons within. As a gross oversimplication (I don't understand the inner tech of graphical design apps that well), "Erase" would use the layer's alpha value on the pixels to subtract the alpha value of all pixels underneath it, with 100% alpha meaning the pixel will be drawn as 0% opacity. I know GIMP has it, but that's pretty much it.
Here's an image to help illustrate the effect:
Red is used here for clarity, but it shouldn't matter which color is used.
Again, thank you for making this wonderful application. Looking forward on seeing what the future will bring!
Hy 👋, The Erase blend mode will now be available in the next version 🎉
Hello, thank you for the feedback!
- These are good observations, we will keep them in mind!
- Do you mean a button that resets the canvas to view, or a button that centers the image content? If you want the first, it already exists. Select the zoom tool, go to its tool options on the right side and click on "Fit to frame". This will make the canvas be as it was when you first made the image.
- Thanks to our contributor Variable, the Erase blend mode will be available in version 1.0.4!
Great!
For the second point: I was referring to doing nothing else but centering the sprite to the view. "Fit to frame" would zoom it in (thus messing with the zoom level) and 100% also centers the sprite to the view.
What I'd be asking is: Could there be button (preferably hotkeyable) somewhere easy to access that only sets the sprite to the center of the frame, leaving the zoom level intact? That way, reorienting oneself is just a button/hotkey away.
Again, thanks for the quick reply/fix!
That sounds useful indeed! Any ideas where that button should be placed?
I would think to the left or the right of the zoom slider at the top (as the current pixel position under the mouse is displayed to the right of it). On the right would make it within reasonable eyesight of the pixel position.
Though I'm not an UI/UX designer so I can't exactly say what would be best. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
As an user, I'm okay with any place as long as it's always visible regardless of tool selected (just like the zoom slider is always visible, because the top bar is).
The feature will now be available in the next version (The option shall appear in the View menu, with a changeable hotkey of Shift + C)
Hello, I liked the idea of the program, but I want a Linux version AppImage
Hello, thank you! Unfortunately there are currently no plans for an AppImage version, but there is a Flatpak version if you are interested.
Thank you very much.
Hi, I already really like the software, I've been using it for a while, but I moved to 1.0.3 and I can't do any exports anymore, before I was on 0.11.4 and I didn't keep it, it's stupid, if there's a way to get this version back, while waiting to know about my problem
Hello, can you provide more information about the issue? What happens exactly when you try to export?
Older versions are available from Pixelorama's GitHub page, you can get 0.11.4 here: https://github.com/Orama-Interactive/Pixelorama/releases/tag/v0.11.4
Just keep in mind that pxo files, palettes, shortcut profiles and layouts saved with 1.0 cannot be opened by older versions. Extensions made for 1.0 also do not work in older versions, and vice versa.
The left and right tool options wont show up for some reason and also the palettes
vers: 1.3 windows
Hmm that's weird. Did this break after an update or are you a new user? Can you try going to the Window menu, Layouts and select another layout to see if it works? Alternatively, try deleting any extensions you may have, close and launch Pixelorama again, and download the extensions again,
hi im updating from pre 1.0 and it appears when i start pixelorama but dissapears a second later. the layouts didnt change any thing put when i click window and then panels a of the right mouse button settings appear
i have also tried going back versions
This may be due to the update from pre 1.0. The layout system got changed and 1.0+ layouts are not compatible with pre-1.0. Try going to C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Roaming\Pixelorama\ and deleting the layouts folder, and launch Pixelorama again.
i tried building from source code but even that didnt work
i think this is because of 1.0
i went back to 0.11.4 and it showed. is there a way to use 0.11 layouts with 1.0+?
0.11 layouts are not compatible with 1.0 and vice versa, unfortunately.
Pixelorama is great but could you bring back monochromatic colour palette please?
Hy, it seems the palettes were merged into pixelorama palette 🤔
Though you can still download the old palettes from here
(Click the palette you want to download, then click the (...) button, and select "download")
Hi! Do you happen to have any functionality with graphic tablets? I searched but I didn't find a quick and easy way to zoom in.
Hy, you can use the zoom tool. To use it, click and drag left/right
im on mac, i cant see the tool bar on the top, so im unable to crop the canvas e.t.c. how do i fix this
The tool bar is above the encircled part (I have highlighted it in yellow)
I have a small question.
Does Pixelorama have a gradient tool?
Hy 👋
It has a gradient effect (Similar to tool but you add gradient through a dialog).
thanks.
i did not realized there was filter.
for some reason it has randomly started to not show up on my screen
it does open and shows up on my taskbar but the window itself briefly shows up and then disappears
clicking on it on the taskbar doesn't do anything
is this an issue with having two monitors since I installed one since the last time I used it
Hello! Yeah this may be a multi-monitor issue. You can try clearing Pixelorama's settings to see if that fixes the issue for you. You can do that by deleting the "config.ini" file found in
C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Roaming\Pixelorama\ if you are on Windows, ~/.local/share/Pixelorama/ if you are on Linux, or /Users/[USERNAME]/Library/Application Support/Pixelorama/ if you are on macOS.hello ,i have a question.
------
i want to copy pixel art from frame1 to the frame2.
but i dont know how.
should i use "link cell to" for copy to the frame2?
HY if you want to copy to frame 2, and then make changes to that cel on frame 2, use copy/paste (Ctrl + C, Ctrl + V) or clone frame button.
But if you want the two to have EXACTLY the same image (changes to frame 2 also gets applied to frame 1) then use "link cels to"
thankS!!
How do i export to unity?
Hello! You can export your project as multiple png images, one for every frame, or you can export all of your frames into a single spritesheet, which you can later import to Unity. More info about exporting here: https://www.oramainteractive.com/Pixelorama-Docs/user_manual/save_and_export#exp...
Android (Tablet) release when?
Hy 👋, It's planned but currently the focus is on PC at the moment so it in the far future.
Though you can still use it for a tablet through the web version
That's okay, I'll wait.
I tend to struggle with web versions with my tablets sadly. Any browsers you would recommend however?
bug report for v1.0.3-stable:
it seems that the effects have stopped working completely and also leave the screen dark after closing them. this also happens with some other popups, while others undo the screen darkening. i have also noticed some graphical errors like flickering triangles, however i think the video fps is too low to see them here
Hy, If you have any extensions installed, they might be causing this behavior, please update them if you have any.
Extensions that were installed during 1.0 stable and not updated, will cause some problems for 1.0.2 and 1.0.3 (because they were made a little differently)
thanks, after updating extensions the effects work correctly now
Glad to help
Hola, por alguna razón cuando intento dibujar con el lápiz de la tableta gráfica no funciona, solamente hace un puntito de color.
Hy, have you tried changing the driver, from the preferences? Maybe it'll help
Te refieres a desinstalar el que ya tiene e instalar otro nuevo ¿o como?
No tengo mucha idea de como funciona eso jaja, por eso aunque vi abajo a alguien con el mismo problema volví a preguntar.
Tampoco logro encontrar donde están las preferencias.
Si sirve de algo es una wacom intuos ctl490dw, sin pantalla de antes del año 2020.
You can change your driver from here (this option is shown for Windows OS only). Set the driver to something else (From the list of options)
Ahh con que ahí era, muchas gracias si me sirvió.
Que tengas un lindo día/noche <3
por fin logre dibujar algo
Glad to help 😄
The changes you've made to this software are just astounding!!! And those extensions are great, too! I hope you don't mind if I make a couple of suggestions:
- Could there be a way to have thumbnails of .pxo files in the file browser? I have a lot of files and I think it would be great to see a thumbnail without having to actually open the file to see what's in it.
- Currently, I'm not able to move the color picker pop up in Gradient Map effects out of the way so that I can pick colors from the canvas or palette.
- Merging two layers with different opacity gives a wrong result. Put a color on a layer at <100% opacity, then make another layer on top with a different color and also <100% opacity to reproduce this.
- It would be great to have a way to flatten all layers without having to merge them individually or exporting and then re-importing a .png. Even better if one can merge only visible layers!
- The ability to zoom and pan in the Effects preview window would be a welcome relief! Or even making it possible to see changes on the canvas in realtime just like in Layer Effects.
- Possibility of importing .gifs?
I'm using Pixelorama 1.0.3-dev on Linux Mint.
I'd really like to thank your team for all the hard work!
Hello, thank you for the feedback!
- We could look into creating a custom file browser that has thumbnails, but for now you can enable native file dialogs from the Edit menu, Prefrences, under the Interface category. This option will use your operating system's file browser.
- This will be fixed in the next update!
- This is an interesting observation. Right now, when merging two layers together, the layer above keeps its opacity, and the layer below also keeps its own opacity, which makes the top layer appear to have less opacity than it used to. What would be the correct behavior instead?
The rest of the ideas all sound useful and we're noting them for the future. For .gif importing, it's technically already possible if you have FFMPEG installed, and you put its path in the Preferences, under the Startup category, but eventually we'd like to add .gif importing without having to rely to FFMPEG.
I made a small test for opacity.
A is two separate overlapping layers: Blue Blob - layer opacity 72%, on top of Red Blob, layer opacity 65%. There is a separate Background layer, White, Layer opacity 100%. There are no layer effects on any of the layers.
I duplicated the two colored layers to make B, which I then merged into one layer. As you can see, the Blue Blob in B becomes much lighter than it originally was and the color where the two blobs overlap also becomes lighter. If I switch the layer order, Red Blob layer over Blue Blob layer, the reverse happens and Red Blob becomes much lighter. Would it be possible to merge the two layers and have the new merged layer have the same result as A?
-My OS file browser doesn't show thumbnails of .pxo files, unfortunately.
- I'm glad to hear the color picker issue will be fixed, that's great news!
- I'd like to thank you also for adding Contrast as an effect! You exceeded what I had imagined when I had asked about the feature (adding saturation and RGB sliders!, A tint effect, whaat?!!) Absolutely top-tier work!
- I'm looking forward to the next release, along with @Variable's Index Map effect.
Thank you for the reply! Right now it seems that there is no way to merge the two layers and have them be the same as A, but we will keep this in mind and change it in a future version.
This was the best pixel animators/drawer I found so far!
The feature was very pixel friendly like and easy to use!
I also got some suggestion for the software:
- A performance improvement updates, since I only got like 7 fps on animation mode...
- A gaussian blur filter
- Draw on animation mode without "Pressing & Moving" the cursor "Only Pressing" and we draw through the animated sprites
Overall it's a really good software. I'm in love with this tool.
Thank you very much for the feedback!
- Do you have any example projects that we can use to replicate the performance issues? Or at least can you let us know how many layers and frames your project has? Posting your device's specifications (such as the operating system, CPU, GPU, RAM etc) would also be helpful!
- Gaussian blur is coming in the next update!
- That is a good idea, noted!
Here is the project that I working for!
It's a 64 x 64 Sprites
It had 6 layers which in layer 5, 4, 2 had a Brightness / Contrast filter in it.
Here is my Laptop specs!
Processor: AMD A4-9125 RADEON R3, 4 COMPUTE CORES 2C+2G 2.30 GHz
Ram: 16,0 GB
Operating System: Windows 10 64-Bit
Really looking forward this!
Hy, have you tried increasing the fps value (from the image it's set to play at 9fps)
Yes I already did make it 30 fps and it's just playing on like 6 / 7 fps
As a temporary workaround, you can go to the View menu and disable "Display Layer Effects". This will disable the previewing of layer effects in the canvas, but they will still be applied in the exported images. Layer effects are currently hindering performance, we're currently considering ways on how to improve that.
Now that I've tried the latest version (I've been using 0.11 before) I have to leave some negative feedback.
1. All my shortcuts were gone and it was quite cumbersome to assign them from the scratch.
2. I had a pxo-project with multiple layers and many frames (enemy animations for the game I'm developing) and when I tried to export some of the layers into spritesheets, the whole process was very cumbersome and slow. (My specs Ryzen2600x, RTX2070, 16 gb RAM)
I got so frustrated that I reverted back to the older version, but now I'm not able to load my pxo-project with it anymore. Now every time I try to load it with the older version, the whole program crashes.
I was finally able to make the spritesheets with the latest version, but it took some time and patience. Apparently if I want to change the amount of columns and rows, I can't write the exact amount using the keyboard. Instead I have to click the increase/decrease arrows and every time I click them, the program freezes for few seconds. So it took quite a while to change rows to 9 from 56 or whatever the amount was.
I love the older versions, because they are fast and easy to use with all the necessary features I need, but this new one is just slow and cumbersome. Definitely not worth the update for me, at least in this state.
I decided to give the latest version another chance and while exporting and some other stuff are still slow, I'm starting to get by with them. I really hope there will be some performance improvements in the future, because this is still a great program.
Hy, sorry for the trouble.
For the shortcuts and project, it was unavoidable because it was a breaking change (the way projects get saved is different now)
Regarding the slow export can you send a project file that is slow, and provide a video showing the bug (on discord). We'll look at it 😄.
Hello, thank you so much for reporting the issue! I tested a project with 256 frames, and there is indeed a significant performance decrease in v1.0 compared to v0.11 when changing any kind of setting in the export dialog (which includes the amount of rows/columns in a spritesheet). This is due to the new layer blending system that supports blending modes, which did not exist in v0.11. However, it is possible to make this faster by simply caching the blended frames once when the export dialog appears, instead of re-blending them every time something changes. I am currently working on this and it should be available in the next version, so you shouldn't experience any slowness when changing the number of rows/columns.
As for the 6 rows turning to 12 issue, I cannot seem to replicate it. If you have any exact reproduction steps, it would be very helpful!
hello,May I ask a question?
1:Does Pixelorama have a smudge brush(blur)?
2:Also, is it possible to edit the UI theme by myself? I would like to have a light gray theme.
Hello! There's no blur tool at the moment. As for themes, the only way to achieve this would be by creating an extension with Godot that adds a custom theme.
Thank you for the comment. I understood it. I will use it as is.
una pregunta ¿como puedo poner una imagen de referencia para guiarme y poder hacer mi dibujo?
Hello, you can drag and drop an image and from import options, choose "reference image".
I'm facing a performance issue on v1.0.2-stable (Linux 64 bit version). When I play the animation, everything works too low, so if I zoom out, it gets more fluid (but still slow), also is not possible to draw due the intense lag. In the previous version everything goes perfect.
Hello, this may be a performance issue caused by the new group blending. If you have any group layers, try setting their blend mode to "Passthrough".
I'm on Mac OS Sonoma and it crashes when I unchecked "Single window mode"
It does this every time
Thanks for the bug report! Unfortunately we don't own a Mac to test it, but we'll keep the issue in mind in case we find a fix.
In need shortcut key to switch left tool and right tool.
I can't switch color by key "x" since update.
In need clipping mask for layer Group
Thanks for the feedback!
- This is a nice idea, noted.
- Are you using a custom shortcut profile? If so, it may have been broken if you have updated from 0.x to 1.x. Try deleting it from the Preferences and creating an new one.
- This is now possible in today's update!
I realized this is a bug switch color shortcut only works when the Color Picker is visible
Loving the tool so far. I was wondering if yall are planning on adding Palette indexing? (Changing all the pixels in a canvas of the same color when changing the color in the palette)
Hello, thank you! Yeah we plan on adding it eventually!
Is there any tool to replace the selected color with another one?
By the way, custom icon color preferences are not saved when restarting the program
-
¿Hay alguna herramienta para reemplazar el color seleccionado por otro?
Por cierto, las preferencias de color de icono personalizado no se guardan al reiniciar el programa
Hello! You can use the bucket tool and change its mode to "similar color" in the tool options. And thank you for the bug report, it will be fixed in the next version!
One small thing I've noticed that would make a huge difference as an animator... is that I'm used to being able to press left and right keys when I have selected the lower panel and then have it toggle between frames (in Aseprite). I feel like that behavior is very intuitive and would make sense in Pixelorama too.
Hy 👋, I think there are shortcuts for those keys in preferences, I don't remember what their names were but I'm certain they exist.
Hello! You can use Control + the left and right keys to move between frames.
Any chance of allowing custom scripts in Pixelorama? I think it would be awesome if it allowed custom scripts in GDScript, haha. (In contrast to how Aseprite allows custom scripts in Lua). The main thing is writing an API layer that people can reference to grab different objects within the Pixelorama project.
EDIT: Sorry, I didn't see that extensions were possible! That is great! I think that maybe they shouldn't be hidden away in preferences but that's just a personal preference. Great work!!!
I don't really care what anyone else thinks, but I think Pixelorama has the potential to be the best free and open source pixel art tool ever! It is already challenging other paid tools like Aseprite. I took my time and compared Pixelorama with some other pixel art tools. Turns out that only Pixelorama provides with all the things I need for my work. It has some really unique features that I've never seen in any other tool. Great job, Orama Interactive!
Couldn't have said it better myself! Pixelorama has been an absolute joy
to work in! And several of its features have saved my bacon when working with pre-made assets. Thank you so much for this wonderful software!! I hope to support it on Steam someday. :)Thank you both so much for your kind words! They really make our day!
Buenas noches, tengo un problema, compre su aplicación por steam por primera vez y lo ejecute en mi computadora, al arrancar el programa la pantalla de la aplicación me salia en gris, no mostraba nada y no pareciera que estuviera cargando algo, posiblemente tiene un bug, pero ya intente desintalar e instalar de nuevo, incluso bajar el juego desde su web oficial, pero nada parece funcionar, incluso busque en youtube y no aparece como solucionar el problema, necesito ayuda por favor para solucionarlo
Hello! This may be a problem with your device not being able to run Pixelorama. If it's easy, can you post your computer's specs? Like its operating system, CPU and GPU.
On Mac in Chrome Browser
The screens are static, not updating to show user input. Text fields don't change until the screen is resized, and the canvas only updates unreliably when refreshing the page.
Hello, thank you for reporting! This is most likely an issue with the macOS version of Chrome and SharedArrayBuffer, which Pixelorama 1.0 requires. While there's not much we can do right now, in a future version this will not be required anymore and Pixelorama should run fine again. For now, it's best to download the desktop version.
Apple devices still have experimental WebGL2 support, which might be the issue with the fact the Godot 4's web export is based on WebGL2
I tried drawing using my windows surface pen, but it only seems to register where the pen is initially pressed down and lifted and not any of the movements in between.
Will there possibly be support for this in the future?
If you are on Windows you can try changing the tablet driver in Preferences to see if it maybe helps. Other than that there are input dynamics settings in the Global Tools panel (top right) which allow tweaking of tablet pen settings.
I found some bugs(pixelorama v1.0 stable, mac os):
But overall pixelorama is a very good pixel art programm.
Hello, thank you for the bug reports!
- Is the bottom layer locked or invisible?
- Are you moving the mouse cursor into the canvas? Doing so results in input fields to lose focus, otherwise that shouldn't happen. Do you have exact steps that result in them losing focus?
- This is weird, we will investigate it.
Looks like a great tool. Does it support a touch interface?
Hello, thank you! Technically yes, but the user interface is not optimized to be used on small touch screens, like phones. It might work well on tablets though.