A few days ago, on Sunday, I pushed Kobee Studio 1.4.0. It is a fairly major update, but the reason I am excited about it is not really the version number or the amount of code that went into it.
It is the feeling of opening a board that used to be a collection of footprints and traces, then adding the little details that make it feel like your board.
A label in exactly the right place. A pin name that saves you from reaching for the schematic. A warning symbol beside the connector that you will definitely plug in backwards once if you do not mark it. A QR code that tells future-you where the firmware lives. These are small things, but they are the things that turn a working PCB into a finished object.
That is what I have been building with Kobee Studio: a set of tools for making useful, editable PCB artwork without leaving KiCad.
Image placeholder: Add a wide photograph or screenshot of a finished board covered in Kobee Studio artwork here.
The fun bit is making the board explain itself
I started Kobee Studio because I kept wanting to add visual language to my boards. Not decoration for the sake of decoration, although I am absolutely not against a board looking good. I wanted the board to explain itself when I picked it up six months later.
Which way does this connector face? What is this button? Which pin is one? What does this test point measure? Is this the board with the old firmware or the new one?
KiCad is excellent at designing the electrical and mechanical parts of a PCB. The last layer — the part where a board becomes readable to a human — is where I kept wanting better tools. Kobee Studio is my attempt to make that layer feel like part of PCB design rather than an awkward trip through another drawing program.
Image placeholder: Add a close-up of a board detail where labels, symbols or polarity marks make the hardware easier to understand.
Start with a label, then keep going
The easiest place to start is a label. Kobee Studio can make filled, inverted and outline labels with shapes, padding, borders, corner radii, different end styles and optional underlines.
That sounds like a lot of controls, but the useful part is simple: you can make the label fit the thing it is describing. A small rounded label for a status LED. A long tab for a connector. A pointer for a test point. A chunky inverted label that is easy to read on a busy silkscreen.
The result is ordinary editable KiCad geometry. It is not a flattened image that becomes somebody else's problem when the board changes.
Image placeholder: Add a set of label examples showing different shapes, fills, outlines and underlines on a real PCB.
Add the symbols you actually need
Words are useful, but a good little symbol can say something instantly. Kobee Studio includes a searchable collection of PCB-safe icons for things like ground, power, LEDs, batteries, warnings, inputs, outputs, test points and polarity.
You can use them by themselves, put them beside text, or build them into a label. I like this for the small decisions that would otherwise need a paragraph: a clear polarity mark, a warning triangle, an LED indicator, or a symbol that tells me which side of a connector I am looking at.
Version 1.4.0 also lets you upload your own SVG assets. That means you can make a symbol for a project-specific connector, a house logo, a revision mark, or whatever odd little visual convention your builds have collected over time.
Image placeholder: Add a photo or screenshot showing several icons and quick labels used together on one board.
Image placeholder: Add a close-up of a custom SVG symbol on a PCB, plus the original SVG or picker entry if useful.
Make connectors and components easier to find
Pin headers are one of those places where a little artwork saves a surprising amount of head-scratching. Kobee Studio can create overlays for single-row 2.54 mm headers, including pin labels, orientation, plug clearance and optional openings.
Instead of counting from the edge of the board while holding a cable in one hand, you can mark the connector where you will actually see it.
The same idea works around components. Component callouts can frame a passive, LED, tactile switch or custom component envelope without changing the electrical footprint. Component arrays extend that to repeated rows and columns, which is handy for LED banks, indicators and other groups that are easy to misread.
Image placeholder: Add a screenshot of a pin-header overlay with pin numbers and orientation markings.
Image placeholder: Add a board close-up showing a component callout or repeated component array.
Put useful information on the board
Sometimes the most satisfying mark on a board is not the prettiest one. It is the one that answers a question.
Kobee Studio can generate QR codes and Code 128 barcodes directly from the PCB artwork workflow. Put a board revision, a serial number, a documentation link or a firmware identifier somewhere you can scan it later. The codes stay editable, and the optional human-readable line is separate from the encoded payload.
There are sensible fabrication details here too: protected QR quiet zones, minimum barcode sizes and the reminder that a small code should be checked against the chosen board finish and scanner before it goes into production.
Image placeholder: Add a photograph of a QR code or barcode on a finished board, ideally with the readable text visible.
The redesign is there to get out of the way
The previous interface grew one feature at a time. That is how most useful tools begin, including this one, but the result started to feel like a map of the project's history.
For 1.4.0 I rebuilt the UI around the way I actually want to work: choose an artwork type, make a few decisions, see the result, and place it back into the board. The navigation is clearer, the controls are easier to read, and the layout gives the preview and the settings room to breathe.
The redesign also gives the less visible parts of the workflow a proper home.
Image placeholder: Add a full-window screenshot of the redesigned Kobee Studio editor with the preview visible.
Dark mode for late-night board sessions
There is now a proper themed interface with Follow system, Light, and Dark appearance options. This is not a feature that changes what the board does, but it changes how pleasant it is to spend an evening tuning a label or checking a dense preview.
Image placeholder: Add matching light-mode and dark-mode screenshots side by side.
mm and mils without changing the board underneath
You can switch the displayed units between millimetres (mm) and mils (mil). The important detail is that the geometry stays stored in millimetres internally, so changing the display preference does not unexpectedly resize existing artwork.
That makes it easier to follow the conventions of a project or a manufacturer without having to mentally translate every value while using the editor.
Profiles for the settings you keep rebuilding
If you make enough boards, you start to develop preferences. Maybe labels are always a certain height. Maybe your pin-header overlays use the same spacing. Maybe your machine codes need a particular size to scan reliably.
Kobee Studio 1.4.0 lets you save those settings as profiles, recall them later, and choose a default profile for each artwork tool. Profiles are kept separate for labels, pin headers, component callouts, component arrays and machine codes.
This is one of those small workflow features that only becomes exciting after you use it a few times. The next label starts closer to the one you wanted instead of the one the generic defaults guessed for you.
Image placeholder: Add a screenshot of the Profiles and defaults settings page with a few named profiles visible.
Back up the bits that make your setup yours
Custom symbols, profiles, quick labels and visibility choices are the sort of things you do not want to recreate after moving to a new computer. The new Data & backup tools export those personal settings and libraries into a ZIP file and restore them later.
The plugin package itself is not included. KiCad's Plugin and Content Manager handles installing the application; the backup carries the library and preferences you have built around it.
Image placeholder: Add a screenshot of the Data & backup page or a photo of the exported backup workflow.
A few things I am still figuring out
The custom SVG workflow is powerful, but SVG is a much bigger format than the small, predictable set of shapes that makes sense on a PCB. For now, Kobee Studio wants simple filled geometry. Convert strokes to paths, save a Plain SVG, and avoid filters, gradients, embedded images, text, external links and other features that do not translate cleanly into PCB regions.
The current guide recommends designing on a 240 × 240 px Inkscape canvas and keeping the important part of the symbol comfortably inside the edges. The pixel size is only a working canvas; the physical size comes from the height you choose in Kobee Studio.
I am still working on the examples and documentation here. The fun part of building a tool in public is that the gaps become obvious as soon as somebody tries to use it for a board I did not imagine.
Image placeholder: Add a before-and-after image of an SVG symbol being prepared, uploaded and used on a board.
This is the bit I want feedback on
Kobee Studio is still being bootstrapped in public. I am making it because I want my own boards to feel more finished, but the best version of that idea will come from seeing how other makers use their boards.
What do you label? What do you mark? Which things do you always have to look up in the schematic? Do you have a symbol or a workflow that you keep recreating by hand?
If you try Kobee Studio 1.4.0, open an issue on GitHub if something breaks or feels confusing. A screenshot, the KiCad version, your operating system and a small example board are incredibly helpful when I am trying to reproduce a problem.
Thanks to everyone who has tested it, sent feedback, and helped me turn a small tool for making PCB labels into something that can make a whole board easier to live with.
If you want to try it
Kobee Studio 1.4.0 can be installed through KiCad's Plugin and Content Manager. Add this custom repository:
1https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mrcpuddington/mrcpuddington-kicad-repository/main/repository.json
In KiCad, open Plugin and Content Manager → Manage repositories, choose Add, paste the URL, save it, and refresh the catalogue. Find Kobee Studio 1.4.0 and choose Install.
If you previously installed Kobee Studio manually, remove the old installation before installing the Plugin and Content Manager package. Having two installations around can make it unclear which copy KiCad is loading.
Kobee Studio 1.4.0 uses KiCad's supported IPC plugin workflow and is tested with KiCad 10 on macOS and Windows. Linux uses the same package, but still needs more complete UI and artwork validation before I would recommend relying on it for anything critical.
Enjoy the new version. 🐝
— Corey
