Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream gives you a 256×256-pixel canvas, four brush sizes, and roughly 84 paintable swatches. That's enough flexibility to paint almost anything — and just constrained enough that "anything" becomes paralysing the moment you open the Palette House for the first time.
This is a working list of 30 Tomodachi Life pixel art ideas that I keep coming back to when designing for the game. They're sorted by difficulty — beginner ideas use the chunky 16 px brush (16×16 grid, ~256 cells); intermediate uses 8 px (32×32 grid, ~1,024 cells); advanced uses 4 px (64×64 grid, ~4,096 cells). If you want to skip planning entirely, drop a reference image into the Pixel Art Maker and follow the recipe card.
Beginner ideas — 16×16 grid, 5–10 minutes each
These are designs you can finish during a TV ad break. They look intentional, not amateurish, because they're built around bold silhouettes — not because they're complex. Start here if you've never used the Palette House before.
Heart emoji
A solid red heart on white. 4 swatches, almost zero planning.
Five-point star
Classic yellow star, black outline. Reads at a glance.
Smiley face
Yellow circle, two dots, a curved mouth. The "hello world" of pixel art.
Rainbow stripes
Six horizontal bands, ROYGBP order. No outline needed.
Cherry fruit
Two red circles with a brown stem and green leaf. A favourite food item.
Single flower
Five-petal daisy on a stem. Pick any colour combo.
Country flag (2-stripe)
Any simple two-band flag — Polish, Indonesian, Monégasque, etc.
Mushroom
Red cap with white spots, beige stem. Reads at any size.
Music note
A single black quaver. Try it as a chest design on a t-shirt.
Solid-colour cat silhouette
A single-colour cat shape on contrasting background. No detail, all readable.
Intermediate ideas — 32×32 grid, 18–35 minutes each
The sweet spot. 1,024 cells gives you enough room for shading, outlines and small details — but not so many that you'll abandon the design after dinner. Most of the best Palette House art on Reddit and Discord lives at this resolution.
Pizza slice
Triangular crust, tomato base, pepperoni circles, cheese drips. Reads as food at any size.
Sushi roll
Nori band, white rice, salmon/avocado fill. Two pieces side-by-side.
Donut with sprinkles
Pink-glazed ring with pastel sprinkles. Cute on plates and clothes alike.
Pixel cat portrait
Front-facing cat head with pointy ears, big eyes, whiskers. Best at 32×32.
Anime chibi face
Round face, oversized eyes, simple hair. Works for any character.
Sports team crest
Two colours, a simple shield outline, a letter or symbol. Football, baseball, basketball — pick your team.
Hamburger
Classic stack: top bun, lettuce, cheese, patty, bottom bun. Sesame seeds optional.
Pixel Pokémon-style monster
A "fakemon" of your own — bipedal cute creature with two-tone colours.
Holiday tree
Green triangular tree with star, ornaments and trunk. Reusable every December.
Cup of ramen
Bowl, noodles, egg half, narutomaki, scallion flecks. Steam optional.
Advanced ideas — 64×64 grid, 45–90 minutes each
The full 4-pixel brush, full Palette House palette, full attention required. These are showpiece designs you'll be proud to see daily. Don't start here — but absolutely come here once the workflow is muscle memory.
Recognisable character face
A specific gaming/anime character at portrait scale. Eyes are the hardest part.
Album cover homage
A famous album cover (Dark Side of the Moon, Nevermind, Abbey Road). Iconic ones work because the silhouette is the design.
Landscape miniature
Mountains in the distance, lake in the middle, foreground tree. Use dithering for the sky gradient.
Detailed food plate
A full meal with multiple components — pasta, salad, garnish, sauce, all readable.
Famous painting
Recreate The Great Wave, Starry Night, Mona Lisa at 64×64. The Pixel Art Maker handles this well with Floyd–Steinberg dither.
Cityscape silhouette
A skyline at sunset. Use 3–4 building shades against a gradient sky.
Pet portrait (photo source)
Your real cat or dog. Upload a photo to the Pixel Art Maker, pick Detailed + Atkinson dither, paint cell-by-cell.
Logo recreation
A complex multi-colour brand logo. Pick something with 3–6 distinct colours, not full photography.
Constellation map
Black canvas, star clusters in white/yellow, faint line connectors. Calm and personal.
Comic-style portrait
Bold black outlines, flat-colour fills, halftone shading. Roy Lichtenstein style.
A workflow that makes any idea easier
The hardest part of Palette House pixel art isn't the painting — it's the planning. Painting cell-by-cell from a clear reference is mechanical; painting freehand while figuring out the composition is exhausting. The shortcut is to use a paint-by-numbers tool.
- Pick an idea from the list above. If you can't draw it from memory, find a reference photo (cherries, a pizza slice, your cat).
- Open the Grid Maker. Drop the reference image into the canvas.
- Match the brush size to the tier. Beginner = 16 px. Intermediate = 8 px. Advanced = 4 px.
- Read the recipe card. It tells you the exact brush, mode and palette to select in-game.
- Open the Palette House. Select the brush, set Grid view to 8×8, and paint top-to-bottom, left-to-right.
For style-heavy designs (photos, paintings, dithered gradients), the Pixel Art Maker with Atkinson or Floyd–Steinberg dithering produces softer, more photographic output than the Grid Maker's flat-colour mode.
Five practical tips before you start painting
- Pick a category that gets seen. Clothes are visible on every Mii who wears them — high return on painting time. Book covers and TVs are only seen during the related animations — low return. Start with clothes.
- Set in-game Grid view to 8×8. The densest setting aligns 1:1 with our 4-px-brush preview. The other settings just confuse the count.
- Take a photo of the recipe card with your phone. You'll glance at it every few seconds while painting. Don't trust memory.
- Block in by colour, not by region. Paint all the dark outline cells first, then all the body-colour cells, then the highlights. Mistakes are easier to spot.
- Exit the Palette House every 10 minutes. The game auto-saves on exit. If you accidentally close the game mid-design, recent progress is preserved.
Ready to start?
Pick one idea from the beginner list, open the Grid Maker, and you'll have your first Palette House design finished in under fifteen minutes. After three or four chunky icons, the 32×32 tier feels approachable. After a week, you'll be picking 64×64 portraits with no second thought.