February 2013 Guest Tips and Tricks - Making Surreal Backgrounds with Xara Fractals

[dcahall]

Thanks for the kind feedback. I really had some fun trying to incorporate off of these things with the tutorial. You might notice that the boy is an adaptation of the one in your Clock Tower image. I used the shape tool to create a bunch of pieces that he is made of.

Yeah, that darts comment was kind of out of line as I think about it. I really did not mean it to be negative. I was really saying, go ahead and give me feed back so I can continue to improve my skills. As you have seen several time before, I am not an artist. I have been doing this stuff as a retirement hobby.

Sometimes I wish I had a good use for this stuff because it is fun. I really like using the Xara tool and I really appreciate the skills people like you, Frances, Stygg and several others are willing to share with people like me.

[Gare]

As you have seen several time before, I am not an artist. I have been doing this stuff as a retirement hobby.Sometimes I wish I had a good use for this stuff because it is fun.

I've been "doing Art" for most of my life, and for most of my life, the pursuit of self-expression via creating stuff on paper has not paid the bills or filled the fridge. Sadly, this is why many gifted people turn to art as a relaxation and/or a passtime.

It is certainly relaxing, or can be if you immerse yourself in it. But for all my experience, the pursuit of Art is usually a reward in and of itself. The process of creation doesn't have to have a "good use" as you put it.

Let your experience and own person thrill of having said something in a non-verbal way be your payoff.

My Best,

Gary

[stygg2003]

Glad you enjoyed the tut. dcahall and I like the variation you've created, really good. As Gary always says, if you learn from resources and improve or add to the original well that must be good. I notice this is the second time you finish your post with "throw darts at it" stop putting yourself down, were all learning here and hope to improve as we go.

Stygg

[dcahall]

Yep, no more "throw darts at it". That comes across negative which is not what I meant.

Thanks for the good words. I did have a couple of problems so I improvised a little. I am going to go back through the tut and see what caused me the problem and let you know what they were. I do remember that one of them was with the profile. You said select option 3 but I did not have multiple options. I just made the setting like what your screen capture showed.

I will add another post when I go back and see where I had a problem.

BTW: I do not know if it makes a difference but I am using P&GD instead of Designer.

[dcahall]

Went through the tut again and think I messed up the first time (although I honestly was satisfied with the final picture). The only question I might have is the dimensions in two places.

1. On step 4 under "Whipping up a Cloudy Sky" you say the dimension should be 735x992 pixels. Did you really mean for it to be that tall. Yes, it got fixed when you do the Clip View but I wondered if you meant for it to by 992x735.
2. On step 1 under "Creating the Ground Plane" you say the dimension should be 627x509. Should the width be the same as the original box (672)?

I also did one additional step. Since this wound up with a pretty tall image, I created a final box that was the size of the total image I wanted, put it to the back, did Ctrl-A to select all objects and finally did a Clip View to wind up with the final image (below).



Once again, just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed the tut and feel that I learned some very useful things for future endeavors.

[stygg2003]

The dimensions I give in the tut. dcahall are correct and your final image is pretty good. If what you finally see is what you like then that's it. You made some changes and your image turned out good. The line you see between the sky and ground base is due to Xara's anti-analising and not a fault in the tut. as Gary explained in an earlier post.

Stygg.

[dcahall]

In my first one try I eliminated the line by slightly overlapping the sky and ground and applying a small amount of feathering. You have taught me something here that I think will be very useful. I do not think I would have thought of doing multiple layers of fractal fills to achieve the sky like this.

Looking forward to more tutorials. It is always fun to learn how to make better use of a tool.

I wish that you, Gary, Frances and a couple of others could/would write tutorials for another product that I own (ArtRage 4) so that I could learn how to use that software better. It is a great artist tool but I am not artist and sometimes I get really frustrated because I cannot figure out how to use the software to achieve some things.

[Gare]

Overlapping and feathering is an inspired and very good remedy to the reality that Xara's anti-aliasing engine usually works for you, but also sometimes against you.

Another thing you might try is making certain that the width and height of shapes is precisely an even pixel number. You'll notice that occasionally you'll see the width or height of a shape to be a fractional amount, and when Xara then exports with anti-aliasing, it cannot reconcile the fractional pixel amount and leaves a semi-transparent row or column of pixels which become a visible line.






ArtRage tutorials aren't going to happen on the Xara Xone, for reasons I hope you can understand.

The Xara Group, is more than generous for footing the bill for TalkGraphics and providing forums for Photoshop and CorelDRAW. The Xara Group and its parent company, MAGIX, cannot support every graphics program on Earth, nor should they even try. ArtRage, as I recall, has a good community of their own, and good support.

I'd like to repeat something I mentioned in this month's tutorial on image retouching: Art can usually be approached as a process. You don't fling yourself at it and expect results, nor is the "use a bigger hammer" philosophy useful in creating Art, or most anything else.

1. Identify what your goal is. Be specific, and break it down into smaller goals if a single large one is creatively overwhelming.

2. Devise a system for solving or achieving your goal. If the goal is to create a painting, then start with a sketch, discover your colors, and work from the general outline to the specific details on your painting.

3. Pick the tools you need to accomplish your goal based on the appropriateness and familiarity you have with the tools you own.

It helps to learn the language of the Natives sometimes! If you come from, say, an engineering or a mathematics career and background, it's very hard to learn art, because you have brought yourself up with a language that influences your thinking, and is not applicable to this new realm of creative endeavor. So it helps to give up thinking, "Oh, I must do this or that within x number of hours", and just kick back and learn, experiment, and forget the time constraints that are self-imposed.

I didn't get to where I am in the art field overnight. In fact, I'm still not there. But I find the jouney much more enjoyable than any destination I might imagine.

Relax, man. Perhaps if you don't try to find the solutions so hard, the solutions might find you!

Good stuff comes to you when you leave your mind open.

My Best,

Gary

[dcahall]

Gary, a couple of things I am learning from people like you are to be more patient and to not be afraid to try. I retired a couple of years ago and have been having fun learning to use the Xara tool (thanks to people like you, Frances, Stygg and some others).

I did not mean for you to post ArtRage tutorials on the Xara Xone. I have looked at tutorials on the Ambient Design site and they are not the caliber of stuff that is on the Xone. They just released a new version of their tool that I really like but am struggling a little about how to use it. I fully appreciate and would not expect to see ArtRage stuff on the Xone.

As you, and the whole world has seen, I am not an artist but the digital art/graphics world is fascinating to me. The only real world exposure was in creating a couple of DVD/automated slide shows for 50th year high school graduations for both my wife and my classes. I did incorporate some graphics in them but not to the level of stuff I am now trying. I also used to create some minor graphics and a couple of animations for PPT that our sales people used. So I fully appreciate what you are saying about the language. I might also add that because of the people here in this forum, I am learning to "see"/"look" at things differently. When I recreated the little boy from the Clock Tower image you had in one of your tutorials, I learned a lot about creating and combining shapes, using the shape tool to create small objects that I then combined for the final image, using the feathering tool to make objects that did not have clean edges, and many other things. And yes, I also that was a good lesson in learning to take my time and think about the "big picture" in smaller pieces.

Before I retired, I designed web applications (updates, new facilities, user documentation and training) for the home building industry (I was a Product Manager and Business Analyst). I do not pretend to be an artist and enjoy seeing things people like you create. I have to admit (going back to the language thing) that sometimes you use terms that make me stop and think (a good thing for me in the learning process).

OK - all of that said, I have watched your current video. I now need to go back and watch it again and give it a try. Sometimes a little bit of a challenge when you only have a single screen (on my laptop) to watch (pause) and then go do.

[Gare]

Hey.

The best we can expect from ourselves and from other is to at least try at something.

An honest "try" makes you feel good, too!

And an "Artist" is nothing less and nothing more than "one who is immersed in the practice of creating Art." So you might feel your work is not as polished as others? Don't refuse to call yourself an artist because of this.

There's Good Art.
There's Outstanding Art.
There's Poor Art.
There is no such thing hanging on a wall that is Not Art.

Be good to yourself DCAHall. Be accurate in the way you describe your efforts. Words affect the way we think... as the flip side of what we think gives rise to words.


@everyone—

I will try to get the transcript for this month up as soon as. I would expect this to come in handy, seeing as the tute this month runs over 10 minutes.

By the way, Frances, I am completely at the whim of the Muses when it comes to what I cover versus how many minutes it takes to document it on video. I'll begin with a topic, a concept, and without fail, I'll say to myself going in, "Oh, this will run 5 minutes, 6 tops"...and it doesn't.

The good news (hopefully) is that I took my time and honestly paced the tute this month, perhaps explaining why it ran as long as it did. Apparently, you (and I hope others) were able to follow it.

My Best,

Gary