Corel Painter X - Artistic Endeavours

With Artistic Endeavours now running for quite a few issues, the arrival of a new version of Painter is always a landmark. Painter has been upgraded from Version IX5 and is presented with a new livery, designed by Andrew Jones. The manual has almost doubled in page count and the format has changed to landscape. More important (and essential) to the learning process are the DVD tutorials of Jeremy Sutton, provided in the box. As a beginner they will get you off to a flying start.

The main feature enhancements in Painter X are as follows:

Faster operation (we found that it started in 1.8s compared with 8.4s for Painter IX5). It is also claimed that the brushes work faster.

Real Bristle Painting System. This mimics natural brush physical structure such as distance from the ferrule, tip shape, stiffness and distance from the painting surface. Carol Tipping is much enthused about this feature.

Divine Proportions. A gizmo to seek out the spot for the Da Vinci Divine Proportions. Also included is a new layout grid. The entire thing strikes us as being a gimmick for the compositionally-challenged, but you may have your own views on the matter, other reviewers seem to have dwelt on the feature over-long!

Photo Painting has been enhanced. With Smart Stroke set on the Auto Painter, the script starts painting with a large brush and gradually works smaller and smaller as it gets down to the detail. It even tries to follow the shape and structure of the composition. At the very least it provides a faster way to create a ‘muck-up’ for individual brushwork. It is random and two consecutive attempts will not be identical.

Match Palette, lets you match colour and intensity between two images.

Match Palette

Mixer Palette. For mixing paints on a virtual palette board. This has been enhanced for better control.

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