How to Set Up Photoshop for Pixel Art
Photoshop isn’t widely known as a tool for creating pixel art. But it can be done, with the right setup. Here’s how:
These instructions were written using Photoshop version 22.4.3 on Windows 10.
The pencil tool is your friend.
The default brush tool draws anti-aliased lines–that is, it can draw “between the pixels” and create partial transparency. This is great for smooth lines at high resolutions, but it doesn’t give you the control you need for pixel art.
Instead, use the pencil tool. At 100% opacity, the pencil tool is all-or-nothing–it either fills in a pixel all the way, or it doesn’t.
Also, be sure to set the size of your brush down to 1 px. You can do this in the Brush Settings window, or by pressing the left bracket “[” key until the toolbar shows a brush size of 1. Most of the basic brushes work the same way when they’re down at this size, so you don’t need to worry much about any other settings.
If you’re having trouble finding the pencil tool, click and hold on the brush tool to see its variants.
Set the eraser to pencil mode, too.
Photoshop has two basic drawing tools, but only one eraser. By default, it works like the brush, where it can erase some of the transparency of your pixels. Luckily, you can switch it to pencil mode from the toolbar to make it work like the pencil instead.
Make sure to set the eraser to a size of 1 px too.
Zoom in!
To work with individual pixels, you’re going to need to get up-close and personal. Depending on the piece, I usually work at a zoom level of at least 1000%, sometimes as high as 2000%. I typically hold Alt and scroll with my mouse wheel to zoom (or Option and scroll, if you’re on a Mac), but there are a number of other ways to do it.
I also suggest zooming out every once in a while to check your work at its intended viewing dimensions. Sometimes things that look good close-up don’t actually work when you zoom out. If you’re not a fan of zooming in and out all the time, you can use the Navigator window to preview the zoomed-out version. Find it under Window > Navigator.
Turn off the pixel grid (if you want).
By default, Photoshop displays a pixel grid when you zoom in past 500%. This may be useful for some artists, but I personally don’t like it. To turn it off (or back on), go to View > Show > Pixel Grid.
Save as PSD, export as PNG.
Save early and save often. I recommend keeping a master version of each piece as a native PSD file so you can preserve any layers or filters you might have.
But to use your final artwork in other software, you’ll probably need to export it to another image format, too. The one I recommend is PNG. It’s a lossless format, meaning you won’t lose any image quality when you save it or load it up again, and it supports transparent pixels. Photoshop has a quick way of doing this using File > Export > Quick Export as PNG.
Video Example
In the video below, I show you my process from beginning to end as I work on some pixel art for one of my card game projects. Skip to 12:28 if you’d like to get straight into the pixels!
