Sometimes you just need MORE...

I needed to paint large numbers of fish on several double page spreads. Using the image hose in Painter X an artist can create a "brush" that does just that.  I painted some fish, changed the size and direction of several and saved them as an Image Hose.  Now I can choose that brush in painter and spray little fish of several sizes anywhere I want them in my digital oceans.

Embossing a pattern

©Ginger Nielson 2009

This is an illustration from a story I am developing. I wanted to show more texture in the pieces and especially in the sheep. So, here I embossed a pattern over the sheep's wooly coat.

Using Painter X, I created the pattern first, one that I liked, saved it, and then used it with the pattern embossing brush to create the effect.

Using a technique like this once in a while can be effective. One just has to be sure not to overdo it.


I am hoping to find some other ways to create various textures that won't overpower the other spreads in this book. I love the journey that illustration takes me on each day!

journal notes....

Sometimes I need to PAINT with real paint before I finish an illustration in the computer. In this case I used hot press illustration board to begin a sea scene for a project I am currently working on.

I like to be able to use my whole arm ( and soul) when I am painting and my sketches and preliminary paintings are usually done on a rather large scale. They will be reduced in the computer to the correct size for the project underway.
I used Dr. Martin's inks and some transparent acrylics for the first stage. Along with that combination I also used a house paint brush, a fan brush and some more conventional sable brushes.
After photographing the preliminary painting I transferred the image to my computer and completed it in Painter. The advantage for me is being able to get darker layers in place without having to wait a day for paint to dry.. and if I don't like a layer... I whisk it away.
In addition to transferring the painting to the computer I was able to stretch the entire image horizontally to accommodate the size I wanted to work with for this book.

If you look carefully you might be able to find two very recognizable constellations. Did you find them?

©Ginger Nielson 2009

PAINTER X ~ THE ISSUES

I have always been a painter. That way when Painter the program came along I was hooked. The use of the brushes and various stroke controls was and is amazing. BUT... when I upgraded to Painter X, I had a huge disappointment. Those fantastic REAL BRISTLE brushes were just so deadly S L O W. I tried all the tricks in my little bag of tricks to no avail. I upgraded my Wacom, downloaded the newest drivers, boosted the scratch disk, set all the extra space on my external hard drive. Still those marvelous brush strokes eluded my faster pace. UNTIL... after emailing Corel with no response I called in for another issue, and just on the spur of the moment they offered me tech support for any other issues. I found an answer to my problem, and maybe if you have been slowed down either by Painter X or by my problem ( a slower brain) this could help.

If you open PREFERENCES> GENERAL and uncheck BRUSH GHOSTING and ENHANCED BRUSH GHOSTING, the brushes in that category of REAL BRISTLE will behave! Yippee. This is extremely important when creating a painting on a larger canvas such as a two page spread for a large picture book. Some of those page spreads can be as wide as 24 inches and even under the best of circumstances can take days to paint.

If anyone else has had this problem, I hope this helps.