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No Clean-up Required Digital
Painting Creating digital paintings from photographs
can be very challenging, yet also very rewarding.
For many the task of transforming their digital images into digital
paintings has been done using either Photoshop’s selection of built-in filters
or some lesser known applications that automatically create the painting effect
for you. The problem with these
approaches is that, while the results are certainly acceptable, they all tend to
look the same since your options are very limited.
This isn’t to say that you can’t create beautiful digital paintings
with these applications, you can…but there is a better and easier way to do
it, with Corel Painter Essentials 3. Corel
Painter Essentials 3 has taken the core of its more powerful sibling, Painter
IX, and placed it in an interface that’s easy to navigate and very intuitive.
The interface is clean and uncluttered putting all of the tools you need
right there on the desktop. While
some sacrifices were made in order to deliver a consumer level version of
Painter IX, those sacrifices were well made, leaving the power of the program
intact while limiting the number and type of brushes available, etc.
Original Image Creating a Quick Clone Different
Routes – Same Destination Bring in your image as you would in any
other image editor (File-Open). Once
your image is opened in Painter Essentials 3 you have different directions in
which you can go to create your digital painting.
Which choice you make depends solely upon how comfortable you are with
digital “painting” and how much control you want over your finished image.
Choosing Underpainting Styles Cloned and Saturated Absolute novices can choose to have Painter Essentials 3 “auto-paint” their images for them. While this is the quickest route to a finished digital painting you can still “tweak” the results once the process has finished. Using the Restoration brushes, you can “brush” detail back into your “paintings”. There are two restoration brushes from which to choose, a soft edge cloner brush and a hard edge cloner brush. Both of these brushes will allow you to restore detail to the underlying image in your painting. The soft edge cloner brush restores smaller amounts of detail with each brush stroke while the hard edge cloner brush restores more detail with each brush stroke.
Brush Categories
Quick Clone Showing Tracing Paper Painting on Tracing Paper Painter Essentials 3 does not have a steep
learning curve so most users will get fairly comfortable with it pretty quickly.
Once you’ve gotten a feel for how the program works you can take the
next step and begin creating digital paintings using “Quick Clone” and
“Tracing Paper”. Simply put,
quick clone and tracing paper allow you to create your own “digital
painting” using your original image as a guide.
Open the image that you want to work with and from the menu, select
“Quick Clone”. This creates a
“clone” of your image over which you’ll create your painting.
Once your clone is created click on the “Clone Color” brush on the
color pallet (which is on the right side of the screen assuming you’ve left
all of your pallets in their default locations).
Then, using your “brush”, begin painting over your image.
As you paint, you’ll notice that each brush stroke automatically picks
up the color from the underlying image. Continue
painting until you’ve covered your entire image.
Anytime that you want to check your progress, simply press “ctrl+t”
(in Windows) to turn off the “tracing paper” revealing your painting
underneath. To return to painting,
just press “ctrl+t” again to bring back the “tracing paper”.
Once you’ve finished painting, you can use the “cloner” brushes
found under “restore” to bring back detail to your digital painting.
Checking Process in Watercolor - Tracing Paper Hidden Restoring Detail with Cloner Brushes While you can use a mouse with Painter
Essentials 3, you’ll get the most out of the application by using a tablet
such as those made by Wacom. Tablets
will give you a more natural “feeling” of painting or drawing than a mouse
ever will and prices for tablets continue to become more affordable.
In Process Check, Tracing Paper Removed - Oils In Process Check Restoring Details - Oils Powerful
Yet Simple Painter Essentials 3 isn’t a competitor of
your image editor and shouldn’t be viewed that way.
The two programs are vastly different and actually complement each other
very nicely and together create an incredibly powerful and effective creative
toolset for the digital artist. I’ve
only touched on the surface of the options and abilities of Corel Painter
Essentials 3 - there is so much more. Corel
Painter Essentials 3 is a great “natural media” painting application and
should you ever find that you’ve outgrown it, you’ll have the familiarity
and experience necessary to move up to it’s bigger brother, Painter IX.
Getting started is truly as simple as I’ve made it out to be.
When you’re ready you can take as much control as you want, and be as
creative as you want. The results
are not only amazingly beautiful, they’re also unique to you and you’re
style. Painter Essentials 3 is available for $99.
(Only $69. while current holiday specials are in effect.) For more information on Painter Essentials 3
visit Painter
Essentials 3 System Requirements:
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