Most Corel Painter and Photoshop artists users will eventually
take their finished artwork to print. Sometimes when they do
so,
they
discover
certain aspects of their artwork do not appear as expected.
Most issues of disappointment for painter artists arise due
to a lack of detail being seen and the prints being darker
than may have been expected. These issues are best described
as working
in
scale
and equalizing color. Since a number of Painter users will
use Photoshop as well, the tips below will take some of the
instructions provided by both programs.
Working in Scale
Working in scale simply means the display on the screen is
to the scale that will be printed. Programs such as Photoshop,
Painter, Paint Shop Pro and many other image editing or art
programs, allow the user to zoom in and out of the picture.
This ability is an extremely helpful one since it lets the
user check details as well as perspective. Using Painter or
Photoshop as an example, when zoomed in, you can give attention
to details with a small brush. If zoomed out, using a larger
brush can help you quickly color or paint less detailed elements.
Unfortunately it is easy for artists to loose track of scale.
By keeping scale in mind, the user may think some details will
show up in print when they may not. The best example is brush
strokes. Many painter artists want the brush strokes to be
visible to further give the artwork a more naturally painted
look. When an artist is not keeping track of the scale of the
document as well as the brush size, the brush stroke effects
may become lost in the print’s texture (if printed on
a textured media like canvas) or too small to discern. On the
opposite end, if the brush is too big and the artist is working
from a zoomed out perspective, the brush strokes may give the
artwork an unnatural appearance when printed.
Problems associated with not working in scale include once
an image goes to print include:
Brush strokes not being visible
Artistic effects become lost
Small details are less defined
Pixelation showing due to improper document size setup
(too low-res)
To tell if you
are working in scale, you should to have an idea of the final
print
size
of
your
artwork.
It
is
surprising
how many artists will start creating a new work but forget
to account for the size when in print. Based upon this fact,
it is very important to establish the print size before starting
to paint otherwise you may experience scale and size issues
that throw off the desired effect trying to be achieved.
Once you have decided upon the size, you will need to create
a new document in Painter so that the it has enough pixels
to accommodate the print size. The recommended dimensions are
anywhere from 200 to 300 pixels for every inch you plan to
print. This means if you create a new document at 200 pixels
per inch, and you want the final print to be 16 x 20 then the
document should be 3200 x 4000 pixels. A word of caution, documents
that size will eat up a lot of memory (RAM) and working on
a painter document that size also uses a lot of processor (CPU)
resources. If you have trouble working in that size you set,
you may need resize by bumping the resolution down to 150 pixels
per inch. Any lower, your artwork may gain a pixilated look
and not look natural in print.
Now that you have set the size, the next step is to turn on
the ruler guides. The below instructions are taken from the
Painter version 8 and Photoshop version 7 documentation. Some
minor differences in the instructions may occur in earlier
or later versions but should still work.
Corel Painter
Photoshop
Corel Painter lets you show or hide rulers along the
top and left sides of the document window. Each mark
on a ruler is known as a tick and represents the unit
of measurement. You can set the unit of measurement to
pixels, inches, centimeters, points, or picas.
As you drag an image around the document window, the
rulers scroll to show the position of the Canvas in
the document window. The origin of the document is
the intersection of the zero (0) ticks on each ruler.
By default, the origin is the upper left corner of
the Canvas. Changing the origin resets the location
of the 0 ticks on the rulers.
To display or hide rulers
Choose Canvas menu > Rulers > Show
Rulers or Hide Rulers.
To set the ruler units
Choose Canvas menu > Rulers > Ruler
Options, or hold down Option (Mac OS)
or Alt (Windows) and click in
the ruler.
In the Ruler Options dialog box, choose a unit
of measurement from the Ruler Unit pop-up menu.
When visible, rulers appear along
the top and left side of the active window. Markers
in the ruler display the pointer's position when you
move it. Changing the ruler origin (the (0, 0) mark
on the top and left rulers) lets you measure from a
specific point on the image. The ruler origin also
determines the grid's point of origin.
To display or hide rulers:
Choose View > Rulers.
To change the rulers' zero origin:
To snap the
ruler origin to guides, slices, or Document
bounds, choose View > Snap To, then choose
any combination of options from the submenu.
(Photoshop) You can also snap
to a grid in addition to guides, slices, and Document
bounds.
Position
the pointer over the intersection of the rulers in
the upper left corner of the window, and drag diagonally
down onto the image. A set of cross hairs appears,
marking the new origin on the rulers.
To make the ruler origin snap
to the ruler ticks (Photoshop), hold down Shift as
you drag.
Note: To
reset the ruler origin to its default value, double-click
the upper left corner of the rulers.
To change the rulers' settings (Photoshop):
Do one of
the following:
Double-click a ruler.
In Windows or Mac
OS 9.x, choose Edit > Preferences > Units & Rulers.
In Mac OS X, choose
Photoshop > Preferences > Units & Rulers.
For Rulers,
choose a unit of measurement.
Note: Changing
the units on the Info palette automatically changes
the units on the rulers.
For Point/Pica
Size, choose from the following options:
PostScript (72 points
per inch) if you are printing to a PostScript device.
Traditional to use
printer's 72.27 points per inch.
Click OK.
With the ruler on use the zoom tool while holding up an actual
ruler to your monitor. Once the ruler on your monitor match
the size of the ruler you are holding up, then you document
is in scale and you are ready to start painting and working
in scale. By painting in scale you can be more assured those
details such as brush strokes or elements in your artwork are
going to be as you intend.
Preventing Prints from Being Too Dark
The next biggest problem painter artists experience is prints
which are too dark. This problem borders more on individual
artists’ style
but again, the view of the artwork on the monitor can play
a roll. If you are one of the fortunate ones to be using one
of the newer Mac or LCD monitors, the default settings of your
monitor may be doing you a disservice. This is because many
monitors project
the mid
tones brighter than they are in print. While this is great
for seeing details of the image on the computer screen, when
going
to
print, those mid levels
are darker than expected.
To help this you may want to use the “Equalize” tool
under the “Effects Menu” in Painter or "Image >
Adjustments" menu in Photoshop. If you are using Photoshop
you will alsow ant to review the "Using Levels" instructions
in the Help documentation that comes with the program. The
Levels command is the ideal method but the Equalize command
in either pogram may be helpful for the less advanced user.
The Equalize command redistributes the brightness values of
the
pixels in
an image
so
that they more evenly represent the entire range of
brightness levels. When you apply this command, Photoshop
finds the brightest and darkest values in the composite
image and remaps them so that the brightest value represents
white and the darkest value represents black. Photoshop
then attempts to equalize the brightness--that is,
to distribute the intermediate pixel values evenly
throughout the grayscale.
The below instructions are taken from the Painter version
8 and Photoshop version 7 documentation. Some minor differences
in the instructions may occur in earlier or later versions
but should still work.
Corel Painter
Photoshop
Select a layer or area
of the canvas.
If you want to apply
the effect to the entire image, make sure there are
no selections.
Choose Effects
menu > Tonal Control > Equalize.
Corel Painter automatically
adjusts the image or selection so that the lightest
color is white and the darkest color is black.
In the Equalize dialog
box, adjust contrast by dragging the black and white
markers under the histogram.
Any values in the image
located to the right of the white marker become white;
any values to the left of the black marker become black.
Adjust the gamma by
doing one of the following:
Move the Brightness slider to
the right to increase gamma, making the image darker.
Move the Brightness slider to
the left to decrease gamma, making the image lighter.
Changing the gamma
adjusts only the mid tones of an image and leaves
the black and white areas untouched.
Click OK to apply
changes.
A preview of the
changes is applied to the original image, but is
not final until you click OK. If you want to revert
to the original image, click Cancel.
To use the Equalize command:
Choose Image > Adjustments > Equalize.
If you selected
an area of the image, select what to equalize in
the dialog box, and click OK:
Equalize Selected
Area Only to evenly distribute only the selection's
pixels.
Equalize Entire Image
Based on Selected Area to evenly distribute all
image pixels based on those in the selection
If after equalizing your image, you find it too bright on
your screen, adjust your monitor settings so it is no longer
too
bright. By using the equalize tool and then adjusting your
monitor to compensate, you will be less liable to find your
prints too dark.
