Command-line, general-purpose palette generator for use with pixel art, textures, or art software. Palettes are constructed based on the principles described in Slynyrd's seminal blog on pixel art color palettes.
This is a .NET Framework 8 tool written in C#. Once you have .NET installed, you can install this tool globally:
dotnet tool install -g Chickensoft.PalettePainter
# Run the tool
palettepainter generate --helppalettepainter generate palette.png --scale 12
Note
The --scale or -x parameter controls how large a pixel is. These images were generated with --scale 12 so that each palette swatch is 12x12 pixels.
palettepainter generate palette.png --hue 180 --saturation 1 --brightness 1 --num-ramps 8 --hue-shift 0.5 --hue-spectrum 100 --desaturate 0.3 --scale 12
palettepainter generate palette.png --hue 20 --saturation 1 --brightness 1 --num-ramps 4 --hue-shift 0.1 --hue-spectrum 15 --desaturate 0.6 --scale 12
palettepainter generate palette.png --hue 110 --saturation 1 --brightness 1 --num-ramps 6 --hue-shift 0.5 --hue-spectrum 60 --desaturate 0.6 --scale 12
palettepainter generate palette.png --hue 110 --saturation 1 --brightness 1 --num-ramps 4 --num-colors-per-ramp 12 -z 8 --hue-shift 0.5 --hue-spectrum 360 --desaturate 0.3 --scale 12
...etc!
PalettePainter is a command-line tool that exposes a number of variables to help you generate the type of general-purpose palette you're looking for. Each of these parameters is described in the help text palettepainter generate --help:
Palette Painter 1.0.0
Create a palette of colors with the specified number of ramps. You may
customize hue shifts and saturation levels to create a unique palette.
USAGE
palettepainter generate <output> [options]
DESCRIPTION
Generate a palette of colors.
PARAMETERS
* output Palette output image file path
OPTIONS
-n|--num-ramps Number of color ramps to generate Default: "16".
-c|--num-colors-per-ramp Number of colors per ramp Default: "9".
-z|--num-colors-to-trim-for-desaturated-ramp Number of colors to remove from the ends of the ramp when constructing the desaturated color ramp variant. Default: "2".
-d|--desaturate Percentage of saturation to keep when creating a desaturated variant of a color. Default: "0.30000001192092896".
-x|--scale Scale factor for the output image (how big a single pixel should be). Default: "1".
-h|--hue Starting hue of the middle color in the first ramp. Default: "0".
-s|--saturation Percentage of saturation to keep when creating a color. Colors follow the built-in artistic saturation function. This value determines how much of the saturation function to use. Values greater than 1.0 will over-apply the result and can potentially result in color data loss. Default: "1".
-b|--brightness Percentage of brightness to keep when creating a color. Colors follow the built-in artistic brightness function. This value determines how much of the brightness function to use. Values greater than 1.0 will over-apply the result and can potentially result in color data loss. Default: "1".
-m|--hue-shift How much of the hue spectrum (as a fraction between 0 and 1) should be covered by a single color ramp. Default: "0.5".
-u|--hue-spectrum The amount of the hue spectrum to cover in the palette (0-360). Default: "360".
-h|--help Shows help text.
🐣 Package generated from a 🐤 Chickensoft Template — https://chickensoft.games