Pixen 4.1

Pixen is intended for editing art, specifically low-resolution pixel-based artwork. It allows creating not only still but also animated images. The application can import a wide range of file formats, including static images, animated PNGs and GIFs, QuickTime Movies and spritesheets.

The tool has a simple graphic user interface, which is composed of one main window and some additional floating windows, such as a set of tools and a color palette. The kit contains multiple tools, such as Pencil, Eyedropper, Eraser, Zoom, Line, Ellipse, Fill and Rectangle. Likewise, it supports various ways to make a selection, like Magic Wand, Lasso and Selection. It is excellent that, unlike other similar applications, Pixen lets you assign different tools to your mouse buttons.

The application facilitates your work by allowing to work with layers. This way, you can easily hide a given layer so as to concentrate on other details. Likewise, it is possible to create personalized patterns you can later reproduce when drawing. Another convenient feature is that frequently-used colors can be organized into palettes, which can also be imported from other popular applications.

To create an animation, there is the filmstrip view. It lets you draw every frame separately. Moreover, you can import existing movies and modify their frames to create new animations as well.

It is a good thing that your creations can be previewed whenever you want to check how well you are going. In this respect, it is even possible to play your animations. Once they are ready, you can export them in such formats as PNG, GIF, JPG, ICO, BMP, TIFF, SVG and RGF. Similarly, they can be shared on social platforms or sent by email. Unfortunately, I had some problems when exporting animations.

All in all, Pixen is an excellent choice if you are a professional or amateur artist looking for a tool to create your art. The product used to be absolutely free, but not it is only free to try. However, it is good that it has a rather affordable price.