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After Pixelate exports a sprite sheet, you need to wire it into Unity’s animation system to get a looping, playable animation. This guide covers sprite slicing, creating animation clips, and handling material swapping when using normal maps.
1

Verify the sprite sheet is sliced

When Pixelate finishes a capture, AutoSpriteSlicer automatically configures the output PNG as a Multiple sprite with each frame cut to your chosen Cell Size.To confirm: select the PNG in the Project window and check the Inspector. Sprite Mode should read Multiple. Click Sprite Editor to see the individual frame rectangles.
If the frames look misaligned, the cell size used in the Sprite Editor may differ from your Pixelate cell size. Open the Sprite Editor, click Slice, choose Grid By Cell Size, and enter the same width and height you used in Pixelate’s Cell Size field.
2

Create an animation clip from the frames

  1. In the Project window, expand the sprite sheet asset to reveal the individual frame sprites
  2. Select all frames (click the first, shift-click the last)
  3. Drag them onto a GameObject in the Hierarchy
Unity automatically creates an Animator component on the GameObject and an AnimationClip asset alongside the sprite sheet. A file dialog will prompt you to name and save the clip.
For a full walkthrough of this drag-and-drop method, see the official reference video linked from the Pixelate guide files.
3

Set the animation sample rate

Open the Animation window (Window → Animation → Animation) and select your clip. Set the Samples value to match the FPS you used when capturing — for example, if you captured at 12 FPS, set Samples to 12. This ensures playback speed matches your capture rate.
4

Set up material swapping (for normal-mapped sprites)

Each animation clip has its own pair of textures (diffuse + normal map), so each needs its own material. When an animation starts, the Sprite Renderer must switch to the correct material.In the Animation window, with your clip selected:
  1. Click Add Property → expand Sprite Renderer → add Material._MainTex (or the full Material reference)
  2. At frame 0, key the material to the one for this clip
  3. Repeat for each animation clip, keying its own material
If you skip material swapping, the normal map from a different animation will be applied, causing lighting to look wrong during certain animations.
5

Test in the Visualize scene

Open the Visualize scene included with Pixelate. Swap the sprite and material on the Sprite Renderer to your new assets and press Play to verify the animation plays back correctly with lighting.

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Character flipping

To flip your character to face the opposite direction, rotate the GameObject 180° on the Y axis: 
// Correct
transform.rotation = Quaternion.Euler(0f, facingLeft ? 180f : 0f, 0f);
Do not use localScale.x = -1. Negative X scale inverts the normal map’s light response and breaks the lighting effect.

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Tips for clean pixel-art animation

  • Keep Filter Mode set to Point (No Filter) on your sprite textures to preserve sharp pixel edges
  • Disable Compression (set to None) on sprite sheets to prevent color degradation on pixel art
  • If frames appear out of order in the Sprite Editor, the slicing direction is top-left to bottom-right by default — make sure your Pixelate export matches this layout (it does by default)