>> Are you *kidding* me? This is the most advanced thing I've ever seen! o_O
> 
>   Clearly you have never used an image manipulation program to its full
> extent. Even the Gimp has many of the features showcased in that video
> (although, admittedly, some of them are not as easy to use).

Well, given that I can't actually draw, I guess I don't spend a huge 
amount of time with drawing packages. (Which arguably Photoshop is and 
the GIMP isn't - depending on your definitions.) And it's not like the 
GIMP comes with a manual. It's not even clear what half the buttons are 
meant to DO...

Some things that shock me about this video:

- Tim manages to draw, UNdraw and then redraw lines multiple times. 
Usually in a bitmap editor, all drawing operations are final and cannot 
be undone like that. (That's what's so great about vector images - you 
can edit *everything* and nothing is ever "final".)

- He scales objects. This generally isn't possible in bitmap editors 
without absurd levels of highly-visible distortion. (Tim even scales 
individual *parts* of objects - something I've never seen any bitmap 
editor allow.)

- Tim is able to move objects around, place one in front of another, and 
draw stuff behind objects. It's standard in a vector editor, but I've 
never seen it in a bitmap editor.

- I guess the floor fills kind of give it away that this *must* be a 
bitmap. But how does he manage to fill in all that counter-shading and 
never accidentally draw over the outlining? Is he just extremely 
skillful, or is the software assisting him somehow?

- How the heck does he do that thing with the floorboards? And the 
shading for the shadow in the doorway? I've never seen anything so 
advanced, ever!

- How on earth does he do the text like that? When *I* want to outline 
something, I have to sit there for hours drawing the outlines in by 
hand. He appears to have some kind of automation that does it for him... 
And not to mention all the squishing and bending of the text, and the 
multiple levels of gradients and...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Mike Raiford wrote:

> Go download a free trial of it. Go to Adobe, now! Download DOWNLOAD 
> *DOWNLOAD*!!! It'll last 30 days, then you'll be hooked.

Actually... apparently I bought my dad a copy of Adobe Photoshop 
Elements 5 and Adobe Promier for his birthday one year. I'd forgotten 
about that!

[And so had he. The software *demands* SSE2 and refuses to operate 
without it, so he's never been able to run it. Until now...]

I'll have to go round his house and have a play with it.



A5 one that comes bundled with a copy of Photoshop Elements. I'm 
momentarily tempted...

...and then I remember that I can't actually draw, and just having 
similar software and hardware to Tim wouldn't magically enable me to be 
a supreme artist like him. And I'm probably too stupid to figure out a 
package like Photoshop anyway.

[You might recall I gave up on 3D Studio Max - reputedly the most 
powerful 3D software ever written in human history - because I couldn't 
figure out how to make it draw something other than spheres of cylinders.]

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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On Mon, 03 Mar 2008 10:44:58 +0000, Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:



>A5 one that comes bundled with a copy of Photoshop Elements. I'm 
>momentarily tempted...

A couple of years ago I bought a Wacom A3 graphics tablet on eBay and found that
I liked it a lot even though I can't draw. I then bought a cheep one from

worry about loosing it. Tablets are great not just for drawing but if you suffer
from RSI they reduce the strain and are good for modifying image maps.

Regards
	Stephen

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Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> Well, given that I can't actually draw, I guess I don't spend a huge 
> amount of time with drawing packages. (Which arguably Photoshop is and 
> the GIMP isn't - depending on your definitions.)

  Photoshop is not a "drawing package". AFAIK it doesn't have vector
graphics support, for instance.

> And it's not like the GIMP comes with a manual.

  Where did you get that notion? The gimp has a complete help file system,
and the same documentation is available online as well:

http://docs.gimp.org/en/

> - Tim manages to draw, UNdraw and then redraw lines multiple times. 
> Usually in a bitmap editor, all drawing operations are final and cannot 
> be undone like that.

  Ever heard of the concept of layers? If you haven't, you should really
learn to use them. They help you making new additions without changing
anything of the existing image. Your additions are overlayed over the
rest. Layers are also the thing which help you move individual elements
of the image around without moving the entire image.

> (That's what's so great about vector images - you 
> can edit *everything* and nothing is ever "final".)

  He is not using vector images.

> - He scales objects. This generally isn't possible in bitmap editors 
> without absurd levels of highly-visible distortion.

  Of course it's possible. You simply need a very large resolution for
the image in order to avoid pixelation.

> (Tim even scales 
> individual *parts* of objects - something I've never seen any bitmap 
> editor allow.)

  Read my lips: Layers.

> - Tim is able to move objects around, place one in front of another, and 
> draw stuff behind objects. It's standard in a vector editor, but I've 
> never seen it in a bitmap editor.

  Read my lips: Layers.

  It's a very common technique in bitmap editors.

> - I guess the floor fills kind of give it away that this *must* be a 
> bitmap. But how does he manage to fill in all that counter-shading and 
> never accidentally draw over the outlining? Is he just extremely 
> skillful, or is the software assisting him somehow?

  Layers and layer masks.

> - How the heck does he do that thing with the floorboards? And the 
> shading for the shadow in the doorway? I've never seen anything so 
> advanced, ever!

  Layers, transparency.

  Being a POV-Ray user you should know what alpha transparency means.

> - How on earth does he do the text like that?

  Photoshop has quite advanced text manipulation capabilities. It handles
them as vector graphics (probably one of the few true vector drawing
features in the program) until they are "burnt" into the final bitmap
layer.

  With Photoshop you can distort the text in many ways, add outlines,
shadows, colorations, etc. The gimp has many such features as well
(although it's not as advanced in this respect).

> When *I* want to outline 
> something, I have to sit there for hours drawing the outlines in by 
> hand.

  If you are talking about the text, he doesn't need to outline anything.

  As for outlining elements in a bitmap image, Photoshop has quite
advanced selection tools which make the task much easier.

> And not to mention all the squishing and bending of the text, and the 
> multiple levels of gradients and...

  The text is handled as vectors until burnt into the final image.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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>> And it's not like the GIMP comes with a manual.
> 
>   Where did you get that notion? The gimp has a complete help file system,
> and the same documentation is available online as well:

OK, well then I just learned something...

>> - Tim manages to draw, UNdraw and then redraw lines multiple times. 
>> Usually in a bitmap editor, all drawing operations are final and cannot 
>> be undone like that.
> 
>   Ever heard of the concept of layers? If you haven't, you should really
> learn to use them. They help you making new additions without changing
> anything of the existing image. Your additions are overlayed over the
> rest. Layers are also the thing which help you move individual elements
> of the image around without moving the entire image.

I've heard of layers - but it never occurred to me that you could use 
them for *composing* images. I always throught of them as simply a way 
of merging two images into one. (E.g., so you could cut out part of one 
photograph to insert it into another one.)

If all of the complex manipulations seen here are really done with 
layers... hmm, it must take quite a bit of planning to make sure 
everything is in the correct layer and not accidentally paint yourself 
into a corner.

>> (That's what's so great about vector images - you 
>> can edit *everything* and nothing is ever "final".)
> 
>   He is not using vector images.

Indeed. What I way saying is that this is why *I* prefer vector 
graphics. I make so many mistakes, it's nice having a system where 
anything can be undone or modified later. But it doesn't seem to hinder 
Tim in any way...

>> - He scales objects. This generally isn't possible in bitmap editors 
>> without absurd levels of highly-visible distortion.
> 
>   Of course it's possible. You simply need a very large resolution for
> the image in order to avoid pixelation.

Well, it would probably work if the image was 10,000 pixels square. But 
that sounds a litle infeasible. (OTOH, the final image is quite low 
resolution, so maybe it's doable...)

>> (Tim even scales 
>> individual *parts* of objects - something I've never seen any bitmap 
>> editor allow.)
> 
>   Read my lips: Layers.

Lilah appears to be in a single layer. (He moves her around as one 
item.) And yet, he was able to scale just one leg. How do layers help here?

>> - Tim is able to move objects around, place one in front of another, and 
>> draw stuff behind objects. It's standard in a vector editor, but I've 
>> never seen it in a bitmap editor.
> 
>   Read my lips: Layers.

Yes, I see that now... I would never have thought of using layers that way.

>> - I guess the floor fills kind of give it away that this *must* be a 
>> bitmap. But how does he manage to fill in all that counter-shading and 
>> never accidentally draw over the outlining? Is he just extremely 
>> skillful, or is the software assisting him somehow?
> 
>   Layers and layer masks.

DPaint used to have a thing called "stencils" where you could mark 
certain colours as "protected", and any pixels drawn in that colour 
can't be altered. (Remember, DPaint works with palette-based bitmaps.)

Is this a similar trick, or something different?

>> - How the heck does he do that thing with the floorboards? And the 
>> shading for the shadow in the doorway? I've never seen anything so 
>> advanced, ever!
> 
>   Layers, transparency.

Well, sure - but how does he make the shadow edges soft? That must 
involve some pretty special shading technology. Most software I've seen 
will do simple linear colour gradients, but not complex shadow outlines 
like that.

>> - How on earth does he do the text like that?
> 
>   Photoshop has quite advanced text manipulation capabilities.

You can say that again...

> It handles
> them as vector graphics (probably one of the few true vector drawing
> features in the program) until they are "burnt" into the final bitmap
> layer.

I see.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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"Invisible" <voi### [at] devnull> wrote in message 
news:47cbf253$1@news.povray.org...

>>> (That's what's so great about vector images - you can edit *everything* 
>>> and nothing is ever "final".)
>>
>>   He is not using vector images.
>
> Indeed. What I way saying is that this is why *I* prefer vector graphics. 
> I make so many mistakes, it's nice having a system where anything can be 
> undone or modified later. But it doesn't seem to hinder Tim in any way...
>
Photoshop does support basic vectors. You can use the pen tool to make them 
and even edit them afterwards.


-- 
-Nekar Xenos-

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> Photoshop does support basic vectors. You can use the pen tool to make 
> them and even edit them afterwards.

Even PaintShopPro (which many think of as PS without as many features) 
allows you to add layers that contain vector art (including text).  There's 
no need to lose any of the vector art data until you want to save as a 
bitmap file format (as opposed to the native psp format).  Of course it 
supports all the usual anti-aliasing, gradient colour/opacity fills, line 
styles etc.

Post a reply to this message

Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> If all of the complex manipulations seen here are really done with 
> layers... hmm, it must take quite a bit of planning to make sure 
> everything is in the correct layer and not accidentally paint yourself 
> into a corner.

  You wouldn't believe the sheer amount of layers a graphics professional
uses when creating images. We are talking about hundreds.
  Every single minuscule thing is usually put into its own layers.

  If I'm not completely mistaken, you can group several layers in Photoshop
into one entity which then works as if it was a single layer. This way
you can eg. move a part of the image, which in itself is composed of many
layers, as if it was just one layer.

  Naturally layers can (and should) be named so that you can keep track
of what is where.

> Lilah appears to be in a single layer. (He moves her around as one 
> item.) And yet, he was able to scale just one leg. How do layers help here?

  Probably a bunch of layers grouped together, or maybe some other technique.

> >> - I guess the floor fills kind of give it away that this *must* be a 
> >> bitmap. But how does he manage to fill in all that counter-shading and 
> >> never accidentally draw over the outlining? Is he just extremely 
> >> skillful, or is the software assisting him somehow?
> > 
> >   Layers and layer masks.

> DPaint used to have a thing called "stencils" where you could mark 
> certain colours as "protected", and any pixels drawn in that colour 
> can't be altered. (Remember, DPaint works with palette-based bitmaps.)

> Is this a similar trick, or something different?

  A layer mask is basically an alpha channel for a layer. That is,
besides having a full rgba color layer, the layer can have an additional,
separate alpha channel (called layer mask) which is applied to the layer
as well.
  This is handy when you want to show/hide parts of a layer, without
actually modifying the contents of that layer. And the other way around
is useful too: You can edit the contents of the layer without modifying
the layer mask, which means that your edits will never "bleed" outside
boundaries.

  The layer mask is not a bitmask, but a full alpha mask. This means
that parts of the layer can partially visible, not just on/off.

> >> - How the heck does he do that thing with the floorboards? And the 
> >> shading for the shadow in the doorway? I've never seen anything so 
> >> advanced, ever!
> > 
> >   Layers, transparency.

> Well, sure - but how does he make the shadow edges soft? That must 
> involve some pretty special shading technology. Most software I've seen 
> will do simple linear colour gradients, but not complex shadow outlines 
> like that.

  Varying degrees of alpha transparency. I don't see any difficulty in that.

  In rgba images each pixel has an alpha transparency value. This value
can change from pixel to pixel.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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47cbf253$1@news.povray.org...
> I've heard of layers - but it never occurred to me that you could use them 
> for *composing* images. I always throught of them as simply a way of 
> merging two images into one. (E.g., so you could cut out part of one 
> photograph to insert it into another one.)

Here you go: an image made using 15000 layers.

http://www.bertmonroy.com/fineart/text/fineart_damen.htm

G.

-- 
*****************************
http://www.oyonale.com
*****************************
- Graphic experiments
- POV-Ray, Cinema 4D and Poser computer images
- Posters

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Warp wrote:

>   You wouldn't believe the sheer amount of layers a graphics professional
> uses when creating images. We are talking about hundreds.
>   Every single minuscule thing is usually put into its own layers.

Wow. Just... wow.

And to think I still work on bitmaps using only 1 layer... (But then, if 
you take a photograph of something, it's all one layer, and there's not 
too much you can do about that.)

>   If I'm not completely mistaken, you can group several layers in Photoshop
> into one entity which then works as if it was a single layer. This way
> you can eg. move a part of the image, which in itself is composed of many
> layers, as if it was just one layer.

I can easily see that if *I* ever attempted to do something like this, 
I'd end up putting two things into the same layer and then being 
completely stumped later on because those things need to be in seperate 
layers.

>   A layer mask is basically an alpha channel for a layer. That is,
> besides having a full rgba color layer, the layer can have an additional,
> separate alpha channel (called layer mask) which is applied to the layer
> as well.
>   This is handy when you want to show/hide parts of a layer, without
> actually modifying the contents of that layer. And the other way around
> is useful too: You can edit the contents of the layer without modifying
> the layer mask, which means that your edits will never "bleed" outside
> boundaries.
> 
>   The layer mask is not a bitmask, but a full alpha mask. This means
> that parts of the layer can partially visible, not just on/off.

Right. So... there's a channel that controls how opaque a layer is, and 
another channel that controls how much you can draw on it?

>> Well, sure - but how does he make the shadow edges soft? That must 
>> involve some pretty special shading technology. Most software I've seen 
>> will do simple linear colour gradients, but not complex shadow outlines 
>> like that.
> 
>   Varying degrees of alpha transparency. I don't see any difficulty in that.

Oh - you mean make a layer that's just flat dark-green, and then paint 
onto the alpha channel to blend it into the light-green parts? Ingenious...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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