Free Halftone Stencil Generator – SVG & PNG

Turn a photo into a tonal halftone dot stencil for craft cutting. This free halftone stencil generator maps darker photo areas to larger circular openings and lighter areas to smaller or absent dots. Control finished width, dot pitch, minimum material gap, smallest hole, contrast, and square or staggered placement. Export individual SVG circles for cutting or a PNG preview. The purpose is shaded dot artwork—not a solid silhouette stencil, rhinestone placement template, or CMYK screen-printing separation. Your image is processed in the browser.

Make a halftone stencil from your photo

1. Choose a clear image. Use a JPG, PNG or WebP up to 20 MB and 40 megapixels. A close crop with a distinct subject works better than a busy background. Transparent areas are treated as white. Crop unwanted borders before selecting the file.

2. Enter the finished width. Width is measured in millimeters. Height follows the original aspect ratio. Decide on the physical dimensions before tuning the dots: changing the width changes how many dots fit into the picture.

3. Balance detail and strength. Start with a 4 mm pitch, a 1 mm material gap and a 0.7 mm minimum hole. These are tool defaults for experimentation, not tested settings for every material. Inspect important features, then adjust one control at a time.

4. Export and test. Download SVG for editable circles or PNG for a raster image. Verify imported dimensions, test a small section of the design and check that your material stays connected before cutting the whole stencil.

Dot pitch, material gaps and minimum holes

Dot pitch is the center-to-center spacing of neighboring circles. Smaller spacing gives more samples of the photo and can preserve more detail, but it also creates more cuts. Larger spacing produces a simpler, more graphic pattern.

Minimum material gap limits the largest circle. The largest possible diameter equals pitch minus gap. At a 4 mm pitch with a 1 mm gap, a completely dark sample produces a 3 mm opening. Neighboring circles remain separated in the generated geometry; blade width, cutting accuracy and material behavior can reduce the real remaining material.

Smallest hole removes openings below the chosen diameter. Raising it can simplify awkward tiny cuts but also removes subtle highlights. If the setting exceeds the largest possible hole, the tool asks you to correct it instead of exporting an unusable pattern.

The square grid uses straight rows. Staggered rows shift alternate rows and place their centers closer vertically while retaining the selected nearest-neighbor pitch. Both layouts use circles. Contrast changes tonal separation; reverse tones swaps which parts of the image produce larger holes.

Halftone photo shading vs solid stencils and rhinestone templates

Halftone photo stencils use different-sized circular openings to suggest shadows and highlights. A darker pixel sample gives a larger dot; pale tones give smaller or no holes. Dot pitch controls the spacing and how finely the photo is sampled, while material gap keeps nearby circles separate. This is meant for single-color tonal artwork, including dotted portraits and shaded graphics.

For bold silhouettes, lettering, solid regions and bridge-assisted cutting, use the Stencil Maker for solid photo shapes instead. For templates that position fixed-size gems or stones, use the Rhinestone Template Maker for stone placement. Its dots represent rhinestone holes and counts, not variable-size halftone dots representing photo brightness. These are separate design tasks, despite all three tools accepting images.

This generator does not trace arbitrary outlines, place rhinestones, or automatically add bridges to letterforms. Its output consists of separated circles. For connected letter cutouts, see stencil bridges for letters and logos.

Cuttable SVG circle geometry versus PNG halftone preview

The SVG contains individual black circles with a millimeter width and height. It does not embed the original photograph or include a background rectangle that might be interpreted as an extra cutting path. Black circles represent intended openings; your cutting software still needs the correct operation and material settings. The W3C SVG circle specification explains how circle geometry is represented.

PNG contains black dots on a white background, with a maximum long edge of 1,400 pixels. It is useful for checking the composition or placing the result in a raster workflow. It is not a guaranteed 300 DPI production file. The SVG preserves editable geometry, but neither format reconstructs detail that was missing from your photo.

Fix missing details, pale results and difficult cuts

Facial details disappear: crop closer to the subject, reduce pitch within your material limits, or lower the minimum hole size. A tiny eye cannot survive if the grid samples miss it. Compare the result at its intended viewing size.

The design looks too light: a gap between every opening necessarily leaves material behind, even in deep shadows. Try a smaller gap only if a material test supports it. Increasing contrast may help separate midtones but cannot turn this spaced-dot design into a solid black area.

The cutter creates too many small pieces: use wider spacing or remove more tiny holes. Dense output can also slow vector software. The generator limits patterns to 30,000 sampled positions. For intricate sources, simplify unnecessary source-image details before generating.

Halftone stencil generator questions

Is this a free photo-to-halftone tool?

Yes. You can use the controls and download SVG or PNG without an account. The sample is a generated geometric design so you can try the workflow before choosing a photo.

Can I use the SVG with a vinyl cutter?

Use a cutter workflow that accepts SVG and inspect the imported dimensions. Very small circles may be difficult to cut or weed. Compatibility with a file format does not guarantee that a particular material or blade can reproduce every opening.

Is this a screen-printing halftone separator?

No. This is a single-color, spaced-circle craft stencil generator. It does not create CMYK separations, RIP output, mesh-specific screens or calibrated dot-gain compensation. A physical cutting gap and a screen-printing line screen solve different problems.

Are my photos uploaded or stored?

The tool code reads the selected file locally and does not upload or save it to a server. Reset replaces it with the sample. This describes image processing in the tool; the website may separately use ordinary site services described in its privacy policy.

Why does the exported size change after importing?

Check whether the receiving program preserved the SVG millimeter dimensions. Rescaling the finished SVG also changes every hole and gap. Set your intended width here and verify measurements after import before committing material.