Canvas size – Depending on the art style you can make a Large sprite to canvas ratio for playable character as in Medroid II: Return of Samus, or Low sprite to canvas ratio for playable character as in Super Metroid, or Tiny sprite to canvas ratio as in Cave story.

Avoid – Blur, brushes, blurred gradient as you cannot predict the result or output as you want 100% control over the artwork.

Other must-have tools – Selection tool, recolor tool, line tool, rotation tool, color settings, circle tool.

Software tools – Regardless of the program used you will need Pencil tool, Eyedropper, Eraser, Bucket.

General art program – Paint tool SAI, GIMP, Adobe Photoshop.

Specialty pixel-art programs – Graphicsgale, MS Paint XP/Vista, Aseprite, Promotion.

Keyboard – It is the most powerful tool as the keyboard shortcuts make the process of making art and animation much faster and you can make even your own shortcuts to suit your need.

Tablet – It is good with strokes and has intuitive control but is it harder to tap or click and it is good for initial sketches.

Mouse – It is good with clicks and offers precision but it is harder to draw.

Generally, aliasing is a bane in digital art but in pixel art, aliasing keeps everything sharp. Pixel art was born from limitations so many manual techniques are still in use today. So, techniques of drawing are equally important as the tool used. You can use any tool to create the art as you want to control the pixels regardless of which tool you use. Pixel art is like 2D sculpting where you have total control and you can manipulate every single pixel to differentiate pixel art from pixelated art.

Mix with Foreground ColorChange the influence rate from the foreground color.In this article, we are going to learn what is pixel art.

Mix with Base ColorChange the influence rate from the surrounding colors.

HardnessChange the hardness level of brush outline.

Larger value makes stronger stabilization.

Stabilizing levelSet up the stabilization value between 0 to 32.

Brush Size, opacity, and stabilizing level are the common items. The above highlighted 'D' area varies per the pen setting.

Draw PolygonDraw a polygonal shape by continuing to click on a canvas.

Draw RectangleDraw a rectangular shape.

Draw PolylineDraw multiple straight lines by continuing to click on a canvas.

FreehandThis is the default setting to provide a freehand drawing method.By holding down the Shift, Alt, and/or Ctrl keys, you can fix the angle, ratio, and other constraints. Choosing the drawing method enables you to create a straight line, circle, and such.

Paint tool sai blur brush