Layers

[syd]

I joined this forum today, hello everyone. It is nice to know there is a community that I can gather tips and work out issues I run into.

Let me introduce myself and my experience with Painter. I started with Painter 5 years ago. I wanted to illustrate a story for children I wrote. I have worked with all versions up to Painter X. I wrote and illustrated another book I wrote for children and self published via Authorhouse.

I am using a Mac and Painter X. I have run into an issue, not a glich with Painter I do not think, just need to figure a way around the problem.

I am doing a portrait in Charcoal. My problem I am having is the layers are picking up the colors of the background or each other. I have not worked with charcoal before and I believe it has to do with charcoals opacity as it is true with water colors. Anyway I was wondering if anyone might have experience this or have a helpful tip I can use?

Thanks

[Jinny Brown]

Hi,

Welcome to the forums. This is only one of many where you can get help and enjoy the company of other Painter users. You'll find a list of the forums and newsgroups I've found to be the most valuable on my PixelAlley website. In the Left column, click Painter Community Links and you'll see the list, descriptions and links to the forums, e-mail lists, and instructions for signing on to the Corel Painter newsgroups.

PixelAlley Home Page

Now to see if I can help:

I do think this is a Painter X glitch (also in Painter X.1), or it sounds like one we've experienced.

As you know, when the Layers palette's Pick Up Underlying Color box is checked and we paint on a Layer, underlying color is picked up as we paint.

The glitch is:

Though it looks like the Pick Up Underlying Colors feature is not enabled (box is not checked), it actually is enabled.

Solution:

Click in the Pick Up Underlying Colors box until you see a check mark. Then click again to disable Pick Up Underlying Colors.

Try to remember this glitch so you can make sure Pick Up Underlying Colors is disabled when you don't want to use it.... before finding yourself in a mess again.


Good luck!

[syd]

I appreciate your quick response Jinny, being that this is the Fourth of July. I will give this a go. This is an important portrait and I want to make this work. So this is a Painter glitch? I thought it was me!

[Jinny Brown]

Hi syd,

I'm just guessing it's a Painter glitch, based on experiences I've had and other Painter X/X.1 users have had.

I hope that's it, since it's pretty easy to fix (if we remember).

[syd]

I see I have a problem, because when I followed your instructions it did not work. However I will try it in P9.5.

For future reference if I understand you Jinny when I do my next layer to remember to click underlying color and then click it off, this way I should be able to avoid this again.

But for now I am in a spot.

[Jinny Brown]

Hi syd,

You know, I think I may have misled you. It's the Preserve Transparency box that has the glitch, sorry about that.

The Preserve Transparency Box glitch is, as far as I know, new with Painter X and X.1 and does not exist in Painter IX, IX 9.1 or IX.5.

You don't say exactly which Charcoals' variant you're using, the brush Opacity, and colors you're using.

So, I'll have to guess that if you're actually picking up underlying color, three things need to be changed:

• Make sure the Pick Up Underlying Colors box is unchecked (or it's disabled).
• Make sure your brush variant is set with Resat/Resaturation at 100%.
• Make sure your brush variant is set with Bleed at 0%.

Now you won't pick up underlying color when painting on a layer and the colors won't be mixed when you're working on the Canvas or when you're working on a Layer.

As you probably know after using Painter through several versions:

• Resat/Resaturation controls how much color is painted in the brush stroke.
• Bleed controls how much existing color is picked up and painted in the brush stroke along with the currently selected color.

When Resat is low and Bleed is high, a brush variant can be used to both paint and blend.

When Resat is at 0% and Bleed somewhere around 50% to 100%, the brush variant won't lay down color but it can be used to blend existing color.


.

[syd]

I don't know why it did not occur to me before, but I figured out how to work around my issue. It of course was not the preferred way, but it will work. The background layer was seeping into my other layers, so what I realized was if I click on the background layer and erase the background color that was changing my image layer I had the result I wanted. I am happy.

Thank you Jinny for your advice, because I know that in some of my image layers I wanted a soft and more opaque look, I turned the resolution down, and bleed. I also did not pay attention to Preserve transparency, and was not aware of underlying color glitch.

So all in all, a lesson learned.