Update the list of contributors (Pinta/Actions/Help/AboutDialogAction.cs). Contributors for the release are tracked in CHANGELOG.md.
Ensure that the copyright year in the About Dialog is up to date.
Write release notes, including a list of bug fixes, new features, and any changes to dependencies that may affect distro packages. The CHANGELOG.md file provides a good starting point.
Also update the user guide with any relevant changes.
Add the release notes to xdg/pinta.appdata.xml.in (example).
Create a release branch (e.g. release-1.4) so that development may continue on the master branch.
When ready, create a signed tag for the release, e.g. git tag -s 2.0.
Create builds for each platform:
Linux: run make dist and make dist-zip from a clean checkout