Tilf — Pixel Art Editor Tilf (Tiny Elf) is a simple yet powerful pixel art editor built with PySide6. It’s designed for creating sprites, icons, and small 2D assets with essential tools, live preview, undo/redo, and export options. There are several Pixel Art Editors that do the same things and even much more, but many require an account registration or the insertion of an e-mail or have a certain business model. I'm not interested in all that, my goal is to be able to create sprites freely, with (almost) zero dependencies, zero setup time, zero installations: Tilf starts and I begin to draw what I want. It runs on Windows, MacOS and GNU/Linux. Download the latest release from the releases page. Windows 11 -> Download MacOS 15.6 -> Download GNU/Linux (ParrotOS 6.4) -> Download I’m aware that the code quality isn’t great. I didn’t prioritize it when writing this. This project was something I put together during my spare time, and a lot of it could be written much better. There's definitely room for improvement, so I'm more than happy to accept PRs from anyone willing to contribute. Why doesn't this tool have many commits? Because I mainly used it for learning and personal purposes. Publish it as an Open Source project might be interesting for others as well. Table of Contents Features Drawing tools: Pencil Eraser Fill (bucket) Eyedropper Rectangle (stroke) Ellipse (stroke) Canvas: New image with custom dimensions Zoom 1–50x (mouse wheel or slider) Editable background color (alpha supported) Optional grid with customizable color Clear canvas Workflow: Undo/Redo with history up to 50 states Drag & drop images to open Real-time preview in a side dock (you can move it wherever you want) Import/Export: Open PNG, JPEG/JPG, BMP Export to PNG (with or without transparency), JPEG/JPG, BMP Handy details: Hold Shift while drawing rectangles/ellipses to constrain to squares/circles Grid is shown when zoom (cell size) is at least 4 Requirements Python 3, virtualenv OS: Windows, MacOS or GNULinux Dependencies: PySide6 PyInstaller I did not use uv or poetry for this project; I don't think it is necessary to introduce a tool of that kind for a project that is, all things considered, simple. Build on MacOS and GNU/Linux Clone the repository: git clone https://github.com/danterolle/tilf.git && cd tilf This project has a Makefile that automates all the necessary build and cleanup operations for Tilf (for MacOS and GNU/Linux only), so we just need to run: make The executable will be in the dist folder. ./tilf Enjoy! About Windows Run from source Clone the repository by using Git Bash: git clone https://github.com/danterolle/tilf.git cd tilf Create a virtual environment: py.exe -m venv env Activate the virtual environment: ./env/Scripts/activate Install the dependencies: pip install pyside6 pyinstaller pillow Note: And finally, run the application: py.exe ./main.py Build executable .exe Clone the repository by using Git Bash: git clone https://github.com/danterolle/tilf.git cd tilf ./env/Scripts/activate Install the dependencies: pip install pyside6 pyinstaller pillow Run PyInstaller: pyinstaller --name tilf --onefile --windowed --icon assets/icon.icns --add-data assets:assets --add-data style.qss:. main.py The executable will be in the dist folder. ./tilf Keyboard Shortcuts for file operations File: New: Ctrl+N Open: Ctrl+O Save: Ctrl+S Edit: Undo: Ctrl+Z Redo: Ctrl+Y Tools: Pencil: B Eraser: E Bucket: G Eyedropper: I Rectangle: R Ellipse: C Shapes: Constrain to square/circle: hold Shift Save and Auto-Save Export formats: PNG: optionally keep transparency. JPEG/JPG, BMP: no transparency. On close, if there are unsaved changes, a recovery .png is automatically saved into a tilf_autosaves folder next to the startup script, with a timestamped filename. Tips and Known Limits Undo/Redo history is capped at 50 states to limit memory usage. Large flood fills may take longer on big images. The grid appears when zoom (cell size) is at least 4. Very large images may impact performance; Remember: Tilf targets compact pixel art and sprites. Troubleshooting - Work In Progress ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'PySide6' Ensure your virtualenv is active and run: pip install pyside6 Contributing Open issues for bugs or feature requests. For PRs, please keep the code style consistent and explain changes clearly. Feature ideas are welcome (e.g. advanced fills, selections, layers). Thank you! License GPL v3.0, see the LICENSE file for details. Contact