Changing color/saturation

I'm using Painter IV. Mac OSX.

I'm doing a Digital Watercolor painting. I have a layer that is a solid colored border. I would like to experiment with making this border different colors without repainting it over and over with each new color. I've tried going to Effects>Tonal Control, and using the color options there, but nothing seems to effect the color. What am I doing wrong? I can change the Brightness/Contrast, but nothing else I try seems to be effecting the layer.

Also, the Preview in the various dialogue boxes only shows when I click on the mouse and stay clicked down. Is there a way to keep the Preview visible withought having to keep my finger on the mouse?

Many thanks :)

Um, Painter IV would be Painter 4 and there was no Digital Watercolor brush category until Painter 8 was released.

Here are the Painter versions that use Roman numerals:

Painter IX (Painter 9)
Painter IX.1 sometimes called Painter IX 9.1 (Painter 9.1)
Painter IX.5 (Painter 9.5)

Painter X (Painter 10)
Painter X.1 (Painter 10.1)

In any case, try this to experiment with various colors for your frame Layer:

1. In the Layers palette, highlight the frame Layer.

2. Use Effects > Tonal Control > Adjust Colors, Using: Uniform Color.

3. In the Preview window, click and drag to make the border visible.

4. Move the Hue Shift slider to see different colors.

5. Move the Saturation slider to increase or decrease saturation.

6. Move the Value slider to make the color lighter or darker.

7. Click the Reset button to return to the original color/saturation/value or click the OK button if you like the results.


Jin

Ooops! Yes, I mean Corel IX.....

Thanks for the reply, I will give that a try :)

Ok. That worked great for the solid colored border. Thanks! That'll save me a lot of time.

Is there a way to change the color range of a painted object with various different hues and transparancies? For example, a shell painted in various shades of blues and greens changed to warmer colors.

A couple of methods you might want to experiment with:

Use the same method as I described above (Effects > Tonal Control > Adjust Colors).

Or....

Create a new Layer (or multiple new Layers for different colors), change the Composite Method to Colorize, then paint the colors you want. Lower the Layer Opacity as needed for a more subtle effect.

There are many ways to change colors in Corel Painter and it would take more time than I have available to describe them all, but if you spend time reading Painter IX Help Topics, you'll learn a lot that can help.

Good luck!


Jin

For anyone that's still reading this...

I figured out that the Effects don't seems to work on the Digital Watercolors or the Watercolors. They seems to work on everything else. Is anyone else having this problem or is it just me? I was working in Digital Watecolors and non of the Effects seemed to be "effecting" anything, so I tried another medium and they worked fine.

Interesting....

Digital Watercolor is painted on an invisible Wet Layer.

Watercolor is painted on a Watercolor Layer.

Until Digital Watercolor is dried, we can't paint on it or apply Effects menu commands.

Until a Watercolor Layer is commited to an image layer or converted to a Default Layer, we can't paint on it with brush variants from other brush categories or apply Effects menu commands.

Digital Watercolor

To dry Digital Watercolor, use the Layers palette menu command Dry Digital Watercolor or the keyboard shortcut Ctrl/Command+Shift+L. Remember that once Digital Watercolor is dried, it can't be made wet Digital Watercolor again.

Watercolor

To apply Effects menu commands to a Watercolor Layer, use one of the following methods:

• Choose the Effects menu command and when the window pops up asking you if you want to "Commit to an image Layer?", click the Commit button.
• Use the Layers palette menu command Convert to Default Layer, then choose the Effects menu command.

To use brush variants from other brush categories on a Watercolor Layer, use the Layers palette menu command Convert to Default Layer.