Pixel Tool became a circle

[NapoleonIVBonaparte]

Well uhh; its quite simply really. Im working on a map in affinity photo and one day, boom! Now the pixel tool has become a circle in shape, and idk how to get it back to being a normal darn pixel

[Joachim_L]

Welcome to the Affinity forums @NapoleonIVBonaparte!

Maybe Preferences >> Miscellaneous >> Reset Brushes could help?

[NapoleonIVBonaparte]

Didn't work

[carl123]

What do you mean by "pixel tool"?

Ignore the above

[Guest]

1 hour ago, NapoleonIVBonaparte said:

Well uhh; its quite simply really. Im working on a map in affinity photo and one day, boom! Now the pixel tool has become a circle in shape, and idk how to get it back to being a normal darn pixel

I've never found a way to reset it back to it's original state, but you can create a new square bush (in the menu in the brushes panel) that you can always use to get back to it.

[iconoclast]

My Pixel Tool adapts the form of the selected brush. I think that is the normal behaviour. Just the same as the paintbrush. So if you select a simple round brush, the brush cursor will become a circle.

Edit: Have to correct myself - the cursor is always a circle, but inside the circle the form of the brushhead is shown. Sorry!

[R C-R]

5 hours ago, iconoclast said:

Edit: Have to correct myself - the cursor is always a circle, but inside the circle the form of the brushhead is shown.

This is not true on my Mac. If I have selected a square brush then the cursor is square. This is true whether or not "Show Brush Preview" is enabled in Preferences > User Interface.

Also, when I start up AP, the Pixel Tool always reverts to a square brush shape, but if I change the brush to any other shape, it retains that shape until I change it to another one, or restart the app.

To make things easier, I created a single square brush & added it to my "Basic" brush category. That category may be a reimport from the  1.6 version or something, but adding a square brush to any convenient category should work as well.

[iconoclast]

4 minutes ago, R C-R said:

This is not true on my Mac. If I have selected a square brush then the cursor is square. This is true whether or not "Show Brush Preview" is enabled in Preferences > User Interface.

Also, when I start up AP, the Pixel Tool always reverts to a square brush shape, but if I change the brush to any other shape, it retains that shape until I change it to another one, or restart the app.

To make things easier, I created a single square brush & added it to my "Basic" brush category. That category may be a reimport from the  1.6 version or something, but adding a square brush to any convenient category should work as well.

You're right, the circle turns into a square if I select a square brush. That is the same on Windows. But if it appears as a square or a circle when I start AP depends on which of both forms I had selected before. So it is not a square everytime I start AP. At least on Windows.

I think this point is not so important. You may probably think that the Pixel Brush should appear as a square, because pixels have the shape of a square. But I don't think that this is really the most important point of this tool. The main difference between the Paint Brush Tool and the Pixel Tool is that the Pixel Tool always paints hard strokes, no matter what adjustments you make. The AP Help says: "The Pixel Tool draws pixel-aligned, hard-edged lines. This is in contrast to the Paint Brush which may have a slight pixel variance due to its antialiasing." In GIMP for example the similar tool is called Pencil Tool, and it is described in the Tool Tips as follows: "Hard edged painting". That is the most characteristic point of this tool. The name "Pixel Tool" might be a little misleading.

[R C-R]

1 minute ago, iconoclast said:

But if it appears as a square or a circle when I start AP depends on which of both forms I had selected before. So it is not a square everytime I start AP. At least on Windows.

Either this is a difference between the Mac & Windows behavior or I have overlooked some preference setting that prevents it resetting to a square shape on restart.