Corel Painter 8™ Tricks and Tips

[davi]

Post painter8 tricks and tips here.

Keys...

M = Magnifier
G = Grabber
E = Rotate Page
"." = Perspective (that's a period)
C = Crop
L = Lasso
W = Magic Wand
P = Pen
Q = Quick Curve
I = Rectangular Shape
J = Oval Shape
B = Brush (Freehand)
V = Brush (Straight Lines - not represented by a separate icon in the Tools palette.
K = Paint Bucket
D = Dropper
R = Rectangular Selection
O = Oval Selection
F = Layer Adjuster
S = Selection Adjuster
H = Shape Selection
T = Text
Z = Scissors
A = Add Point
X = Remove Point
Y = Convert Point

[sandman]

Originally posted by davi

...So, this will allow you the ability to buildup and build down your greyscale at warp speed.

Nice one Davi

The keyboard shortcut 'Shift + X' will toggle between the foreground and background colours (black and white) if set up in the colors palette. The old stylus will be on meltdown.

David

[davi]

wow i didn't even think about trying that.
that will make grey scale drawing work at uber light speed.

this is a great brush trick until you get into details, things seem to get rather annoying with the resat.

[Grooveholmes]

I think the most important Trick to getting 8 to work properly out of the box is to set up your Brush Tracking.

Apparently a Pressure Scale of 1.00 seems to make it act like painter 7, where as the brushes don't 'dig in' as much.

[talos72]

I have been messing around with v8, and of course it still suffers from "slow brush" syndrome. A good number of brushes (acrylics too) still lag when above a certain size, doesn't have to be that big either. Does someone know of a setting or brushes good for covering larger areas withouth too much lag?

[tegehel]

Hi there,

In Painter 8, I can't figure out how to simply desaturate using a (photo?) tool. (what I want to desaturate's on a layer).

Basically, I want to be able to desaturate like in Photoshop, using a brush that (de)saturates.

I've tried Photo/Saturation Add with all possible numbers and combinations, and it only adds saturation. In 7, if you tweaked some parameters you could turn anything in color into its grayscale version.

I've try Photo/Colorizing using black or white and it doesn't work.

I've looked for other tools but can't find anything other than selecting the shape and using a menu (pain in the ass).

I'm pretty sure there's a way, but I haven't found it and the help doesn't point out to anything (obvious). I don't have the manual for 8. Seven worked slightly differently, so its manual's not useful in this case.

? clues ?

ty.

C.

Talos: I have Plenty of HD space and 1 Gig of ram. When my brush are beyond a certain size, they slow down to a crawl too. I don't know but 1 Gig should be enough, huh? My processor's "only" an AMD 2.0 but still...

C.

[MindCandyMan]

When you are working in high resolution (like tegehel has to work for professional pieces) you are going to get lag...it's inevitable. One thing I have found that helps (this is a side note) if you are using win xp...create a seperate logon for just when you are painting. Over time if that's the only thing you ever do with that logon name xp will start to allocate all ram to it, etc...) One thing I have started doing is picking a color and filling an area with the actual paint bucket or something like that and then painting over top of that. Even the selection tool could be used to select areas to fill in. Also remember your feature setting as well...if your feature is set too low and your brush size is too high it will go really slow. Hope that helps a little.

[I.was.ink]

Does anyone know the shortcut keys for the actual drawing tools. I want to change from the pallete knife, to the oil pastel. Also does the pencil have a quickkey?

Any quick keys would be helpful.

[Snowfly]

The 1 to 0 keys bump the opacity of your brush strokes up and down from 10% to 100%

This one should already be obvious. Just building on davi's tip.

[Lunatique]

If you like some of the impasto brushes, but don't want the impasto, you can permanently turn them off by setting "the draw to" to "color" instead of depth.

[Crystlmth]

Does anyone know of hot keys to switch between brushes? I Like to jump between painting and erasing while working in photoshop but there doesn't seem to be hotkeys for the brushes at all. Anyone know?

-Dave

[sandman]

Originally posted by Crystlmth
Does anyone know of hot keys to switch between brushes? I Like to jump between painting and erasing while working in photoshop but there doesn't seem to be hotkeys for the brushes at all. Anyone know?

-Dave

Sorry, no hot keys that I know of

You could invert the double ended Wacom stylus and select your eraser and associated settings with the 'eraser' end. That way, you can always access your eraser (or any other brush if first selected) by inverting your pen (stylus). This can also be done with two separate pens, with one set as an eraser.

In Painter 6 and 7, you could also make yourself a nice custom palette for quick access to the erasers and other favourite brushes, papers and even some menu items.

Unfortunately, in Painter 8, the custom palette feature has been dropped. There is a 'Tracker' palette, which will allow access to your most recently used brushes however.

In Photoshop, the eraser is actually a separate tool from the brushes, whereas in Painter, the erasers are simply brush variants.

David

[Crystlmth]

Thank you!! Flipping my pen works wonders! THats all i wanted was to switch from bush 2 eraser nice and quick, is that so much to ask? for a hot key for that? anyways this work around is the ticket for me. Thank you.

-Dave

[Fozzybar]

"e" for eraser and "b" for brush...

but this should be the last ps tip here, because it's a painter thread...

[Crystlmth]

my question was about painter.. not ps.

[Fozzybar]

oh...ok...i just misunderstood the last sentence...

[pixlart]

Asked earlier:

I've tried Photo/Saturation Add with all possible numbers and combinations, and it only adds saturation. In 7, if you tweaked some parameters you could turn anything in color into its grayscale version.

Solution:

Select the Photo: Saturation Add variant and reduce the "Grain" slider to 0%.

Save as "Desaturate" variant.

Restore the "Saturation Add" variant to its original setting for future use.

The new "Desaturate" variant will, uh, desaturate color imagery. You may want to additionally set the "Opacity" expression pop-up (Brush Creator "General" tab) to "Pressure". This will make the variant more controllable.

[Redmond]

I'm still with version 7. Does version 8 have a real full-screen mode wich takes-up your entire screen like in photoshop? That's what I miss most.

[tegehel]

redmond: you can hide the palette and press ctrl+M: it's the closest thing to fullscreen that Painter offers, as far as I can find.

pixlart: thanks

[Vyle]

I have a question:
in Painter 7 I used to have the ability to change the background in my canvas window to another color, is it possible to do that in Painter8 ??

thx for your help!
All the previous posts were awesome!
David could you post an example of what you are explaining in your first post. thx

[tegehel]

That's a good question, Vyle. In Photoshop (PS), under WinXP, you could go to Desktop Properties/Appearances/Advanced, select "Application Background" and change the color there, then the background would change to that color (so will the background of every other application - but you can reset it later).

In Painter, you have Painter's background (default is light grey) and the canvas's background (a darker grey.)

The canvas's background color (darker grey) _seems_ to be hard-coded: I can't find a way to change its color (it's not even mentioned in the Help section).

However, like in PS, you can change the background color (default light grey) to any other color, as explained above. It will change the background of Painter, but not the canvas's background. Then if you "minimize" your canvas to its bare minimum (so it doesn't show that darker grey canvas background but just the painting itself) and place it in the middle of Painter's background (now with a new chosen color), you'll have some sort of similar effect, except you'll still see the canvas's borders.

It's not ideal, but it's as close as I was able to get it.

By the way, Vyle, saw your site: nice skill evolution in time. You're getting much better with that program.

Cheers and if you figure it out, let us know, please.

C.

[Vyle]

thx for the tip tegehel! It's a clever way to emulate the effect.

I run on W2000, and I tried to find a way to alter my canvas background window, but with no chance either.

I think it is hard-coded too for the 50/50 grey canvas background (how dumb is that btw), I was hoping that did not change when I received 8. I got so disapointed that little details like that got lost in the new version. I loved how you could customize your ui in 7.
Maybe a patch to fix that?? pleaaase forward that to the guys at corel!!

Thx for the comments on my progression! It is really thanks to forums like this one...
My turn now! : I really liked your Asheron's Call Templates ( I like those monochromatic paintings).
Other than that, Painter was an eye-opener for me: I barely use photoshop nowadays.


David

[Jin]

Hi,

You don't need to wait for anyone to forward your comments to Corel.

Send them directly to Corel Painter Program Manager Rick Champagne at:

[email protected]

Be sure to include your complete system specs, OS version, Painter version, with patch number if any, and all relevant details.

Keep Rick's e-mail address and send off comments whenever something comes up.

[bluepulse]

Originally posted by Redmond
I'm still with version 7. Does version 8 have a real full-screen mode wich takes-up your entire screen like in photoshop? That's what I miss most.

Hit the tab key and all you get full screen

[monkeygecko]

It's annoying that you can't hit "r" for smudge like you can in photoshop, but I have figured out you can build your own toolset like "oil"... I just made my own folder

Corel Painter 8 > Brushes > Painter Brushes > [your folder name]

Start by copying a couple of jpg, nib, stk, xml files from say "oil".. You can make new brushes in painter and save them in painter.

Play with it for a bit, I messed it up the first few brushes I made.

Now you can right click and pick one of your custom brushes from the menu... yummy!
Still not as good as a hot key though.

:bash:

[Jin]

Learn to use Painter's Custom Palettes, available in all versions up to Painter 8, then in Painter 8.1 as well (with the patch installed).

You'll find instructions in the updated Painter 8 User Guide available in PDF format when you download the Painter 8.1 patch.

It's the quickest way to set up your brushes for ready access.

[farmer]

hi everybody...
i am trying to work with painter since a week... but i just cant handle it..
there are alot of questions in my head..
i was reading some of this painter threads but i just get confused..

is painter 7 better that painter 8?
how can it be there are no shortcuts for tools? and the many tools and toolsettings confusing me a little bit..where can i fing good beginner tutorials for painter...?? plzz help

:nopity:

[Jin]

farmer,

Tell us what it is you're puzzled about, specifically. Then maybe we can help. Post your questions in a new thread, since as you can see by the thread name, this thread is for people to share their Corel Painter 8 Tricks and Tips.

Painter 7 is not better than Painter 8, nor is Painter 8 better than Painter 7.

Some people prefer one over the other for various reasons.

Take a look at my website, PixelAlley, where you'll find a lot of basic tutorials and information for Painter 7.

It won't teach you how to paint or draw, but it might help alleviate some of the confusion.

URL's below my signature.

You ask "how can it be there are no shortcuts for tools?".

In Painter, all tools are found in the Tools palette. There's only one tool for painting and drawing and that's the Brush tool.

There's a letter key assigned to each tool in the Tools palette. For instance, B key for Brush tool, G key for Grabber tool, M key for Magnifier tool, and so on.

If you mean there are no keyboard shortcuts to select brush variants, that's right, there aren't. In Painter 8, there are over 400 brush variants in the default Painter 8 brush library and many more on Painter 8 CD 2. It would be impossible to have a keyboard shortcut for each brush variant.

However, in Painter 7 and earlier versions, and in Painter 8.1 (with the 8.1 patch installed), you can set up a Custom Palette containing your most used brush category icons, main menu command buttons, and palette menu command buttons. If you want to understand how this works, download the updated Painter8UserGuiide.pdf and read about Creating Custom Palettes... at:

ftp://ftp.corel.com/pub/Painter/8.1

[The TODDLER]

Does anyone know what painter 10 is? Has anyone ever heard of this program before? Just a question thanks.

[Jin]

Hi TODDLER,

Again, this question and other Painter questions would be better posted in their own threads with appropriately descriptive subject lines.

This thread is to share Painter 8 Tricks and Tips.

Since the answer to this question is short and we're already off topic in this thread.

There is no Corel Painter 10.

The current version is Corel Painter 8.