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1. km BS r Stew Teni j Show Scripta l Wie nio Thi Tracker Shew image Porttotia Pa Show Brush Creator EE Custom Palette b v Dean Mode Toggle Wi w Unnitied 1 BON Property Bar Ose tO J goror Fal Anh Con nols Coir Faleibei Hide Layer Hiie Chamme Toolbox LIAA The default Painter desktop with the Window gt Library Palettes menu PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 27 Fo pe CE ah Tk GETTING STARTED Figure 1 21 The Toolbox bottom right corner of a Toolbox icon indicates that a pop up menu is accessible if you hold your lt O L cursor down on the icon Take a few moments to explore the Toolbox Property Bar The Property Bar provides easy access to commonly needed parameters related to the currently selected tool Notice as you change the tool choice how the Property Bar changes For the Brush tool the parameters displayed in the Property Bar are dependent on the specific brush variant that is cur rently selected Greater in depth adjustment of brush parameters is possible through the Brush Con trols group of palettes Window gt Brush Controls or by choosing the Brush Creator mode Window gt Show Brush Creator Brush Selector Bar Brushes are at the heart of Painter s magic The phenomenal range and ability of Painter s brushes empowers you to express yourself freely on the digital canvas Th
2. Initially the library palette you are most likely to want to see on your desktop is the Papers palette Window gt Library Palettes gt Show Papers This gives you a preview and control of the paper texture applied with grainy brushes Saving Palette Arrangements As you work in Painter you ll find you rearrange your desktop to suit different tasks hiding or showing those palettes that are relevant creating custom palettes as appropriate When you have a palette arrangement you like and that you wish to be able to return to in an instant at any time choose Window gt Arrange Palettes gt Save Layout Figure 1 27 Name your layout with a descrip tive name that relates to the task it is good for e g Simple Paint If you ever wish to return to the standard palette arrangement select Window gt Arrange Palettes gt Default 1 6 Foundation Skills Foundation skills are the nuts and bolts of painting You ve already learned how to open mount and save a canvas and how to select your brush variant from the Brush Selector Bar The remaining foun dation skills you need to learn are how to control your brush size how to pick color and how to remove paint PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 33 if Painter File Edt Canvey Layers Select Shapes Effects Movie DEEA Heip S E ja MT 5 GETTING STARTED e lt m m 0 Li titrteee je e i oA Saving a palette arrangement Control
3. 7a G z h Ly z i ae a A Save Preferences m eaa ai Palettes and UI T window O z D LL the color in your Colors palette and click on the Window Background Use Current Color button use this for presentations when prefer a dark gray or black background color rather than the default mid gray Figure 1 18 Memory and Scratch Preferences 1 Click on the Preferences pop up menu and select Memory and Scratch Figure 1 19 If you wish to maximize the potential power of Painter when working on large files you change the Memory Usage from 80 to 100 of available EJ Make sure the Scratch Disk you have assigned has plenty of free space Register If you haven t registered your copy of Painter do so by selecting Help gt Register Memory Usage B0 X of available AN changes eel ake ec when oe paai Lapi Porter Pe phar pe EEr kiii bord i een la yir Shp Rard deren or partion wath ha ca GR FETS Memory and Scratch Preferences window GETTING STARTED 0 lt m 5 Li 26 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Set Up Your Painter Desktop We take a look at the Painter desktop and review what s what and what s where We look at how you can control your desktop and explore the brushes hierarchy Desktop Overview The Painter IX desktop comprises four main interface elements Toolbox Property Bar Brush Selec tor Bar a
4. Pate habien wha Cancel EQ comet Gp Wind Figure 1 16 Shapes Preferences window Preferences window Shapes Preferences Ry Click on the Preferences pop up menu and select Shapes Figure 1 16 ea Uncheck the defaults of Stroke in Current Color on Draw and Fill with Current Color on Close 3 Check Big Handles These settings help keep your paths simple and unobtrusive when you use the Pen tool to create and edit a path for the purposes of selection Note that the Shapes Preferences window also contains an Align Brush to Path Tolerance setting for the snap to path painting feature Internet Preferences En Click on the Preferences pop up menu and select Internet You will see the default library address used by the Help menu Just leave this as is Save Preferences El Click on the Preferences pop up menu and select Save 2 For Mac users choose Append Always the default is Never and check Use Lower Case Figure 1 17 EN For Mac and Windows users make the Color Space RGB for both TIFF and Photoshop PSD files The defaults are Prompt on Save Palettes and UI Preferences m Click on the Preferences pop up menu and select Palettes and Ul z If you wish to change the window background color from gray this is the background color you see surrounding your canvas when it is mounted in Screen Mode then select PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 25 Preferences window Q W h tc z
5. BRUSH CATEGORY Figure 1 22 The Brush Selector Bar FETS The Brush Selector Bar pop up menu Palettes There are thirty five palettes that come with Painter more can be created using Window gt Custom Palettes Nineteen of these palettes are grouped within the Brush Controls palette Many palettes have pop up menus on the far right of the palette title bar click on the triangle You may find you want different combinations of palettes showing for different tasks For instance when painting you may just want to see Colors and Layers For working with text you will also want to see the text palette For working on collage the layers and channels palettes will be needed Palettes can be conveniently grouped or ungrouped for instance the Color palettes are initially all grouped together and opened or closed when closed you just see the palette title bar as well as hidden or shown Thus you can make the best use of your working space and avoid getting it too cluttered PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 29 Moving Palettes To move palettes into or out of a group of palettes or to change their order within a group of palettes you simply click and drag on the center of the title bar the cursor becomes a Grabber Hand as you pass over the center of the palette title bars Opening and Closing Palettes To open or close a palette you click on the left of the palette title bar where the solid black
6. FS The current pattern is the default Watercolor aver clone source Watercolor and Liquid Ink Layers Watercolor brushes give beautiful soft watercolor washes and effects Liquid Ink brushes produce some astounding graphic and resist effects Both Watercolor and Liquid Ink brushes paint into special layers that are separate from and sit above the regular background canvas Figure 1 36 These layers are generated automatically as soon as you apply a Watercolor Liquid Ink brush to your image You can see these layers listed in the Layers palette After you ve applied Watercolor Liquid Ink brushes if you then try to apply a non Watercolor Liquid Ink brush you ll get a warning Only Watercolor Liquid Ink brushes can be used on Water color Liquid Ink layers Outlined next are several alternative ways you can overcome this error Painting Beneath a Watercolor Liquid Ink Layer To preserve the Watercolor Liquid Ink layer and paint underneath it with other non Watercolor Liquid Ink brushes click on the Canvas layer in the Layers palette The Canvas layer will now be highlighted and you can continue painting with non Watercolor Liquid Ink brushes on the background canvas beneath the Watercolor Liquid Ink layer Any time you wish to add Water color Liquid Ink brushstrokes to the Watercolor Liquid Ink layer just reselect that layer Note that the editability of Watercolor Liquid Ink layers with Watercolor Liquid Ink brushes is only preser
7. Grip Pen GETTING STARTED e lt m eo Li GETTING STARTED 0 lt m 5 Li 12 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Wacom Intuos3 Control Panel Eg The tablet driver installs a Control Panel Figure 1 3 Make sure you have the most up to date driver installed on your computer see www wacom com for free download of the current drivers BI In Mac OS X select System Preferences gt Other gt Wacom Tablet In Windows click Start gt Settings gt Control Panel and double click on the Wacom Tablet icon If you ever need to uninstall the Wacom control panel in Mac OS X you ll find an uninstall icon in Applica tions gt Tablet Making Double Clicking Easier E Select the Grip Pen icon in the Tools menu at the top of the Wacom Tablet Control Panel Wacom Tablet Properties on Windows Select the Pen tab B Move the Tip Double Click Distance slider towards the right Large This makes it easier to double click Figure 1 4 The compromise here is that you don t want to make it too easy to double click or you ll find yourself accidentally double clicking when you don t wish to w Click on the Details button in the Pen tab This reveals the Feel Details window Figure 1 5 Figure 1 3 The Wacom Control Panel with Pen Tab selected PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 13 Customizes the amount of pressure needed to click or draw Drag the slider to
8. Quack Clone Da0 A Deire mage bom des E Turn on Tratin Papar l Sah te Clones ush Tiina Cater Ol Grabte Enah Cheating Auto Save soripes de dyads Gsm gases Eran tie ent j mwala kiapnie increment 5 E HF indicate ciesa source with crete haini while choning if Dew Posa oun ered A area e pn Dini mirng when drawing Gutuide qelachen show Comet dislog whan converting to lipi Figure 1 12 General Preferences window GETTING STARTED Z 2 lt m Z L 22 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Brush Tracking Preferences F In the top right corner of your Painter desktop you will see a brush selector with two icons and a description of the current brush category and variant these terms will be explained in more detail later in this chapter Click on the left icon You will see a pop up menu that lists the brush categories PA At first you will just see five categories listed in the pop up menu Click and drag the bottom right corner of the category pop up menu downward until you see a complete list of categories visible on your screen ends with Watercolor EJ Select the Artists category w Click on the right hand icon You will see a pop up menu that lists the brush variants con tained within the Artists category It is a good idea to get into the habit initially of click ing and dragging down the bottom right corner of each variant pop up menu to make sure you are seeing all the
9. a softer or linear setting Displays the tip JETAILS dialog paa vy atk customize the tip sensitivity Press down on the tablet with your pen tip to lest the current tip fowl You can use the CURRENT PRESSURE bar to determine how GETTING STARTED e lt m 0 L Figure 1 5 The Feel Details window 5 Lower the Click Threshold slightly This will make your pen more sensitive to registering a click when you tap lightly Experiment after you ve set this If you find you are accidentally clicking too much then return to this setting and increase the Click Threshold slightly 6 You may also wish to adjust the Sensitivity setting in this Feel Details window to suit your hand If you find it difficult to make a mark in the Try Here scratch pad lower right corner of the Feel Details window then see if a higher Sensitivity setting helps Click OK You are now back in the main Pen tab window The Tip Feel slider in the Pen tab window also gives you control over the pressure sensitivity of your pen tip You will be further fine tuning your pressure sensitivity within Painter so don t worry about getting it exactly right at this stage GETTING STARTED 0 lt m 0 Li 14 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK ETS FS The button function pop up menu Selecting Button Functions The button on the side of the stylus is a two function button Each end of
10. functionality GETTING STARTED 0 lt m Li 30 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Iterative Save There is an Iterative Save command File gt Iterative Save which automatically saves your work in progress with sequentially named files Each Iterative Save file name ends with a three digit number such as _001 002 and so on immediately preceding the file format tag such as rif or tif tag The Save As command is useful even if you choose to use the Iterative Save func tion since there will be times you wish to rename a file such as after making a clone copy duplicate Ea Make sure there is a file open in Painter File gt New Cmd Ctrl N or File gt Open Cmd Ctrl O BI Drag down to Window gt Custom Palette gt Add Command EJ Select File gt Save As You will see Menu Item Save As in the Add Command window Figure 1 25 Zy Click OK This generates a custom palette called Custom 1 containing a Save As button 5 Choose Window gt Custom Palette gt Organizer 6 Locate the new Custom 1 palette in the Organizer and click on it so that it is highlighted Choose Rename and rename Custom 1 Shortcuts Make a Quick Clone Button Quick Clone is a useful feature that does several steps in one command The steps are determined in the General Preferences It is handy to have this as a shortcut button when you are working from photographs F Choose Window g
11. power elegance and consistency in your choice and application of color Color sets allow you to restrict your palette to a particular range of colors and easily pick those colors just by clicking on the color squares They are ideal if you wish to limit your palette of colors and keep consistency of colors throughout a project There are many different color sets supplied with Painter and it is easy to create your own custom color sets When you first open the Color Sets palette you ll see a series of color swatches displayed with the name of each color listed beside the swatch Unless you need to know the actual names of colors I recommend going to the Color Sets pop up menu click on the small solid black triangle in the upper right of the palette and uncheck Display Name Figure 1 32 You will then see all the swatches Sai Sew bo Lieto ert Mixer Swatches S 5808858880 F Hee te Lo Har Ceti et War lo Mixer Pad tuned Hiner Pat Dar Mass Fai Tirap Wes Bei eral Mixer Tools gt F OF W mA Ej tie TF Color Sets BP LP caier inia B ETS Fe The Mixer palette PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 37 F mirt Len I rrr ETS TE The Color Sets palette showing pop up menu GETTING STARTED visible simultaneously The Color Sets principle is simple you click on a swatch and that becomes your current color The default color set has a range of traditional oil paint pigment color
12. print your digital artwork is getting good consistency between the colors you see on the screen when you create your artwork and the colors you see in your final printed image Painter IX has new color management tools built into it that are worthwhile using Refer to the User Manual and Help gt Help Topics for further information on that Here are two books that can help you color manage your creative workflow Mastering Digital Printing by Harald Johnson Muska amp Lipman 2003 ISBN 1 929685 65 3 this is a comprehensive book on digital printing that is written in a chatty easy to follow style and has a chapter on Understanding and Managing Color Real World Color Management by Bruce Fraser et al Peachpit Press 2003 ISBN 0 201 77340 6 a highly detailed technical book that tells you all you could wish to know about the ins and outs of color management One factor to be aware of with regard to printing is that different printers and printing technology may require your files to be in one of two different color modes namely RGB red green blue for most fine art inkjet printers and CMYK cyan magenta yellow black for commercial offset printing Painter is an RGB program in that all color data is stored with RGB values and I recommend only saving RGB files from Painter Photoshop allows you to work in different color modes If you are working with traditional offset lithography printers use Photoshop to convert your fi
13. the one that is within your Corel Painter IX application folder On Macintosh OSX hold down the Option key while you drag the Brushes folder to another location within the Corel Painter IX folder This will create a copy of the folder called Brushes Copy On Windows first select the Brushes folder alnd then choose Copy Ctrl C followed by Paste Ctrl V This will generate a folder called Copy of Brushes It will be useful to have the Brushes folder backed up in case if you ever have a brush variant file become corrupt and need replacing which unfortunately may happen from time to time Backing Up Custom Data In Chapter 3 Brush Creation you will find further instructions about backing up the Painter customization data which is stored in another location on your computer recom mend that you back up custom data every few months to ensure your custom brushes are preserved GETTING STARTED Z 2 lt m Z L 20 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Loading Other Goodies Copy the remaining contents of the appropriate Goodies folder into your Corel Painter IX applica tion folder This extra content includes more art materials such as extra papers patterns and color sets 1 5 Welcome to Painter Open and Mount a Canvas in Painter In this section we re going to start by opening a new canvas in Painter so that you have a scratch pad to try brushes out on We ll make some basic adjustments
14. then you can always import the Illustrator or Freehand generated text as a layer or series of layers into either Photoshop or Painter In Painter Illustrator text is imported as a group of Shapes File gt Acquire gt Adobe Illus trator File If you are preparing a piece for print and want the most precise accurate sharp looking text possible and the text will be a plain color without gradients transparency or drop shadows then you are better off either creating the text in Illustrator or other vector program and converting it to out lines or saving as a PDF document Keep a copy of the original non outline document for your records for future editing and resolution independent resizing You can also create sharp text mixed in with graphics in layout programs such as Adobe InDesign and Quark Xpress Publishing on the Web Publishing artwork on the Web involves a number of conflicting considerations K Keeping your file size as small as possible to minimize download time and avoid the need for scrolling and thus create a better viewer experience PA Showing your artwork in sufficient scale detail quality accuracy and consistency of color to impact viewers and do justice to your talents 3 Protecting your imagery from being used without your permission and therefore not publishing such high quality imagery that people can make good prints from them GETTING STARTED Z e lt m Z L 8 PA
15. variants available GG Select the Sargent Brush variant 6 Make a brushstroke on your canvas starting with very soft pressure and ending with hard pressure Does your brushstroke smoothly go from thin to thick or is there an abrupt jog in the stroke where it suddenly gets thick If the latter then adjusting the Brush Tracking Preferences can help Try a few brushstrokes like this to be sure Don t be afraid to press hard Note how the thickness responds to pressure Make sure you test out the full range of thickness by going to extremes of light and heavy pressure You should be able to com fortably control the thickness across the full range Sometimes you may find that the brush is either too sensitive or too insensitive in response to the pressure you apply We all apply a different natural range of stylus pressure when we paint Brush Tracking allows Painter and your stylus to be sensitive to your natural pressure range Choose Cmd Ctrl K 8 Click on the Preferences pop up menu where you see the word General and select Brush Tracking 9 Make a note of the four slider settings since once you adjust them and click OK to try out the new settings you can t go back and cancel or reset the sliders to their previous values 10 Make a single light stroke in the Brush Tracking Preferences window Figure 1 13 T Click OK 412 Try out a light to hard brushstroke on your canvas and see if the transition from thick to thin is now smoo
16. ARTED eo lt O Z L 36 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK gt Canvas Size the extra canvas added on is the color of the current Paper Color You can use this fact to add colored borders to your work The default Paper Color is white Clone Color The little icon that looks like the Photoshop Rubberstamp icon located below the Hue Wheel in the Colors palette is the Clone Color button It can be activated deactivated for any brush by clicking on it or using the keyboard shortcut U When the Clone Color button is activated the Hue Wheel Value Saturation Triangle and Main and Additional Color rectangles are all grayed out and the current color is determined by the current clone source see File gt Clone Source Note that the Cloners brushes have clone color activated but that the Hue Wheel Value Saturation Triangle and Main and Additional Color rectangles are not grayed out Mixer Palette The Mixer palette Figure 1 31 is based on a traditional artist s palette There is a scratch pad known as the Mixer Pad on which you can apply mix blend and sample colors using a variety of special Mixer tools These tools are accessed by clicking on small icons displayed below the Mixer Pad From the Mixer pop up menu small solid black triangle in upper right corner you can save the Mixer Pad colors and image or convert the Mixer colors into a new color set Color Sets Color Sets can offer you
17. Foundations Foundation I Getting Started GETTING STARTED eo lt O Z L 4 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Every child is an artist The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up Pablo Picasso 1 1 Introduction The journey we are embarking on is to unleash your full creative potential the potential in all of us that Picasso alludes to in his quote We start this journey with the Fundamentals building up a solid foundation from which to grow The first two Fundamentals chapters cover essential knowledge and skills The third Fundamentals chapter covers advanced brush creation and customization not essen tial but ultimately useful if you wish to fully realize your creative potential This first chapter introduces you to Painter and guides you through some initial setting up and getting to know the where to and how to for basic operations such as opening a new canvas selecting a brush changing color clearing your canvas saving your image and so on The chapter concludes with an exploration of some types of brushes that can confuse the first time Painter user By the end of this chapter you ll be familiar with the Painter interface and you ll be comfortable choosing applying and controlling the brushes which are at the heart of Painter 1 2 What s This Thing Called Painter In a Nutshell Corel Painter IX is a phenomenal image creation program
18. INTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Similar considerations apply to preparing images to send and share as e mail attachments With regard to digital imaging workflow Photoshop CS offers a useful File gt Save for Web option which allows you to see how your image will look depending on what quality or format you choose I rec ommend that you use this option when saving from Photoshop for the Web For further Web imaging capabilities you can choose File gt Edit in Image Ready My Web gallery images typically end up being about 400 to 600 pixels in the maximum dimen sion at 72 ppi I create my original artwork at higher resolution as RIFF files in Painter and then resize and resave them also in Painter as High Quality JPEGs Every time you save anything as a JPEG the quality of the file is reduced and if you resave as a JPEG then the quality is reduced even more Only save as a JPEG once Creating images at higher resolution gives you the flexibility to reuse the images for printing at a later time For helping protect your files from misuse you can in Photoshop choose Filter gt Digimarc which allows you to embed a watermark with your copyright notice Printing I have successfully printed from both Painter and Photoshop with excellent results If you print from Photoshop I recommend using the File gt Print with Preview option which allows you more control in positioning your image on the paper A key concern when you come to
19. a PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 41 a 5 Save the resulting file as a RIFF file with the name you wish to call your nozzle 6 Choose Cmd Ctrl L Locate your nozzle file and click Open 8 Apply the nozzle on your canvas 9 Select Add Nozzle to Library Your custom nozzle will now be part of the current Nozzle Library Cloners Powerful Image Transformation Tools The Cloners variants look at a clone source for their source of color rather than the Colors palette color picker which is usually grayed out when Clone Color is active There are numerous different Cloner variants many of which act as artistic filters that you selectively apply by hand rather than apply instantaneously and globally over the whole image as you do when applying an effect You are not restricted to the Brush Variants of the Cloners Brush Category to clone from one image source image into another destination image You can turn almost any brush in Painter into a Cloner brush simply by checking the Clone Color Box in the Colors palette This makes Painter a phenomenally powerful image transformation tool since you can hand paint a clone transforma tion using an almost unlimited variety of brushes Please refer to Chapters 4 and 5 for in depth infor mation on how to transform photographs with the use of cloning brushes The Default Clone Source The default clone source in Painter is the currently selected pattern Window gt Library Palett
20. are at your fingertips when you do wish to remove paint Erasing The Eraser variants in the Erasers category of brushes erase to the paper color which is white by default but can be set for the active canvas to be the current Main Color by selecting Canvas gt Set Paper Color The Bleach variant simply bleaches out the color on the canvas until it is white inde pendent of the Paper Color The bleach gives a similar effect to the Dodge variant in the Photo cate gory of brushes Try the Eraser variants on your painted image You can also simply turn your stylus over on its end and use the large eraser at the opposite end of the stylus tip although I find this a bit cumbersome You can also just paint with white using any brush that adds color to the canvas Deleting Selected Regions of Your Canvas You can use a Selection tool e g lasso or rectangular oval selection tool to select a region of canvas If you want a soft edge to your deletion choose Select gt Feather and feather the selection by 10 pixels or so Then select Delete Backspace to delete to the Paper Color Clearing Your Whole Canvas E Select Cmd Ctrl A equivalent of choosing Select gt All You ll see dancing ants around the perimeter of your canvas unless the perimeter is beyond the limits of the screen z Click the Delete Backspace key on the keyboard Your canvas clears to the paper color white by default unless you have created any Watercolor or Liquid Ink la
21. asily recognize which one it is Adding Brush Variants to Your Custom Palette Besides using the Add Command function to add further buttons to your Shortcuts custom palette such as adding the File gt Clone command which is very useful for photography you can drag icons from any of the libraries Brushes Gradations Papers Patterns Scripts etc into your custom palette This is very useful if you find yourself using the same few brush variants for a particular project Moving Buttons and Icons within Your Custom Palette By default icons and buttons line up horizontally in the custom palette If you want a vertical arrangement of icons and buttons in the custom palette or wish to move the buttons around and change their order hold down the Shift key and click and drag on the icons and buttons Hiding and Showing Custom Palettes To hide a custom palette click on the palette close button top left on Macintosh top right in Windows To show a custom palette choose Window gt Custom Palette gt palette name Deleting Custom Palettes You can use the Custom Palette Organizer to delete extra custom palettes that you no longer want or that you create accidentally easily done when dragging brush icons onto your desktop To delete icons or buttons choose Window gt Custom Palettes gt Organizer Select the name of the custom palette you wish to delete in the custom palette Organizer Click the Delete button in the Organizer
22. e Brush Selector is where you choose the specific brush you wish to use It comprises a Category pop up menu on the left and immediately to the right of the Category pop up the Variant pop up menu Figure 1 22 Always select Category first and Variant second since each brush category grouping type or family of brushes with similar behaviors contains a separate set of brush variants individual brushes You can think of brush cat egories like drawers in an art cabinet with each drawer containing a different collection of related art tools oil paint brushes crayons pens pencils etc When you first open either the Category pop up menu or the Variant pop up menu you will see just the first five items listed and a scroll bar on the right of the menu I recommend you drag the bottom right corner of the menu down as far as it will go to show the complete list The consistent hierarchy of brushes in Painter is Library gt Category gt Variant Understanding this hierarchy is vital to using Painter There is a Brushes pop up menu Figure 1 23 accessible by holding the cursor down on the tri angle in the top right of the Brush Selector window This menu allows you to choose commands for saving custom variants when you create a new brush you like and for returning the current variant to its default settings GETTING STARTED lt m Li 28 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK First choose
23. e disturbed by reflected light from a window Adjust your envi ronment so you feel good about it You want to avoid distractions once you sit down to create art on the computer Before sitting down at your computer do some simple stretching and relaxation exercises These could be as simple as some deep breaths accompanied by slowly raising and lowering your arms gently rotating your head and softly rolling your shoulders You may find it pleasant to put on some relaxing music to accompany this movement When you ve completed some stretching and relax ation exercises finish by shaking out your feet and hands Stand upright with your arms relaxed at your side Observe your posture Breathe deep into your diaphragm hold your head upright and keep your shoulders down Now sit at your computer I recommend getting up and stretching and drinking some water at least every hour prefer ably every 20 minutes Since time flies by when you re absorbed in a project you may find it useful to set a small kitchen timer as your stretch time reminder Creating should be fun Make it easy and comfortable for yourself Observe your posture now that you are sitting Maintain a relaxed upright posture with your head held high not slouched forward and shoulders down not hunched up Sit comfortably facing the screen Make sure your eyes are in line roughly with the center of your screen If you find you are straining your neck by being forced to look up or dow
24. ence of folders with brush category names each accompanied by a JPEG file of the same name for instance Artists and Artists jpg These JPEG files are 30 x 30 pixel icons that represent each brush category in the Brush Selector Bar within Painter The brush category folders contain the individual brush variants Open one of the brush category folders and observe the mixture of xml and other files which contain the brush data for each individual Painter IX brush variant Seeing this will give you a good understanding of the Painter brush hierarchy Library gt Category gt Variant Double check that both the Jeremy Faves 2 0 folder and JPEG have been added to the Painter Brushes folder If they are not in that folder you will not be able to access the Jeremy Faves 2 0 brushes Note that since there is a space at the front of the file name the Jeremy Faves 2 0 brush category is located at the top of the list of categories Load Jeremy Faves 2 0 Brush Category Windows ka Open My Computer Bi Locate the Companion Resource CD typically on the D Drive but this may vary from com puter to computer Ey Open the Goodies Win folder 4 Select the JeremyFaves2 folder and JeremyFaves2 jpg JPEG 5 Right click on the two highlighted items and drag to Copy to Folder or choose Edit gt Copy to Folder 6 In the Copy Items window locate Local Disk C gt Program Files gt Corel gt Corel Painter IX gt Brushes
25. es gt Show Patterns When you first use the Cloners you ll often see a mysterious grey pattern appear on your canvas which happens to be the colors in the default current pattern Changing the pattern in the Pattern Selector will change what the cloning brushes paint if the pattern is the current clone source The current clone source can be identified by choosing File gt Clone Source and seeing what has a checkmark by it Figure 1 35 Starting with a Photograph If you start with a photograph open in Painter and then choose either File gt Clone and File gt Quick Clone a duplicate image is generated clone copy and the original photograph is auto matically made the clone source The Quick Clone function may also delete the clone copy image and turn on Tracing Paper All this is explained in Chapters 4 and 5 GETTING STARTED lt m L GETTING STARTED lt m 0 Li 42 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK EE ee canai Loyer Select Shapes Efer Movie Window Heip a hey EN i r pin Ko Puce 5 imn p Chote nw lt ai re CHEN mea i rkl hae ki or oma l tterative Save THS Gat inii Acquire Eapori Page Seti DEF Print MF how fee 00 elie TH how i feed draf 2004 05 17 How Feil OS fait 2004 05 17 How Feri iF BH hw Pel Feat Figure 1 36 The Watercolor brushes generate a special FETS
26. et at all times This gives you maximum comfort and much greater control If you hold the pen with your hand floating in the air which is a natural tendency for many it is difficult to control and you ll find yourself accidentally clicking when you don t intend to Using the Wacom Grip Pen The Grip Pen position determines precisely and uniquely where the cursor appears on the screen The Grip Pen is not relational like a mouse There is absolute and unique correspondence between every point on the tablet surface and every point on the screen A Grip Pen does all the functions of a mouse and more A light tap is a click Two light taps is a double click Click and drag is a depression of the pen at one position maintaining the pressure while sliding the pen to another position and then lifting the pen tip away from the surface of the tablet From now on put your mouse or trackball to one side and use the Grip Pen for all operations on the computer both within Painter as well as outside Painter You ll find once you get used to it you won t ever want to use a mouse again The Grip Pen is supplied with three replacement standard white nibs a grey spring loaded Stroke nib which gives a dampened feel to the pen and is designed to feel more like a brush and a black Felt nib which gives the feel of more resistance as you paint and is designed to feel more like a marker pen I personally like using the Stroke nib Figure 1 2 Holding the Wacom
27. from the default clone source the currently selected pattern in the Patterns library Some brushes Water color and Liquid Ink paint into special layers and when you try painting with other brushes after using either of those you get a warning telling you that only Watercolor Liquid Ink brushes can be used on Watercolor Liquid Ink layers These are all examples of brushes that may make you scratch your head What follows are the few extra steps you need to follow to realize the full potential of these scratch your head brushes Image Hose Cloners Watercolor Liquid Ink and Impasto Image Hose Painting with Sequences of Image Elements The Image Hose Brush Category is represented by the icon showing a garden hose nozzle with green clover leaves spewing out of the end When you paint with it you will see a succession of images being painted onto the canvas Nozzle Selector The set of images that are being painted are known as a Nozzle The Nozzle selector is located in the lower right corner of the Toolbox Figure 1 33 Image Hose Variants The variants for this brush category are unlike all others Figure 1 34 they do not indicate differ ent brush variants but simply different ways that the nozzle elements are distributed as they leave the Image Hose For instance in the Spray Size P Angle D variant Spray Size P means the size of the elements and their proximity to each other as they are sprayed out is determi
28. gt Painter Brushes Copy both items into that location Figure 1 11 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 19 a If you are on Windows 2000 you will also need to uncheck the Read Only property of all the files you ve copied The following steps are just for Windows 2000 users Locate the two copied items EI Select each item JeremyFaves2 folder and JeremyFaves2 jpg file 9 Right click and choose Properties File gt Properties 10 Uncheck the Read Only box 411 Click Apply 412 Choose the option Apply to this folder subfolders and files SE Click OK GETTING STARTED lt m L What to Do with Your Old Jeremy Faves Brush Category If you already have the earlier version of my custom brush category Jeremy Faves loaded onto your computer in Painter 8 from the Painter 8 Creativity Digital Artist s Handbook suggest you do not copy it over to Painter IX but instead use the new Jeremy Faves 2 0 cate gory that comes with this handbook If you ve already copied it over you may wish to remove it to keep your brush library efficient you don t want to have too many categories because the category list becomes too long have kept key brushes from my earlier Jeremy Faves and added some wonderful new ones so Jeremy Faves 2 0 is an even bigger and better collection of brushes Make a Backup Copy of Your Brushes Folder At this stage make a backup copy of your Brushes folder
29. hat artist used After creating a custom color set choose Save Color set give it a suitable name and save it in the Color Sets folder or any other location in the Corel Painter IX application folder Sampling from an Image The Dropper tool can be used to sample color from any active image in Painter When you have the brush tool selected and do NOT have the clone color button checked in the Color palette then the Option Alt key turns your cursor into the Dropper tool Resetting the Clone Source Point If you use the key shortcut Option Alt when painting with the clone color button checked you will reset the clone source point to wherever you click in the image your cursor will become GETTING STARTED Z 2 lt m Z L 38 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK a crosshair when you press the key followed by a green dot and the number 1 when you click in the image Removing Paint When you re painting I encourage you to avoid the temptation of erasing deleting and undoing brushstrokes to get things perfect Although the computer offers many convenient ways to edit and remove paint your paintings will take on greater depth richness and interest if you build up your brushstrokes even when you re not happy with them rather than deleting them Be committed to your marks Let every mark contribute to the fabric of your painting Having said that here s a brief synopsis of what options
30. he sharpness of the type is not crucial Both Photoshop and Painter have versatile text tools that allow you to experiment with different GETTING STARTED fonts orientation positioning alignment and spacing In Painter by converting to resolution independent vector based Shapes you can also skew and distort lettering individually or as a group The special properties of Painter s Text and Shape layers are only preserved in the RIFF file format If you convert the file to Photoshop format so that it can be opened in Photoshop the Painter Text and Shape layers are converted to regular bitmap image layers Likewise Photoshop Text layers are con verted to regular bitmap image layers when opened up in Painter Thus while you need editability of lt m Z me your text layers you should stay in the program in which you created the text and keep the file format appropriate RIFF format for Painter Text Photoshop format for Photoshop Text By converting your Painter Text or Shape layers to default image layers in Painter you can apply all of Painter s brushes and effects including instant drop shadows Effects gt Objects gt Create Drop Shadow If you want to wrap text accurately around a circle or a path then you should create the text in a vector based program like Adobe Illustrator CorelDRAW or Macromedia Freehand If you wish to add effects to the text or integrate the text into a bitmap pixel image in Painter
31. highlighted by a bold black border in the Tools palette When you first open Painter the Main Color square is always active Although these color squares closely resemble the Foreground and Background color of Photo shop they have quite different functions in Painter Most brushes apply only the Main Color The Addi tional Color has several uses such as specifying a two color gradient the Two Point gradient in the Gradients palette the pressure sensitive colors seen in the F X gt Gradient Flat Brush and provid ing a tint color for Image Hose nozzles when the Grain slider in the Property Bar is moved to the left I recommend that you always have the Main Color active and use the exchange arrows to toggle between the Main and Additional colors when you need to Choosing Paper Color Do not confuse the Additional Color with background or Paper Color The Additional and Main Color squares in Painter look deceptively similar to the Background and Foreground color rec tangles in Adobe Photoshop The Paper Color in Painter is determined in the New File dialog box or by choosing Canvas gt Set Paper Color at which point the Paper Color becomes the current Main Color for the current active image if you then open another image the Paper Color will return to the default white The Eraser family of brushes and the Select All gt Delete commands erase to the current Paper Color When you enlarge a canvas by choosing Canvas GETTING ST
32. in the Preferences to make things more comfortable and convenient Opening a New Canvas Ee Open Painter pJ Select from the top menu bar File gt New Cmd Ctrl N EJ In the New Picture window set the canvas size to 700 pixels wide by 750 pixels high Leave the resolution at 72 pixels per inch the paper color white and the picture type as Image EJ Click OK Mount and Reposition Your Canvas Ea Mount your canvas by selecting the keyboard shortcut Cmd Ctrl M This is equivalent to going to the top menu Window gt Screen Mode Toggle You now see your canvas appear ing against an inert gray background that you can click on and drag over without acci dentally going back to the Finder Mac users It is also visually simpler than having the canvas border frame around the canvas Always work in screen mode unless there s a specific reason not to Move the cursor over the canvas Hold down the spacebar on your keyboard or you can use the lower function button on the Wacom Intuos3 tablet which is set by default to be the space bar The cursor changes into a hand the same Grabber Hand as in the Tools palette Click and drag the canvas still holding the spacebar down and move the canvas so it fits snugly in the top left corner PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 21 Set Up Painter Preferences In this section you will be introduced to each of the Preferences in Painter Some you may not need to adjust but it is sti
33. ist in Photoshop When either program comes across a layer blending mode composite method it doesn t recognize it just substitutes the Normal Photoshop mode or Default Painter method When using Layer Composite Methods in Painter save your file in RIFF file format RIFF is the native file format for Painter RIFF files preserve the most data but cannot be opened in Photoshop Before being able to open a RIFF file in Photoshop you will need to resave the image in Photoshop or TIFF file format If you are using Gel or Magic Combine composite methods it is best to flatten your image in Painter before resaving to preserve the effect of the composite methods on the colors in your image Note that besides some Layer Composite Methods there are other special layers and modes in Painter Watercolor Liquid Ink Impasto Digital Watercolor and Mosaic that lose their special prop erties and editability when you convert from a RIFF format file to a Photoshop format file the full editability of these special Painter layers and modes is preserved only in the RIFF format PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 7 el Generally vector programs such as Adobe Illustrator CorelDRAW or Macromedia Freehand are Type and Design great for sharp editable scalable resolution independent type for setting type on a curve and for keeping file sizes small Use type in Photoshop or Painter only when you wish to apply a special effect to it or t
34. keep pressure applied to your Grip Pen so that it remains in contact with the tablet active surface and drag the stylus across the tablet Observe the icon being dragged across the desktop Eg Double click on the icon so that it opens into a window or an application depending what the icon is IE Close the window 6 Drag the icon back to its original position Move the cursor to each corner and along the edges of the screen keeping the stylus tip about 1 4 inch above the tablet surface at all times It is important to be able to move the cursor around without accidentally clicking or dragging Get a feel for the physical rela tionship between the boundaries of the screen and the boundaries of the tablet Create a Painter Alias Mac OS X RH Locate the Painter IX folder in your computer B Open the Painter IX folder and locate the Painter IX application icon EJ Click and drag the Painter IX application icon into the Dock usually located at the bottom of the screen You will see a Painter alias appear in the Dock 4 A single click on the Painter icon in the Dock opens Painter Si like to set up the Dock with small icons on the right of my screen You can do this through the Apple gt Dock gt Dock Preferences Create a Painter Alias Windows Ea Locate the Painter IX folder in your computer 2 Open the Painter IX folder and locate the Painter IX application icon EI Right Click on the Painter IX application icon and selec
35. les Have the preview set to show the solid black or black and gray circle The twelve small brush dab profile icons located on the upper right of the Size preview show the way pigment will be distributed across the width of the stroke Key Shortcuts You can use the key command combination Cmd Option Shift Ctrl Alt Shift and click and drag on the canvas to change size rapidly over a large range For a small incremental increase or decrease in the brush size you can use the bracket keys the key for decrease the key for increase Picking Color Painter has four Color Palettes Colors Mixer Color Sets and Color Info You can adjust and select color from any of these four palettes plus you can sample color from an existing image using the Dropper tool These different ways except the Color Info palette to pick color are reviewed here Color Palette Standard Colors The Color palette has two ways of displaying color The default display is the Standard Colors color picker with an outer Hue Ring based on a representation of the color spectrum known traditionally as the color wheel and a Saturation Value Triangle in the center The other color picker Small Colors combines a single horizontal hue bar with a Saturation Value Triangle You choose between the Stan dard Colors and the Small Colors in the Color palette pop up menu small solid black triangle in the top right of the Colors palette I recommend sticking with
36. les from RGB to CMYK Be aware that many options and filters are not available in Photoshop when working in CMYK so leave CMYK conversion to the end of your workflow always saving a backup RGB version of your file before changing color modes PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 9 S Video When working on a QuickTime movie for video I generally start my projects in Painter at the required final video resolution typically 720 pixels x 480 pixels at 72 ppi This keeps everything simple and straightforward and allows me to use the resulting QuickTime movie directly without any need for resizing You can generate a frame stack from the replay of a script and subsequently generate a QuickTime movie or AVI movie or numbered files from the frame stack This is explained in Chapter 10 You can also open numbered files or a QuickTime movie in Painter where it appears as a frame stack You can then paint on and apply effects to individual frames or across the whole movie Once your frame stack is exported as a QuickTime movie you can then open that movie in any animation or special effects program such as Adobe Premiere and After Effects and Apple Final Cut Pro 1 4 First Things First Get Comfortable It s important to feel good about your environment Take a look around Is the surface on which the computer monitor and keyboard are situated clear of clutter Is the computer screen in a position and orientation where you won t b
37. ling Your Brush Size Some brushstrokes vary in width according to the pressure you apply with your stylus If you want more variation of brush thickness than that provided by pressure control then you need to adjust the Brush Size You can do this by a number of different means Selecting Size in the Property Bar Click on the right side of the size box in the Property Bar to reveal the pop up size slider The Size Preview and Slider in the Size Palette EF Choose Window gt Brush Controls gt Show Size if it is not already showing on your desktop The preview window on the upper left indicates brush diameter Figure 1 28 The outside of the solid black circle is the brush diameter Some brushes such as the Artists gt Impres sionist variant have a variation of diameter built in Min Size slider less than 100 in which case you will see an inner solid black circle indicating the minimum diameter and an outer gray ring indicating the maximum diameter GETTING STARTED lt m 5 Li 34 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Size Palette Size Palette showing diameter preview showing brush shape for Artists gt Impressionist preview for Artists gt variant Impressionist variant If you click on the Brush Dab Preview Window in the Size section you see a depiction of how the pigment is distributed Figure 1 29 Click again and it returns to the original solid circ
38. ll useful to be aware of the default settings and how to access them General Preferences ig Choose Cmd Ctrl K Corel Painter IX Edit on Windows gt Preferences gt General GETTING STARTED Py In the General Preferences window adjust the cursor angle If you are right handed you may prefer your cursor to point toward the upper left Figure 1 12 If you are left handed you may prefer it pointing to the upper right E You may wish to uncheck the Enable Brush Ghosting checkbox By default this option is checked which results in a preview of the brush shape and size visible on the canvas when lt O 0 L you re about to paint which disappears when you actually paint The advantage of brush ghosting is that you know immediately when you place your cursor on your canvas how big your brush size is and the shape of the brush The disadvantage is that with very small brushes it is difficult to see where your cursor is and with large brushes it is difficult to know exactly the point at which your brushstroke will start Try it with and without the brush ghost and decide for yourself personally prefer to have the brush ghosting disabled A Under Quick Clone uncheck Switch to Cloner Brushes 5 Check Draw zoomed out views using area averaging 6 Click OK to return to your canvas ami rg Carian Uibreres Cursor ype Dish E FENN Selections Faia inan ee apa Palmas Aa Ohne g e Aiesa O e E
39. lly easily in either program Digital photo image capture soft ware packages such as iPhoto ACDSee and iView Media Pro also offer browsing rotating and cropping capability Basic Image Editing Photoshop is great for almost any kind of image editing need such as enhancing your source image and adjusting levels hue saturation contrast and brightness Photoshop offers the optimum control and flexibility for image adjustments using Adjustment Layers When using Photoshop s Adjustment Layers I recommend saving a Photoshop file format master document with the Adjustment Layers and then flattening the layers and resaving a flat version of the file in TIFF format for opening in Painter The reason for making a flattened version of the file is that Painter does not recognize the Photoshop Adjustment Layer properties If you are already working on an image in Painter and want to make tonal or color adjustments then you could use Painter s built in tools under Effects gt Tonal Control though these are not as editable or as powerful as those offered through Photoshop s Adjust ment Layers GETTING STARTED Z e lt m Z L 6 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Hand Painted Artistic Effects Corel Painter IX is the tool to use when you want an organic artistic painterly hand painted look and feel to your image This applies equally whether you are creating a painting from scratch or trans for
40. md Ctrl M if your canvas is mounted Dropping the Impasto Layer If you wish to drop the impasto depth layer onto the background canvas either so you can paint over it in Painter or so you can preserve the impasto depth effect when you open the image up in Photo shop then choose Save As and save the file as a TIFF file Close the TIFF file and then reopen it This will automatically flatten the impasto depth layer Erasing a Portion of the Impasto Layer There are two erasers within the Impasto brush category the Depth Color Eraser which erases every thing including the depth effect and any color on the canvas and the Depth Eraser which seems to leave a subtle indentation If you wish to erase just a portion of the impasto depth I suggest you save two versions of your file one with impasto on and one with impasto off clone one set the other as clone source File gt Clone Source and then use the Cloners gt Soft Cloner to clone from one into the other 1 8 Foundation Projects The How Feel Painting Project Ea Choose Cmd Ctrl N al Open a new canvas 700 pixels wide by 700 pixels high EI Choose Cmd Ctrl M to mount the canvas in screen mode 4 Play with the brushes on the canvas Create an image that expresses how you feel It can be abstract Don t undo or erase just keep building up brushstrokes on top of one another Use this painting as a way to explore the multitude of wonderful brush variants contained in all
41. ming a photographic image While Photoshop has an extensive set of brushes and numerous won derful built in and third party filters and effects there is no substitute for the versatility variety and richness of Painter s brushes and textures You can also start with effects and brushes in Photoshop and then rework your image in Painter finally bringing it back to Photoshop for final refinement and color adjustment Selections and Layers Both Painter and Photoshop have comparable and largely compatible facilities for making and saving selections including compatible Channels and Alpha Channels and for controlling adjusting and organizing layers The Photoshop Lasso tool has the added flexibility of having a feather setting in the Tool Prop erty Bar and a point to point feature when the Option Alt modifier key is held down This makes precise selections easier and faster to do in Photoshop than in Painter where for the most precise selections you would use the Bezier Pen tool to create a Shape and then convert that Shape to a Selection Layer Masks are compatible between the two programs providing you save your files as Photo shop format files Although Photoshop Layer Blending Modes are similar to Painter Layer Com posite Methods there are Photoshop Layer Blending Modes such as Color Burn and Vivid Light that don t exist in Painter and there are Painter Layer Composite Methods such as Gel and Magic Combine that don t ex
42. n then adjust your seat and or monitor height until you are comfortable GETTING STARTED lt m L GETTING STARTED Z e lt m Z L 10 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Make the Tablet Your Friend Harmony Between Human and Computer The graphics tablet is the key to unlocking the computer as an art tool The graphics tablet is an input device that replaces the mouse or trackball though you can still use other input devices if you wish The graphics tablet has an active surface which corresponds to the computer screen You apply a special pen also known as a stylus to this active surface and thus control the cursor on your screen The tablet will become your friend an extension of yourself The company that supplies almost all tablets is Wacom pronounced wah kum Wa is from the Japanese word for harmony and com is short for computer Thus Wacom means harmony between human and computer This is a very apt name since that s exactly what we need as artists harmony between our tools and ourselves The tablet I personally use and highly recommend for most of my art is the Wacom Intuos3 6x8 A5 Figure 1 1 I also enjoy using the Wacom Cintiq 18SX tablet particularly for my live portrait sessions The Cintiq combines an LCD display with the tablet so you actually paint directly on your screen It is very intuitive and can be easily rotated and positio
43. nd Palettes The palettes that are initially displayed by default when you first open Painter are the Color palettes Colors Mixer Color Sets and Color Info and the Layers and Channels palettes There are many other palettes available through the Window menu Figure 1 20 Palettes are listed under the Window menu with either Hide or Show preceding the palette name depending on whether they are already visible on your desktop Under the Window menu some palettes have been grouped together by type Brush Controls Color Palettes Library Palettes All of these elements can be moved around rearranged or hidden Thus you have complete flex ibility in controlling your Painter IX environment My intention here is to give you a quick overview of what s where rather than go into detail and describe every palette and menu item in detail For a more detailed description of the Painter desktop elements please refer to the Painter IX User Manual and Getting Started Guide Toolbox The Toolbox lets you access the Painter IX tools plus a variety of art materials such as the papers patterns gradients nozzles weaves and brush looks Figure 1 21 Note that a small triangle in the Corel Painter File Edt Canvas Layers Select Shapes Effects Movie EO Heip A rg Fafa amp Gm i maagi 10N Gaa ee Hide Pale ied dgrange Palettes Zoom in Zoom Gut Zoom Tofa Hide Toctiean Hide Property Har Hide Brash belecha Bar
44. ned by stylus pressure Angle D means the direction of the Nozzle image elements follows the direction of your brushstroke Select different nozzles and try them out Choose different variant options and see their effect Try light pressure as well as heavy pressure Try short dabs as well as long strokes GETTING STARTED lt O L GETTING STARTED 0 lt m L 40 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK ll i varsan Ane Lireorsin r arge foray Sere P Angew fovay Sirw 8 p hporay ie Angi O Spray Soe EMERE The Image Hose variant list Figure 1 33 The Nozzle selector Picking up the Additional Color in the Image Hose EJ Choose a bright color in the Color Picker Click on the exchange arrows to make that bright color go to the Additional Color rec tangle B Move the Grain slider to the left in the Property Bar w Make a brushstroke and note how the nozzle color changes when you paint Creating Your Own Image Hose Nozzles K Paste your nozzle contents as layers in a file Ez Select all the layers in the Layers palette by clicking on each one with the Shift key held down or choosing Select All in the Layers pop up menu EJ Select Cmd Ctrl G to group the layers 4 Select Make Nozzle from Group from the Nozzles pop up menu located in the top right of the Nozzles selector in the Tools palette
45. ned for comfort When painting live subjects I like the fact that the Cintiq avoids having a vertical computer display screen between my model and I I share here some tips for using the Intuos3 and setting up the Wacom tablet Control Panel for optimum ease of use in Painter The new series of Wacom Intuos3 tablets come with an excellent User s Manual in PDF format Take some time to review the manual so that you are aware of the content Wacom has kindly permitted me to reproduce some of the illustrations from their Intuos3 User s Manual in this book The Intuos3 Control Panel screen shots were taken on a Windows PC Customizable Tablet Keys Touch Strip controls Note 4x5 A6 tablet Tablet work surlace Figure 1 1 The Wacom Intuos3 6x8 A5 tablet PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 11 Relaxed Grip Place your tablet centrally in front of you between you and the screen I find it most comfortable with the tablet resting on my lap and sometimes with the upper section of the tablet resting on the edge of the desk Rest the side of your favored hand on the tablet active surface The standard Wacom pen that comes with the Intuos3 tablet is known as a Grip Pen Lightly hold the Grip Pen with a relaxed grip close to the tip and slightly more upright than you would a normal pen or pencil Your hand and arm should feel totally relaxed There should be no strain Figure 1 2 Keep the side of your hand in contact with the tabl
46. not just how to use Painter but how to use it smartly In Chapter 2 Foundation II Creative Empowerment you ll learn about the three guiding principles of making the most of Painter Simplify Organize and Optimize These principles will help you be more creative more productive and more efficient GETTING STARTED lt O 0 L
47. r You will see a folder Jeremy Faves 2 0 and a JPEG file Jeremy Faves 2 0 jpg Keep this window open and drag it to the right of your screen zy Choose Go gt Applications 5 Open the Corel Painter IX application folder 6 Open the Brushes folder within the Corel Painter IX application folder You will see a Painter Brushes folder within the Brushes folder Figure 1 9 Place this window showing the Painter Brushes folder on the left of your screen 8 Drag the Jeremy Faves 2 0 folder and the Jeremy Faves 2 0 jpg file into the Painter Brushes folder You have now successfully added the Jeremy Faves 2 0 brush category to your Painter Brushes library Figure 1 10 GETTING STARTED Z 2 lt m Z L 18 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK p Li Tor Puanler 5 E an a win Er T C Sruahei Li Paimar Brushes E Acrylics Acryeciing OD Ari Po Attrib jog Lo Arena Artiste ing O Arthi oi Baka the phth mbai ena eed Tea eiea Peep ft D anir Oijen ia Li Beaders E Bendert jog The Painter Brushes folder after the Jeremy Faves 2 0 brush a mp sr ih pa gs category has been added memre as Cana LE Copying Jeremy Faves 2 0 brush category folder and icon to the Painter Brushes directory The Painter Brushes folder the default brush library in Painter contains all the brush cate gories If you open the Painter Brushes folder you ll see a long sequ
48. r Foundation Tools Corel Painter IX your digital art studio is an essential part of your digital imaging toolkit and is a perfect complement to Adobe Photoshop CS your digital darkroom These two foundation tools Painter and Photoshop are primarily bitmap programs that is they deal primarily in imagery com GETTING STARTED posed of pixels though there are resolution independent text and vector shapes in Painter Besides these two great tools you may also find it useful to have a good graphics drawing program with pow erful vector based drawing and text capabilities such as Adobe Illustrator CorelDRAW or Macro media Freehand I have outlined here the main digital workflow tasks you might come across as you work on a digital image and shared my opinions as to which tools are best suited to each task There is some overlap in functionality between all of the programs mentioned and consequently there are lt O 0 L many alternative ways to accomplish the same task There are no hard and fast rules here and you will find many different approaches to workflow Do what works best for you and what you re most comfortable with Photographic Capture Cropping and Orientation For browsing scanning rotating adjusting perspective and cropping photographs Photoshop is often the best tool though Corel Painter IX has introduced entire canvas rotation so if it s just rota tion you need you can do that equa
49. s To access other color sets choose Open Color Set from the pop up menu Then locate the Color Sets folder in the Corel lt O eo Li Painter IX application folder and select a color set from those listed within the folder Note that the default color set is called Painter Colors and is located in the Corel Painter IX application folder outside of the Colors Sets folder The JeremyXtraColorSets folder can be copied over from the Painter Cre ativity Companion CD into the Corel Painter IX application folder and its contents will then be acces sible through the Open Color Set command If you choose New Empty Color Set from the Color Sets pop up menu you can pick your own colors from the Colors palette or from an image and save them one at a time into your new custom color set you would simply click on the Add Color to Color Set button second from the right at the bottom of the Color Sets palette You can edit any color set adding or taking away colors at any time from within the Color Sets palette Adding colors to a color set as you work can be useful in build ing up a color set of your favorite colors over time One of the useful applications of creating your own color sets is when you wish to emulate the color palette of an artist You can open a scanned image of that artist s artwork and then select New Color Set from Image in the pop up menu You ll instantaneously generate a new color set based on the colors t
50. t Custom Palette gt Add Command 2 Choose Shortcuts or whatever you named your custom palette from the Add to menu in the Add Command window Figure 1 26 EG ii Cmi Lyen Select Shapes Effects Mimie Wisi Help J Nem EH Fi Chote ww l Silect command irom the manu har t Quick Chane Srey k abate rere Alitu hem EEE a eo a Be be n r Cat inko oe i Acquire Po Eaport ad Page betim irr Pini MP Ha j fee O belgeneed THF how i feri ra H 0 17 How Fen OSPF 2405 17 How i FerLRiF OSITOS hoyw eel Airiai n_n Figure 1 25 The Add Command window PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 31 yr Select a command from ihe evenu baer or rem a palette many Add haaa ite Menu Rar Figure 1 26 The Add to menu in the Add Command window GETTING STARTED E Choose File gt Quick Clone EJ Click OK Adding Other Menu Commands to Your Shortcuts Custom Palette Other menu commands you may find useful to add to your shortcuts custom palette besides Save As e lt m 0 L and Quick Clone are File gt Clone Window gt Screen Mode Toggle and Window gt Zoom To Fit You may eventually wish to create different custom palettes for different types of projects such as one specifically for working with photographs and another for working with layers including a Layers gt Drop All button Name each custom palette appropriately so that you can e
51. t Shortcut 4 Drag the Shortcut onto your desktop Add Painter to the Start Menu Windows ia If a Painter shortcut icon is on your desktop hold down the Alt key and then click and drag the Painter shortcut icon onto the Start button Painter can now be launched from the Start menu PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 17 a GETTING STARTED Gi Ciir gt uor wo el LTAT The Brushes folder containing the Painter oaecfamudainese Brushes library folder F If the Painter icon is not on your desktop click Start gt Run and type Explorer e lt O 0 L fice Open the Program Files folder and then open the main Corel Painter IX folder 4 Hold down the Alt key and then click and drag the Painter application icon exe file over the Start button This creates a Painter shortcut icon and places it in the Start menu Painter can now be launched from the Start menu Load Jeremy Faves 2 0 Brush Category Macintosh On the Companion Resource CD that comes with this handbook you will find the Jeremy Faves 2 0 brush category which contains many great brush variants some from older versions of Painter and some unique custom brushes made by myself or generously shared by others These brushes will enrich your experience in Painter o Put the Companion Resource CD that comes with this handbook in your computer Bi Double click on the CD icon ES Locate and open the Goodies Mac folde
52. the Standard Colors color picker which is the one that will be shown throughout this handbook Figure 1 30 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 35 F Hue Ring Saturation Value Triangle Additional Color gt Main Color The Color Palette showing the Standard Colors color picker y Clone Color GETTING STARTED To choose a color in the Standard Colors color picker you have to adjust both the small circular cursor in the outer Hue Ring and the one in the central Saturation Value Triangle To select either white or black in the Color Picker take the Saturation Value Triangle cursor to the upper left corner for white or to the lower left corner for black The hue is not relevant when selecting white or black Z lt m Z L It is easy to leave the Saturation Value Triangle cursor in one of the corners black lower left or white upper left and wonder why you are not getting the color indicated by the cursor position in the hue ring You will find a more in depth discussion of color in Chapter 9 Main and Additional Colors Notice the two overlapping squares of color in the lower left corner of the Colors section and also in the Tools palette These are the Main and Additional colors The Main Color is indicated by the fore most of the two overlapping squares Behind the Main Color square is the Additional Color square You make the square active by clicking on it The active square is
53. the button can be pro grammed to choose a separate function a Click on the upper button function pop up menu located in the upper right of the Pens tab window You will see a pop up menu with a list of optional functions that you can set that button function to be Figure 1 6 B Select the function you desire for the back of the button that is the end of the button furthest from the stylus tip This is a matter of personal choice and convenience Some Windows users like to set this function to be Right Click or Alt Personally I like simplicity and I set both button functions on my stylus to be Disabled B Repeat this for the lower button function pop up menu which controls the function of the front of the button the end that is nearest the stylus tip Customizing the Tablet Keys a Click on the Functions icon in the Tools menu at the top of the Wacom Tablet Control Panel Pal Click on the Tablet Keys tab EI Go through the pull down menus and decide what you wish to set each Key to be Figure 1 7 Customizing the Touch Strip Ee Click on the Touch Strip tab Bi Set your Touch Strip function and speed Figure 1 8 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 15 Q W Gc 7a i k W z 2 lt sell a The Tablet Keys customization window a z LL Larne dina a Touch Strip choose a FUNCTION to perionm Vienne Tah Sirip is in use Choose DisastED if you would like
54. the different brush categories Explore the effect of different pressure speeds and directions Spend 30 minutes on this project PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 45 The Visual Glossary Project Optional This project is the creation of your own visual glossary of brushes The goal is to create a series of paintings that capture the look and feel of the brushes from each category like the ones shown earlier in this chapter The experience of making your own visual glossary will familiarize you with the brushes You could choose a theme and make each painting a variation on that theme 1 Choose Cmd Ctrl N a Open a new canvas 500 pixels wide by 500 pixels high EI Choose Cmd Ctrl M to mount the canvas in screen mode 4 Paint with all the variants from the Acrylics brush category 5 When you have filled your canvas with paint select File gt Save As and save the file as acrylicspainting rif into your Painter Projects Chpt01 folder 6 Repeat steps 1 through 5 for all the brush categories Note some categories such as Blenders will require painting over an existing image You can use another category of painting for this purpose 1 9 Wrap Congratulations on mastering the Painter basics You are now familiar with the Painter desktop and know how to select control and apply brushes If you run into any problems refer to Appendix II Troubleshooting You are ready to move onto the next step which is
55. ther and better controlled than before If needed you can return to the Brush Tracking Preferences and repeat the process PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 23 frith Tisthing Chae Me Wey Sat Balun S eo ale Dharituti Applicanes Menun TI ireng Falster Cob tar Diah ii foam Gee foam Ta ta how hiad Tomes how Catra Da a buah irae imio the bava arta mbing Prp Lal presses areal ependi Thin Tawhid Broth beleo php y iE ep Ch alag idara bakya in me cere ba p bres iro Zee bo GETTING STARTED ete ee ell Ft BB Wel Pee O O i i Ff F Cw 7 7 PPH at Cran oe Deiniha ie wees ot Berets Pewee oa Hll ee Cancel oy FETS Customize Keys Preferences indow FETS Brush Tracking Preferences Aa window e lt m L Customize Keys Preferences E Choose Cmd Ctrl K i Click on the Preferences pop up menu where you see the word General and select Cus tomize Keys You will see here a summary of all the main menu and submenu application commands those that you see along the top of your screen with all the default keyboard shortcuts Figure 1 14 You can click in the shortcuts column next to any menu item and type in your own shortcut This incredible facility is heaven for anyone who likes using key board shortcuts in their workflow If you find there is an operation you keep doing regu larly that doesn t have a shortcut
56. this is the place to go to create one The two Customize Keys shortcuts I recommend adjusting immediately for ease of use are the shortcuts for Tools gt Scissors and Other gt ColorTalk ColorTalk is a programming language that allows you to automate tasks The default for Scissors is Z which is easily accidentally chosen if you try to choose Cmd Ctrl Z undo and miss depressing the Cmd Ctrl key in time I recommend making the Scissor shortcut Shift Z The default shortcut for Other gt ColorTalk is N which is easily accidentally hit when you mean to hit the B key I recommend changing the ColorTalk short cut to Option Shift N AIt Shift N Shift N is already taken by ColorTalk Movie Undo Preferences i Click on the Preferences pop up menu and select Undo You will see that the default is set to the maximum of 32 Figure 1 15 suggest leaving this as is This means you can repeat Cmd Ctrl Z 32 times and sequentially undo your last 32 actions on the canvas brushstrokes commands effects GETTING STARTED lt m 0 L 24 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK indo 7 hams 7 Ja a a a Tie a PIFRE Allow Unde up to 32 Levski Gn Bree CHE With Current Colar worse i ee _ Bros ia Catrent Color Chutliree 2 Ae 32 beveli manimum a Chee HE Wath Current Color Selected Point 7 Sroka in Current Color AF iig hasian Alaga Brua pa Fath Tolerate DO
57. tional painting technique of applying thick paint to your canvas Figure 1 37 They can give you some fabulous effects but also cause much confusion and frustration Once you have painted with an Impasto brush the three dimensional embossing appears to remain in your image even when you try to paint over it with other non Impasto brushes It is as if the Impasto depth is recorded in Pr aati fl Pai E Lat a ey eb a F arrar Taian Era Tia is Fe r ra Fahne flee pie l oer bubble gum icon hes toggles impasto Secs depth on and off gelu 1l y7 Impasto brushes add the appearance of depth GETTING STARTED lt O 5 0 L GETTING STARTED Z 2 lt m Z L 44 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK a separate layer one that does not appear in the Layers palette You can control whether an Impasto brush actually generates the depth by choosing Window gt Brush Controls gt Show Impasto By chang ing the Draw to pop up menu from Color and Depth to Color you change the Impasto brush into one that doesn t add depth Whether you like the depth is a matter of taste Turning Off the Impasto Layer You can turn the impasto effect off and on by clicking on the small purple bubble gum star shaped icon that appears in the upper right of the image window frame You have to go out of screen mode to see this icon by choosing C
58. to delete the selected custom palette GETTING STARTED Z 2 lt m Z L 32 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Showing Brush Size I find it useful to see a graphical representation of my brush size as I paint and therefore recommend the following R Choose Window gt Brush Controls gt Show Size Foe Drag the Size palette up to the top of the Brush Controls group of palettes 3 Drag the bottom right corner of the Brush Controls upward until you can just see the Brush Size palette down to the Size slider Library Selectors and Palettes Painter has a variety of Libraries or collections that can be accessed through Selectors In the case of the brushes the brushes library is a collection of brush categories each of which is a grouping of individual Variants As we have seen to select a brush you use the Brush Selector Bar to choose first the Brush Category and then the Brush Variant The Paper Gradient Pattern Weave Look and Nozzle Selectors are all accessible at the bottom of the Toolbox as well as via the Window menu except for Look and Nozzle Selectors which are only accessible through the Toolbox The Scripts Selection Portfolio and Image Portfolio Library Selec tors are accessible through the Window menu The content of all libraries other than the brush library are edited and controlled via Movers typically listed at or near the bottom of the corre sponding palette pop up menu
59. to deactivate the Touch Strip Click to display the ADVANCED TOUCH STRIP SETTINGS dialog box Returns the tab and any where you can enable or disable special Touch Strip tunction advanced Touch Strip areas gives you additional settings to their factory details conditions sii The Touch Strip customization window You may find your stylus hand inadvertently activates the Touch Strip as you move around the tablet and in that case you may wish to set the Touch Strip function on that side to disabled Please note that there are other functionalities within the Wacom Intuos3 tablet that I haven t covered here such as the Pop Up Menu option See the Intuos3 User s Manual for further details Basic Stylus Tasks If you are new to using a tablet it is useful first to get used to some basic tasks If you are already comfortable using a Wacom tablet then skip this section an With your Finder Desktop visible on your screen click on one of the icons for instance the hard drive icon on the Macintosh or the My Computer icon on Windows so that it becomes highlighted Then click on the desktop background so that the icon is no longer highlighted GETTING STARTED Z 2 lt m Z L 16 PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK Py Repeat this and see how light a tap can cause a click You ll be amazed at how little pres sure you need to apply Remember to relax your grip EJ Click on the same icon and this time
60. triangle and palette name are visible GETTING STARTED Hiding and Showing Palettes To hide a palette you click on the close button on the right side of the palette title bar To access the palette pop up menu you click on the small solid black triangle on the far right of the palette title bar Figure 1 24 lt O eo Li Custom Palettes Custom Palettes are ideal for making convenient desktop shortcuts for frequently used commands and menu items They can also be used to create shortcut buttons for your favorite brushes Make a Save As Button A Save As button encourages you to save versions of your work regularly and avoids your acci dentally overwriting your files with File gt Save instead of File gt Save As The Save As command takes you to the Save As window in which you can enter the file name determine file format and choose where to save the file I recommend that you save your work in progress as a RIFF file the native format of Painter and your final image for printing as an RGB TIFF You will find a detailed discus sion regarding strategies for naming and saving your artwork in the next chapter For the remainder of this chapter I suggest you save any images you create as RIFF files in an appropriately named folder such as Painter Projects ChptO1 Click and drag here Click here to hide Click here for pop up menu Click here to open close EMERE Palette title bar
61. ved in the RIFF file format Deleting Watercolor Liquid Ink Layer Eu Click on the Watercolor Liquid Ink layer in the Layers palette If you have more than one layer you wish to delete hold down the Shift key as you select each layer fz Click on the trashcan icon in the lower right of the Layers palette PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 43 Dropping Watercolor Liquid Ink Layer ER Click on the Watercolor Liquid Ink layer in the Layers palette If you have more than one layer you wish to delete hold down the Shift key as you select each layer Click on the left hand icon in the lower left of the Layers palette and drag down to Drop This flattens your image placing what was in the Watercolor or Liquid Ink Layer onto the background canvas and allows you to paint over those marks with other brushes Digital Watercolor The Digital Watercolor brushes paint directly onto either the background canvas or a regular image layer They act as if they are in a separate layer and are not affected by the blending tools in other brush categories If you wish to paint over Digital Watercolor or blend it into the background choose Dry Digital Watercolor from the Layers palette pop up menu Impasto Adding the Illusion of Depth The Impasto category of brushes is a group of brushes that add three dimensional depth to their brushstrokes almost as if you are embossing the canvas as you paint They are designed to emulate the tradi
62. with the richest variety and versatility of brushes available anywhere as well as offering powerful special effects pattern making and anima tion capabilities and industry standard text layers channels and masking Painter is a valuable tool for fine art photography and all forms of image manipulation design illustration collage and video Whatever your application the key to Painter s magic is the ability it offers to apply brushstrokes by hand using a graphics tablet with pressure sensitive stylus as opposed to just applying uniform special effects though Painter has many great special effects that may be successfully incorporated into a final image Through the use of your hand you express your heart in your art The brushes are at the heart of Painter s uniqueness and strength Some brushes emulate traditional natural media such as chalks watercolors and oils while other brushes create unique effects that don t exist outside Painter in the traditional nondigital world There are so many brushes that come with Painter that they have been divided into 33 groups or types known as categories Within each brush category is a collection of individual brushes known as variants See the Visual Glossary at the front of this handbook to get an overview of the variety of brush looks available in each category PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 5 a 1 3 Which Tools to Use When Painter and Photoshop You
63. yers in which case you ll see those remaining you cleared only the background canvas Undoing Individual Brushstrokes To undo individual strokes use the Cmd Ctrl Z up to 32 levels of undo Fading a Brush Stroke or Effect It is also possible to partially undo a brushstroke or effect by selecting Edit gt Fade This is a particu larly useful feature for effects since the small preview windows in the effects dialog boxes often lead you to underestimate the influence of the effect when applied to the whole canvas PAINTER 9 CREATIVITY DIGITAL ARTIST S HANDBOOK 39 1 7 Brushes That May Make You Scratch Your Head Most brushes are straightforward to use and behave in logical predictable ways You just pick the brush and then paint with it directly on your canvas You ll typically see color painted onto the canvas or interaction with color already on the canvas or both You ll notice a myriad of subtle differences in behavior such as some brushes covering up other colors some mixing with other colors some showing paper textures some changing size with pressure and so on You don t need to know any thing special just try them and see what they do As you explore Painter s brushes you will inevitably run into some mysteries Some brushes don t seem to paint any color some Blenders and Distortion brushes for instance Some brushes paint with a color different from that chosen in the Colors palette color picker cloners take color

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