Ciallo

<h1 align = "center">Ciallo ～(∠・ω< )⌒★!</h1> <h3 align="center">The next-generation vector paint program in your dreams.</h3> </br> <div align="center">

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Ciallo is an open-source graphics program for professional digital painting. It aims to compete with traditional raster painting software like Photoshop and Clip Studio Paint, while offering the following unique features researched by the developer:

Unique features

Vectorized Photoshop-like brushes

Vectorized stamp brushes, entirely drawn (rendered) on your graphics card (GPU).

Resolution-independent airbrush, adjust the opacity falloff directly, with ultra‑fast rendering performance.

Export to game engines

Export your artwork into the Godot game engine (as a .scn/.tscn file), and keep it resolution-independent. Like those old days when Flash was alive.

Will support other game engines in the future.

(WIP) Vector fill

Bucket fill in vector form: The positions to fill are editable and tracked with "fill markers", the shape $\odot$ in the image:

Copy and paste these markers between animation frames:

Other features

The following features may be in your favor:

No generative AI

<img align="left" width="192" height="192" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f1/No_AI_art.svg">

Ciallo uses a custom vector format that is aiming to be the game industry standard and hard to generate by the current AI techniques. Unless being explicitly declared by the copyright owners, artworks from Ciallo are forbidden to be trained.

Unlike the big company, Ciallo will never steal your artwork stocks for training AI. We also plan to build a sharing platform while protecting your artworks from unethical AI training.

In the invisible-far future, Ciallo may offer AI-powered features --- but always designed for professional artists.

Optimized pen feel

Ciallo aims to provide a drawing/pen feel significantly better than Clip Studio Paint and Procreate; this will require several technical advancements in future updates. For the current version, the feel is not worse than Clip Studio Paint and certainly better than Photoshop, GIMP, or MyPaint. (Report a bug if the paint tool feels laggier than Photoshop or Krita.)

Infinite canvas

@Developer: "I have never seen a professional artist who needs an infinite canvas when drawing illustrators, mangas, or animes. Do you really need this? Tell me how I can add better support.

Download (Free on all platforms)

Steam | Itch.io

System requirements: Requires a system capable of running small to mid-sized 3D games. Close any other software that heavily uses your GPU before opening Ciallo (except OBS, if necessary).

• OS: Windows 10 or higher
• Memory: 6 GB or more
• GPU: Minimum NV GTX 1650 or AMD Radeon RX 6500 XT
• Monitor: A refresh rate greater than 100 Hz is recommended for the best drawing experience
• Tablet: Use your tablet at its maximum polling/reporting rate. (If you need to buy a new one, the fastest is Wacom DTC-141.)

Ciallo is highly sensitive to your tablet polling rate. It can potentially respond to tablet/mouse input at up to 1000 Hz. However, tablets in 2025 can reach at most 360 Hz (DTC-141), and 150–200 Hz on average, which is highly insufficient for capturing small turning points and handwritten text. If a tablet with a 500–1000 Hz polling rate becomes available on the market, contact me — Ciallo will try to add support.

About macOS: I literally wish to support macOS, but I cannot afford a MacBook Pro (it would cost me roughly half a year's living expenses). Consider sponsoring me on Patreon; really lacking of money.

Development philosophy

EA stage

Ciallo is in an early stage of development; its version number will be labeled as EA (early access). During the EA stage, Ciallo mainly focuses on R&D of traditional painting features using modern shaders and GPU APIs. After finishing those major painting features, we plan to open Steam Workshop, marking the end of the EA stage.

Hand-drawn art

Although Ciallo focuses on vector features, it is NOT intended to replace Inkscape or Illustrator for graphic design. Instead, it aims to provide Clip Studio Paint or Krita vector layers on super steroids. All features that were previously available only in raster workflows would be supported in Ciallo's new vector workflow.

Game art first

Except for the core painting, Ciallo prioritizes auxiliary features supporting video game development. It aims to be a DCC program providing vector hand-drawn assets, including illustrations, 2D animations and hand-drawn textures in 3D.

Feature requests

Hope Ciallo has already addressed something important to you. (To be frank, the large company should have provided these infrastructures a decade ago.) There's always more to add as Ciallo grows. Check the [Contributing Tab] for the development plan.

The developer basically knows the most needed features during the EA stage. These are the YouTube channels he learns painting: Dong Chang | Aaron's Painter Tutorials | saitonaoki.

Instead of asking for features existing in other paint programs, you may propose creative features unconstrained in style. The developer would love to hear new ideas about line art (especially anime-style art) and may be able to do technical research on your request.

If you urgently need a feature from other programs implemented in Ciallo within a week or month, consider contacting the developer or sponsoring the project.

Sponsor Ciallo's research and your future

Ciallo's mission is to bring advanced hard-drawn art techniques from dream to life. It needs your support to keep them free and accessible to everyone.

Consider patreon on Ciallo development, the developer will post plans, designs and teasers about innovative features well before release, which acts as a pre-manual to understand how to use Ciallo. Check the post About Vector Fill as an example.

Moreover, in this age of AI we all face challenges from rapidly advancing AI techniques. Hope Ciallo will be the tool that helps you shine in this era — a tool that liberates your creativity, not one that replaces it with AI or steals it to feed AI. Sponsor Ciallo to shape the future of your digital painting and help keep creativity alive in an AI-driven world.

User-created content copyright and AI notice

For the purposes of this Project, "Artwork" means any brushes and drawings saved, exported, or represented in Ciallo's native format, other game engine vector formats, or raster format. The copyright owner of an Artwork (the "Owner") retains all rights in and to that Artwork. We do not claim any rights over user-created Artwork.

Unless the Owner has given explicit express, written permission, any use of Artwork to train, fine‑tune, validate, evaluate, or otherwise improve machine learning, generative AI, or other automated models or datasets is strictly prohibited. Prohibited acts include, without limitation, collection, copying, ingestion, extraction, annotation, transformation, or inclusion of such Artwork in any training, testing, or benchmarking dataset.

Explicit prohibition on "no‑copyright" labels and opt‑out schemes: Artwork labeled or claimed as "no copyright", "public domain", or similar does not authorize AI training under this project's terms. Likewise, any purported "opt‑out" or "unless the Owner opts out" declarations (i.e., statements that artworks may be used for AI purposes unless an Owner affirmatively opts out) do not and shall not be treated as authorization to use Artwork and this project for AI training. Such uses are violations of this project's terms and may result in injunctive relief, damages, and recovery of costs and attorneys' fees under applicable law.

License and AI notice

Unless otherwise specified, files in this repository are licensed under the AGPL-3.0 license.

Shader code special notice

For the purposes of this Project, "Shader Code" means any GPU shader program, shader graph, material shader, or related code used to render strokes, fills, brushes, or other visual effects in this project.

1. Use in Artwork

   You are explicitly allowed to use the Shader Code render Artwork in closed‑source or commercial games, including shipping binaries and asset bundles containing comp