upscaling of brushes

[tomt]

It's not the brush. You may have to adjust the paper. You can resize the paper texture, brightness and contrast. You do have some adjustments with the brush that will help. "Grain" is a biggy

[Jinbrown]

So I've become a big fan of the pastel - artist pastel chalk brush in painter ix.5 My problem is that when I work in higher resolutions, the brush loses its very bumpy texture and becomes grainy. For example, at 72 dpi it looks like I'm drawing on a beatuifully smooth 300lb coldpress piece of paper, but at 300 dpi it becomes very grainy. I've explored the brush creator options looking for a way to adjust this effect but have not been able to find one. So in summarization, with painter's default brushes is there a way to "up-scale" them for a richer texture? Thankyou in advance!

Hi,

I don't see the results you're seeing, but then I don't know the following in order to make an accurate comparison:


Currently selected Paper and if you used the same Paper when working at 72 ppi and when working at 300 ppi
Papers palette adjustments, if any (i.e. Scale, Brightness, Contrast, Invert)
Brush Size
Any other brush control adjustments you've made to the Pastels' Artist Pastel Chalk variant
Zoom percent at which you see the results both at 72 ppi and at 300 ppi
Here's what I do see when painting on a 300 ppi Canvas, Zoom 100%:

http://www.tutoralley.com/ubb/jins_images/Pastels_Artist_Pastel_Chalk_on_Papers.jpg

[wettham]

Ok I'm sorry I should have left more info. Here are the examples of the same brush with at 72 dpi and 300 dpi (however I shrunk both to 72 afterwards for the purposes of posting.

I understand how the Dpi would affect this, is it just that this brush is really only meant for 72 dpi not 300? Or is the paper grain messing this up. The goal is to be able to do 300 dpi images for print with that lovely texture.

Thanks for your help!

Edit: The paper is basic paper. Technically, do the paper "images" not blow up when you adjust the res higher? Could this be where the problem is?

[Cris-Palomino]

The brush is interacting with the paper, so it is the paper, not the brush. Just like if you took pastel to a coarse charcoal paper and then used the same pastel on a ribbed paper; the tool didn't change, the paper did.

Ok, my example on the left shows default artist's pastel, black, scumbled on a white surface. The image is 300x300/72 ppi on the left; 900x900/300 ppi on the right. I made the papers look identical in size on the screen; you can see the percentages to achieve this. For the image on the right, i sized the brush up to approximate the stroke size on the left side paper...I also upsize 3 times larger since I went from 300 to 900. You can see that they look approximately the same even though the paper on the right is much larger.

http://www.elektralusion.com/painter/72_300.jpg

The thing is that the real test is the printing. The type of printer, the type of paper. It is possible that this will print just as you want...with the graininess you want. You should do some tests to see what settings will result in the look you are after.

You can try other papers. Painter provides some extras; Cher Pendarvis' Painter Wow! book has a great variety. You can also scan your own paper to create your own surfaces.

Cris

[Cris-Palomino]

BTW, I should mention...my comment on brushes that interact with surface...brushes that are created from a Captured Dab is different. These are affected by the sizing because the dab is created a particular size, so sizing it up or down can have an effect, especially if you make the brush larger than the dab's original size.

If you work with Photoshop and its brushes, you'll see the same effect with most brushes there and in painter, especially when the dab is not a solid.

Cris

[Jinbrown]

Hi,

I think you're seeing this grainy effect due to the Paper being different in each example, not because of the difference in Resolution (PPI or number of pixels per inch).

Reading over your first post again, it's not clear what you meant. Maybe it's that you don't quite understand which is which, or maybe it was just due to some typos:

So I've become a big fan of the pastel - artist pastel chalk brush in painter ix.5 My problem is that when I work in higher resolutions, the brush loses its very bumpy texture and becomes grainy.



For example, at 72 dpi it looks like I'm drawing on a beatuifully smooth 300lb coldpress piece of paper, but at 300 dpi it becomes very grainy.


Since 300 ppi is a higher resolution than 72 ppi, and you say at higher resolutions the brush (strokes) become grainy, it seems a contradiction when, in your most recent post, you some demo images:

Here are the examples of the same brush with at 72 dpi and 300 dpi (however I shrunk both to 72 afterwards for the purposes of posting.


It's the lower resolution (72 ppi) image that looks grainy and the higher resolution (300 ppi) image is not grainy.


Edit: The paper is basic paper. Technically, do the paper "images" not blow up when you adjust the res higher? Could this be where the problem is?

In the following demo images, I've used the Pastels' Artist Pastel Chalk and Basic Paper.

On a 72 ppi Canvas

http://www.tutoralley.com/ubb/jins_images/artist_pastel_chalk_basic_papr_72ppi.jpg

On a 300 ppi Canvas

http://www.tutoralley.com/ubb/jins_images/artist_pastel_chalk_basic_papr_300ppi.jpg

I saved both images at the same Resolution (PPI or number of pixels per inch) used to create them. As you can see, neither is grainy like your grainy 72 ppi demo is.


Switching to the Sandy Pastel Paper:

On a 72 ppi Canvas

http://www.tutoralley.com/ubb/jins_images/artist_pastel_chalk_sandypastel_papr_72ppi.jpg

On a 300 ppi Canvas

http://www.tutoralley.com/ubb/jins_images/artist_pastel_chalk_sandypastel_papr_300ppi.jpg

These two are more grainy due to my having used the Sandy Pastel Paper.

Now the same brush variant and Sandy Pastel Paper, but painted with very light pressure:

http://www.tutoralley.com/ubb/jins_images/artst_pstel_chlk_sndypstel_papr_lite_prsr_300ppi.jpg


It's the currently selected Paper (as demonstrated in my larger demo using each of the Papers in the default Painter IX Papers library) along with the Grain slider setting and Grain Expression option, that determine the texture (or grain) seen in a brushstroke. Opacity and Opacity Expression can sometimes affect the appearance of texture too.

When the Pastels' Artist Pastel Chalk variant is restored to its default settings these controls are set to:

Opacity: 100%
Opacity Expression: Pressure
Grain: 23%
Grain Expression: Pressure

[wettham]

Wow, you guys are so knowlogable. Cris, I think you nailed it on the head what the problem is, the example you posted is exactly what I'd like to achieve. How were you able to resize the paper image? The Paper Texture library in the folder doesn't seem to be editable.

Or if you start with a 72 dpi image and manually resize to 300 dpi, does painter blow up the paper size?

Edit: I tried this and the texture changed, and i lost the scumbled look from the toothy paper.

So if this is true would the best solution be to scan some favorite papers at a high res and use them instead of the defaults to get this grainy effect?

[Jinbrown]

wettham,

Read my last post again as I was editing it and adding another demo image when you were posting.


I would imagine Cris scaled the Paper up using the Papers palette's Paper Scale slider (the top slider). The other two sliders are Paper Contrast (middle slider) and Paper Brightness (bottom slider). You can read about the Papers palette controls in:

Painter IX Help > Help Topics > Contents tab > Textures, Patterns and Weaves

On the right panel, click the link named "Using Paper Texture".

On the next page, scroll down and read the following sections:


Controlling Brightness and Contrast of Paper Texture
Adjusting the Grain
Inverting and Scaling Paper Textures

[wettham]

JinBrown,

Thankyou so much for your help, I think I understand it now. After learning all this it seems adjusting the paper can change your markings just as much as the brush can! This was very counter intuitive for me after learning in photoshop. Thanks Cris too!

[Jinbrown]

Yep, it can:


http://www.tutoralley.com/ubb/jins_images/artst_pstel_chlk_sndypstel_papr_scaled_300ppi.jpg

[Cris-Palomino]

Thanks for jumping in, Jin...paper scale is what I used....was coming back to post where to find that in the manual just as I got called away.

The thing that's difficult is that screen resolution is usually 72 ppi, so if you look at an image that you have that will be printed at even 8x10, that's 2400x3000 on your monitor so it shows it bigger than most people's monitors physically are, yet an 8x10 paper easily fits if you put it up against the screen.

Screen and print resolution are very different because your printer is using a specific amount of dots per inch to create your image (as well as 4-7 different inks depending on your printer); your monitor is pixels per inch. For that reason, if I am intent on a particular paper surface looking the way I want, I will do test patches and print them out and that gives me what to go by when I am painting for a specific result.

Hope that helps,
Cris

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