Are you a painter?

[Skybird]

http://www.artrage.com/index.html

I am no painter, I lack the skill and training to bring the imagined scene, object, landscape, figure or face into visual shape andf form that goes beyond amateurish scribbling. But I enjoy to smear with colours and see them interacting on paper or canvas. I tried watercolours many many years ago, but the hobby never went beyond the early first steps.

However, I am fascinated by digital painting options, since I first saw it in action in Paint Shop Pro 9 by Jasc. There it already worked not bad, but slow, creating lines and edges were you wanted round swings of the brush. But I got an idea of what it could be to paint digitally, I even got myself a Wacom tablet back then, a Graphire 3. And then - I forgot about it, and used PSP9 only for the occasional photo editing. Meanwhile I heared of things like Painter and Photoshop and the like, but found the software to be too expensive for just occaisonal use, and also occasional use will not help you to master the very complex, unhandy menues and options.

I now stumbled over a relatively new piece of software, that is exclusively focussed on painting "by hand". The interface is a marvel that represents one of the most elegant and intuitive GUIs I hgave ever seen, and is almost self-explanatory. It comnputes fast enough to allowme fluid, round swings with the brush, and the colour behaviour is a marvel to look at. Yesterday I spend time just smearing colours in the demo version, and enjoyed it like a little kid in Kindergarten.The thing is called Art Rage, and you can find many videos about it at youtube.

If you are not professional master and lord of photoshop, but are interested in digital painting (not image processing and editiing, but manual painting!), then give this a try. A demo is available, and as I said, it kept me fascinated all evening yesterday. The software functions perfectly with my old Wacom board, and also interacts nicely with tablet-PCs and touchscreens. I seriously consider to buy this one, although this konth already has been quzite expensive for me This part of one of the reviews they have linked to, sums it up nicely.

ArtRage Studio Pro is a specialized digital art creation application, and it excels in that specialty. More broad-spectrum software like PhotoShop®, however, include a wide menu of functions that ArtRage Studio Pro does not share. ArtRage Studio Pro lacks most of the image manipulation and special effects features of PhotoShop®, although it does offer color adjustment, blurring, and smoothing. ArtRage Studio Pro also lacks the extensive vector shape and line tools found in PhotoShop®. For someone like me, who does original illustration which is incorporated into both print and web graphic design, ArtRage Studio Pro will have a role in creating the basic art that can be imported into PhotoShop® for book covers, flyers and web applications. (This is no minor function: creating the basic art is at least 90% of the work.) For a visual artist who is just considering the transition to digital media and finds computers and high-end applications daunting, ArtRage Studio Pro is a perfect first step, easy to learn, natural to work with, and at the same time, giving polished, professional results.

ArtRage Studio Pro installs with a 111-page illustrated PDF manual that is a model of clarity. Other user support is provided online and in extensive user forums on Ambient Design’s website.