will Corel ever fix it??????

#1

For some unknown reason I decided to open up X to see if this fundamental problem in Painter had been addressed . And of course not. They are to busy making more brush types that dont work!

[img]http://img128.imageshack.us/img128/9265/painterbrushesrc9.jpg[/img]

And the airbrush on different layers. Side 1 is the airbrush on a seperate layer while side 2 is the airbrush on the canvas. I really dont know how people use the airbrush. Even more so how does Corel version after version over see it.

Sorry I know this is probably getting boring … its been brought up before.

#2

Wow, chill…i don’t see why it is a fundamental issue and how it can affect the flow of a painting…

so you have some strange colour appearing…put a stroke of the right color on top of it!!!
problem solved…

#3

Hello fellow Painterians,

Looks like you’ve brought me out of the woodwork. Brendan and I have compared notes on this before - perhaps this will help illustrate the reason his undies are in a knot! :smiley:

The problem is that when using brushes such as the Digital Airbrush on a layer, it is impossible to achieve a smooth result at lighter pressure levels.  Very un-airbrush like!  I find myself continually having to apply blur to the layer in order to smooth it out - or avoid using layers at all.  Airbrushing directly onto the canvas isn't exactly silky smooth either, but it's better than using layers.

To me, and Brendan, this is a big deal.

To Corel's credit, the banding/roughness has been improved since version 8 (which I am using), but more work needs to be done...

©hris
#4

In addition, as Brendan was trying to point out, this can have a strange effect on the colour as well.

©hris

#5

brenly,

Airbrushes and Conte are brush categories, both with multiple brush variants, each of which behaves differently.

Though a couple of other people in this thread appear to know what you mean, if you want anyone else to test to find out if they get the same results you show in your demo images, you’ll need to be specific.

In their default state, I can’t get any of the Conte variants to behave even close to the way your demo images demonstrate whatever variant you used, whether painting on the Canvas or painting on a Layer.

In any case, have you written directly to the Corel Painter Development team with demo images and specific details? If not, their e-mail address is:

painterteam@corel.com

No one else but people who work for Corel, or who have been told by Corel, can answer the question in your subject line.

…

#6

Jinny,

It doesnt seem to matter which conte variant I use the strange color banding occurs. The trick to getting these bizarre effects is to lay the colors very lighty, as though you were tinting a certian area on a paper that has next to no grain. My main concern with all of this is the airbrush, I only placed the conte example there to reinforce the banding problem.

Chris … time to upgrade to version 9.5 … it is much better than 8!

#7

In an attempt to get to the bottom of this, here’s another example after some more conferring with Brendan. There’s some hue discrepancy between what happens on layers as opposed to the canvas - when using certain colours at very low brush opacities. I’m no longer sure if this is related to the rough airbrush problem in my other example…

#8

I aggree that this really needs to be fixed. I always assumed that it was the kind of problem that would get noticed by the developers and fixed in a point upgrade, not left as it is for several versions. It is because of this problem that I rarely use layers at all. You can get some really horrible results if you are trying to be delecate.

I am downloading the demo of X now but I can’t see myself upgrading until it is fixed. It is one of only a handfull of things that would persuade me to part with my cash. The others, like the creation of image thumbnails upon saving, don’t seem like a big deal to me.

Maybe we should put a petition together to stop them making gimmicky “photo -> art” conversion features and concentrate on meat and potato stuff instead.

#9

Could be a good idea …

Id like to know if anyone else has experienced the weird banding problem or other strange oddities with the airbrush or other brushes.

has anyone used the colorizer brush???

#10

…to quote a David Byrne song.

Yes, this banding has been a problem since I believe version 7 or 8 and it’s still here, on both Windows and Mac versions. I also have work-arounds and have been silently and patiently waiting for this “fix” for years now.

Until then, here’s some tips on how to “minimize” this dreadful “banding effect”, and it works in all versions as far as I know and remember, including 9.5 which I’m sticking with for now.

  1. choose any paper other than Basic (I use French Watercolor);
  2. make sure brightness and contrast is somewhere close to the same (depending on the paper of course), around 50% (at least low contrast).
  3. Before doing delicate work on a new layer, choose a new paper, or just the scaling slightly of the paper currently in use. TIP if you don’t know already, you can also save (drag) custom Papers i.e. settings to your custom pallette with your painting tools for easy paper texture flipping.
  4. make sure that “Pick up Underlying Color” from the layer palette is checked.

I believe the problem arises, and I think the thread is here somewhere in the Archives, is that all layers use the paper texture to lay down the paint. There was some talk years back that Corel was working on a way to turn off textures completely from a layer, so that you could paint as smoothly as within PhotoShop. Actually, it was the birth of the “Digital Airbrush” variant. Unfortunately, I guess they’ve given up on perfecting it, and instead have decided to continue to create more and more worthless brush variants, instead of concentrating on getting the absolute most important one RIGHT.

The airbrush is THE most basic and important brush within any digital paint program… since V1 of PS and V1 of ColorStudio (waaaay back when!). It MUST work perfectly and smoothly on any computer, within any program, any layer, etc. etc. Mainly, because it is the basis engine for all of the photo retouching tools. Get the airbrush right, and then the phototools like burn and dodge will also work… which at the moment “also” DO NOT within X (creates banding and artifacting just like the airbrush does!).

Oh yeah… and just to add to a another thread I saw about the workspace feature: nice idea => horribly executed and worthless, considering the context menu problem I experienced as well. As always, I’m curious if they do Beta testing at Corel with assorted real-world users and artists, and not only JinBrown. Nothin’ against her, but she sure does seem to be the only “Corel is the greatest software company on earth evangelist” around here. I mean really, some of the blatant bugs and missing “feature” requests within this version are downright “Microsoft-esque” in my opinion. If it ain’t broke, fix it… and if it is broke, ignore it and the users that complain about it, and hope that forums such as this one one will come up with a nice work-around.

Sad. Very Sad!

#11

that’s a bit hard, don’t you think? and quite some way departed from constructive critiscism… :shrug:

#12

For a Photoshop native such as myself, this banding problem is a huge turn-off with Painter. If that problem were solved, I’d spend a lot more time in Painter and my preference for Photoshop would decrease. As it is, I just find it difficult to intuitively paint without seeing strange artifacts happening. Photoshop doesn’t do that, so I’m resting on my laurels for now. :smiley:

#13

why not do what i did …create a blank paper by creating a new image 100x100 selecting it all and going to create paper. here you have a perfectly smooth surface to airbrush on!
but there are still gaps in the brush work :frowning:

#14

…but with no success. Because as your “unhappy face” shows, there are still gaps in the airbrush strokes. Again, because Painter expects “gray-scale variance” i.e. texture. Also, changing the spacing of the airbrush also doesn’t work, and in fact can create even more artifacts. However, if you have never done this, you might like the smoothness for use as a different “Heavy Air” variant for other types of work/painting :slight_smile: See? I’m not only sarcasm and fury as a someone hinted in reply to my post earlier.

#15

I’ve used both PS and Painter and I must say that the layers in Painter need a little “fixing”. Some things about Painter are great compared to PS like the blenders and rotating ( mind u the rotating aspect leaves the edges in a mess that’s only there when it isn’t straight. But it’s anoying ). Layers on the other hand with some media/brushes create some artifacts that should be smooth - I’ve noticed this too and had to resort to either changing brushes OR painting on the canvas or layer below that to get it smooth. Not the way it should be. Sure you can say it’s because of the brush variants…but it can be smarter than that.
And is it just me but…the layers’ palette doesn’t want to increase in size. I want to stretch it out a little longer to see more of my layers but it won’t increase more than maybe 4 layer showing. ?? Just me? Another anoying thing…anyway. Maybe v20.

#16

someone mentioned is there’ anyone else but Jinny Brown giving the input for Painter to the Corel team praising it…well
If you look into the credits section of Painters’ startup window…listed under “special thanks” you can find a big list of people that gave thier input for Painter’s every release. Erik Tiemens is there too. Cool. But I’m sure some of them have mentioned these things to Corel…so I’m sure there’s a reason why they remain.

#17

I’ve used both PS and Painter and I must say that the layers in Painter need a little “fixing”. Some things about Painter are great compared to PS like the blenders and rotating ( mind u the rotating aspect leaves the edges in a mess that’s only there when it isn’t straight. But it’s anoying ).

That happens because Painter does not do anti-aliased zooming, if you try the new OpenCanvas 4.5.06 you’ll noticed they implemented this, I only mentioned OC because there’s an option on the menu to enable and disable AA so you can see what a difference it makes. (They also design the most awesome interface I’ve ever used on a graphics application).

#18

Since version 8, you can undock the Channels palette from the Layers palette and you can enlarge it to any size you want, at least you can do this on a PC. I’m not sure about the Mac OS.

Munk

#19

See this image, in painter X the cursor changes when you are pointing this area, in painter IX you need to point also this area but the cursor does not change :D.

I admit if you don’t know where is the resize bar it can be a problem

#20

Undoc the Channels bar and you can extend the length and width of the Layers menu. Leaving the channels bar docked will just allow increasing the length.