Purpose of using Photoshop/Corel Painter with Artrage?

[juggerp]

Hey everyone,

Just something I've been curious about: When I am viewing some peoples' work in the gallery, I notice that they often use a mixture of applications, stating that some work was done in photoshop in addition to Artrage. Can someone explain why you would switch between different applications? Are there some features that Artrage doesn't currently have that are needed? If so, what are some examples?

Thanks

[Docsmith626]

The most obvious answer is that the Rage crew has resisted the temptation to be all things to all artists. They have avoided mission creep and thereby produced the most effective and accessible natural painting software on the market. That means that you have to go elsewhere to find things like vector graphic effects. Painter, ArtRage's primary rival, went in the opposite direction, producing an unintelligible UI and a massive learning curve.

[limey-g]

I use photoshop quite a bit to finish a painting to what i want.
The main reason for me is the use of masks for selective changes to a layer and as a retoucher of many years I feel very comfortable using it.

[Steve B]

Well, for example, it's much easier do roughs in Sketchbook Pro, IMO, because the select, rotate, & resize functions are very easy and fluid to use. In Artrage they're available, but much slower to get at and use.

In Paint Tool Sai, certain paint and pencil textures are much easier to accomplish quickly, and you can do things like erase with transparency for any brush, etc. It's more customizable in many ways.

Artrage is very good at emulating a lot about paint, wet paint, blends, and washes, but lacks other useful tools, in a nutshell. It can do many/most things many other programs can do, but certain programs do certain things much easier.

Depends on what you want to accomplish.

[Chuckart]

Tablet and Pen.

While holding Pen just above/ off your tablet surface:


Holding Right Click allows you to drag canvas around.

Holding RC + Shift allows Zoom

Holding RC + Alt allows rotate


Press D to reset to default.

Easy peasy. Hope this helps

[Sweedie]

Painter, ArtRage's primary rival, went in the opposite direction, producing an unintelligible UI and a massive learning curve.

Really? Painter has a lot more easy GUI than Photoshop and other photo editing /grapihc software. Painter 12 GUI is easy to learn for the willing and you can set up your own workspace (that you can not do in Artrage).

Painter is not hard to learn. Just read the pdf or help-files that comes with the software if you don't understand how to use it. There ate also video tutorials on Corels website or on YouTube to learn from. Some books are also available that will explain the great Corel digital painting software. A massive learning curve is not at hand. Not much harder than ArtRage in fact.

Painter can be hard to get used to if you have been using Artrage, just like I heard many digital artists having a hard time getting used to Artrage.

I use both software about 50% each. And Photoshop for photo editing. All three are great software.

[wenkat]

It's individual's choice and comfort. No software is ultimate or the best, but distinguish with unique features. The aim should be to bring out the best picture to the satisfaction of the artist.

[Steve B]

Thank you Chuck Art for the shortcuts, I could see them being super useful for artists only a desktop. I work on a tablet, and therefore don't have the option of using those. I didn't really make that clear in my post.

For my usage pattern, SBP seems better setup for those functions-- i.e. its easier to access them super quickly by pen only using their lagoon system. I've also found Artrage responds much more slowly doing these things than other programs like SBP, Sai, and Painter. Its long been one of the oddities of the program, IMO. Of course, that too may be better on a fully powered desktop. I could see that being true. On a tabletpc though, I've found those things much smoother in other programs.

As for Painter- yes, 12 is better, no doubt, and it does let you customize your workspace and brushes more (which is a feature I'd like to see more of from Artrage), but IMO, after many months taking classes and reading tutorials, etc, I found working in Painter far more difficult and cumbersome . Comparatively, out of the box, I found Artrage ready usable and accessible and Painter totally unintelligible. Of course, that's only my experience. Many people use and love Painter.

[GaryExo]

I've used PS on and off for a number of years but never managed to get comfortable painting or even drawing in it. That's what I've now bought ArtRage for and I intend to use it as much as a direct alternative to traditional painting as I can but I can also see myself importing a painting into PS to take advantage of the myriad options available there for tweaking colour depths and tones. I won't do it as a matter of course, simply where I think it's required.

I considered buying Painter for quite a while but concluded that ArtRage might work better for me. I like it so far!