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GlyphStudio

Workspace Guide

GlyphStudio uses ten workspace modes inside a single desktop shell — not separate windows or browser routes.

Shared shell

Every mode shares the same persistent regions:

  • Top Bar — project name, save state, mode tabs, undo/redo, zoom, validation badge
  • Left Tool Rail — 17 editing tools (pencil, eraser, fill, line, rectangle, ellipse, selections, transforms, slice, socket, measure, sketch brush/eraser)
  • Center Canvas — the main editing surface
  • Right Dock — tabbed panels that change per mode (Layers, Palette, AI Assist, Validation, etc.)
  • Bottom Dock — timeline, frame strip, or results tray depending on mode

Modes

Edit

Primary drawing and sprite construction. Canvas with pixel-perfect rendering, overlay toggles (pixel grid, onion skin), and tool-driven editing.

Tools: pencil, eraser, flood fill, line, rectangle, ellipse, eyedropper (color-select), rectangular marquee, lasso, magic select, move, transform, slice, socket, measure, sketch brush, sketch eraser. Each tool operates on the active layer only.

Layers: Multi-layer editing with per-layer visibility, rename, reorder, and delete. The Layer Panel in the right dock shows layers top-to-bottom. During paint strokes, the canvas composites all visible layers in real-time using alpha blending (draft stroke compositing).

Selection: Rectangular marquee with marching ants overlay. Copy/cut/paste/delete operate on the active layer’s pixels within the selection bounds. Escape clears the selection.

Canvas: Scroll-wheel zoom (1x–32x), pixel grid overlay, coordinate readout. The canvas renders the flattened composite of all visible layers.

Animate

Frame-based animation editing. The bottom dock shows the frame strip with clickable frame cards.

Frames: Add, duplicate, delete, reorder frames. Each frame owns its own layer stack. Arrow keys navigate between frames.

Playback: Play/pause (Space), loop toggle, FPS control (1–60). Scrubber bar for seeking. Onion skin automatically suppressed during playback.

Onion skin: Previous/next frame ghost overlays with configurable opacity and tint (blue for previous, red for next).

Frame timing: Per-frame duration overrides with inline editing and presets (50ms–500ms). Default timing derived from global FPS.

Import/Export: Import sprite sheets by slicing a grid into frames. Export as horizontal/vertical sprite strip with all visible layers flattened per frame.

Palette

Palette panel with foreground/background color selection, color picker, and X shortcut for swap. Full palette editor with ramp grouping, semantic role mapping, contract rules, and live preview planned for future stages.

AI Assist

Task-oriented AI panel — not a chatbot. Sections for region draft, variant proposals, cleanup/requantize, silhouette repair, and animation assist. Results land in a tray with accept/compare/discard actions.

Locomotion

Motion analysis and draft generation as a real workspace. Analyze stride rhythm, contact timing, center of mass. Preview at gameplay scale with footfall markers and root motion overlays. Generate constrained draft frame tracks.

Validate

Repair-oriented workspace with issue highlighting on canvas. Categories include palette contract, socket alignment, atlas sizing, animation timing, and locomotion profile. Each issue links to jump-to-fix repair actions.

Export

Export with live preview and validation readiness checks. Presets for sprite sheet, animation strip, PNG sequence, GIF, and engine-ready atlas packages.

Scene

Multi-asset composition workspace for assembling sprites into scenes. Place, layer, and arrange asset instances on a shared canvas with camera controls and parallax depth.

Instances: Add asset instances from the catalog, position them with drag or precise coordinates, control z-order, visibility, and opacity per instance.

Camera: Pan and zoom the scene camera. Author camera keyframes on the timeline for animated camera moves with linear or hold interpolation.

Playback: Scene-level playback with tick-based clock, FPS control, and loop toggle. Clip assignments control which animation each instance plays.

Character builder: Assemble character instances from slot-based builds with source linking, overrides, and re-application from source.

History: Full undo/redo for all scene operations (instance placement, camera moves, character edits) with provenance logging and drilldown inspection.

Vector

Vector master editing workspace for creating and editing SVG-based shapes that can be reduced to pixel art at target resolutions.

Tools: Select, rectangle, ellipse, line, pen, and text tools with fill color, stroke color, and stroke width controls.

Live preview: Real-time rasterized preview at target pixel resolution using size profiles, with collapse overlay showing how vector shapes map to the pixel grid.

AI creation: Vector shape generation through AI prompts with structured output.

Reduction: Convert vector artwork to pixel art at configured size profiles with preview before commit.

Project Home

Landing screen for creating, opening, and managing projects. Templates for common starting points (blank sprite, character animation, modular kit, faction palette study).