8Canvas
Design to data.
8Canvas is a free infinite-canvas design tool for game designers. Sketch systems as shapes and arrows, attach the properties and tags your game needs, and export the drawing as Lua, JSON or YAML that your game reads directly — the diagram is the data.
What it does
An infinite canvas
Rectangles, ellipses, diamonds, lines, text and pictures; arrows between them; rich text with styles, lists and links. Runs in the browser, works offline, saves as you draw.
Data on every shape
Each shape carries an id, properties and tags; interface shapes pass them on to the shapes that implement them. Tech trees, crafting graphs, state machines and content tables stay editable as drawings.
Export to your game
One command writes .lua, .json or .yaml with the resolved data of every shape and connection, ready to require from a game. Markdown export for documents and reviews.
Share and review
Keep a drawing in Google Drive and share it like any Drive file: viewers read it, commenters leave threads and reactions, editors work on it — at different times, or live when two people have it open at once.
How 8Canvas uses Google Drive
Drawings are your files. When you choose Save to Google Drive, 8Canvas asks Google for one permission, drive.file, which covers only the files 8Canvas created or that you picked yourself. With it the app:
- creates and updates the
.8canvasfile you are drawing in, in your Drive; - opens a drawing you pick with Google's file picker, and checks whether you may edit, comment on or only view it;
- reads your account's email address to show who is editing in a shared drawing and to apply the drawing's own access list.
It never sees the rest of your Drive. Nothing you draw is stored on our servers: the file lives in your Drive and a copy in your browser. The sign-in itself is kept in your browser; signing out revokes it, and you can remove 8Canvas at any time from your Google account's third-party access page. Details are in the privacy policy.