Pixen
Encyclopedia
Pixen is an open-source raster graphics editor
for Mac OS X
created by the Open Sword Group. It is designed to create and edit pixel art
. The latest version is Pixen 3.
. While common tools are included in Pixen, such as the pencil, eraser, and fill tool, Pixen also uses a unique left/right tool system. This system enables the user to assign a different tool to the left and right mouse buttons. This can be used effectively when drawing and erasing. It also features several color palettes, as well as integration with Mac OS X's color options. Like many other bitmap
-based applications, Pixen has a layer system that will let you organize parts of an image, name them, or hide them.
is not possible to achieve in Pixen, and all tools have had color fading.
Pixen also focuses on indexed colors and palette use. This makes it ideal for editing indexed formats, like .gif, and usage on systems with low memory resources.
interface, and makes extensive use of Cocoa elements. From a layout perspective Pixen borrows ideas from other rasters editors. It features a tool case and separate windows for the image, layers and tools.
Raster graphics editor
A raster graphics editor is a computer program that allows users to paint and edit pictures interactively on the computer screen and save them in one of many popular “bitmap” or “raster” formats such as JPEG, PNG, GIF and TIFF....
for Mac OS X
Mac OS X
Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...
created by the Open Sword Group. It is designed to create and edit pixel art
Pixel art
Pixel art is a form of digital art, created through the use of raster graphics software, where images are edited on the pixel level. Graphics in most old computer and video games, graphing calculator games, and many mobile phone games are mostly pixel art.- History :The term pixel art was first...
. The latest version is Pixen 3.
Features
Pixen utilizes a basic interface similar to that of Adobe PhotoshopAdobe Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop is a graphics editing program developed and published by Adobe Systems Incorporated.Adobe's 2003 "Creative Suite" rebranding led to Adobe Photoshop 8's renaming to Adobe Photoshop CS. Thus, Adobe Photoshop CS5 is the 12th major release of Adobe Photoshop...
. While common tools are included in Pixen, such as the pencil, eraser, and fill tool, Pixen also uses a unique left/right tool system. This system enables the user to assign a different tool to the left and right mouse buttons. This can be used effectively when drawing and erasing. It also features several color palettes, as well as integration with Mac OS X's color options. Like many other bitmap
Bitmap
In computer graphics, a bitmap or pixmap is a type of memory organization or image file format used to store digital images. The term bitmap comes from the computer programming terminology, meaning just a map of bits, a spatially mapped array of bits. Now, along with pixmap, it commonly refers to...
-based applications, Pixen has a layer system that will let you organize parts of an image, name them, or hide them.
Focus
Pixen is designed for pixel art, and therefore only has tools primarily focused on a few colors. One important part of this is that anti-aliasingAnti-aliasing
In digital signal processing, spatial anti-aliasing is the technique of minimizing the distortion artifacts known as aliasing when representing a high-resolution image at a lower resolution...
is not possible to achieve in Pixen, and all tools have had color fading.
Pixen also focuses on indexed colors and palette use. This makes it ideal for editing indexed formats, like .gif, and usage on systems with low memory resources.
Interface
Pixen is designed from the start with a native Mac OS X look and feel. It therefore features a CocoaCocoa (API)
Cocoa is Apple's native object-oriented application programming interface for the Mac OS X operating system and—along with the Cocoa Touch extension for gesture recognition and animation—for applications for the iOS operating system, used on Apple devices such as the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and...
interface, and makes extensive use of Cocoa elements. From a layout perspective Pixen borrows ideas from other rasters editors. It features a tool case and separate windows for the image, layers and tools.