Painting with Photoshop Elements?

[cyree]

Does anyone here attempt to make digital paintings with Photoshop Elements? I was wondering because I cannot afford the full retail version and do not want to pirate it, but $50 seems reasonable providing Elements will allow me to do some painting.

If anyone knows how the options compare please let me know.

Thanks!

Just to get a response quicker I will paypal the first replier $17 no not really because I am broke Which is why I can only afford photoshop elements instead of Photoshop Gold Turbo Pearl CS Edition.

[luvazquez]

Keep the Paypal payment :)

Never really tried painting with Photoshop Elements, but there are other alternatives to photoshop.

Not sure if you're on a PC or a mac, but I know there's a few programs out there available that cost considerably less than photoshop and with which you can do some nice images.

Take a look at Bobby Chiu's work sometime...he's got a ton of demonstrations on youtube, and alot of them are done with Sketchbook Pro, which I believe runs for about $100. Good stuff.

Open Canvas is another one which you can get some good results with, though I'm not sure exactly how much it costs. I think it's like $75?

Hope this helps

-Lu

[Edriss]

I got Photoshop Elements 5 and 6 with my Bamboo which I've been using to paint since around December and it works fine for me. It doesn't have thousands of brushes and some (most, probably) of the tools that the full version of Photoshop has (I haven't actually seen the fill version, woe is me.) I actually prefer Elements 5 to 6 but that's just me.

Before that I used Corel Photo-Paint because that's the program my dad had handy and I wasn't that keen on paining for another program when that one seemed to do the job.

Though as I've already said I've switched to Elements 5 and am loving it.

Hope this helps, even though I've probably rambled.

[hecartha]

Take a look at Bobby Chiu's work sometime...he's got a ton of demonstrations on youtube, and alot of them are done with Sketchbook Pro, which I believe runs for about $100. Good stuff.
If you are under Windows, for $50 you can buy a true high end program which can deal with many layers, which seems to support 64-bit (the exe seems to be 32-bit on task manager...I don't know how it can be possible) as it was able to use more than 3GB on my computer under Vista64. The size of the document does not have any impact on navigation performance (1 layer 500x500 pixels run as smooth as 50 layers 8000x8000 pixels if you have the memory) where other programs like sketchbook pro, artrage, openCanvas die under the pressure of the high number of pixels. In fact even Painter is not able to deal with the kind of document SAI is able to use as it cannot use more than 1,3GB. Photoshop using graphic acceleration disables the graphic card if you have not enough graphic memory but no problem with SAI as it uses only your cpu for a very smooth navigation (on core2duo or more)
-The layer engine has more blending method than those other programs (still less than Photoshop) with blending methods for layers or group or pass through the group.
-it supports groups of layer (sub group, sub sub group and so on), mask, clipping mask (fully compatible with Photoshop)
-a unique system of overlying texture per layer or group of layer you can modify dynamically (scale and grain intensity) and you can use this texture as grain for your brush.
-It allows to set pressure of your stylus per tools (openCanvas can do that but none any other programs mentioned there)
-you can set to any tool a keyboard shortcut you can activate in two ways, temporary switch (click and maintain the key) or normal tool switching (quick press and release)...that was introduced in Photoshop CS4 later~
-It can use also a special linework layer which is able to use an hybrid vector/raster system to ink your work. As a vector system to generate the line, you can edit dynamically thickness of your line, adjust the curve precisely. As it uses a raster rendering method, it is fast as using normal raster layer.
-It has tabs support which is consistent with the use of all your memory on 64-bit OS.
-It has perfect anti aliased view on the working area and the resizeable navigator which can be used as thumb view
-multiple view
-transformation tool (rotation, scale, perspective and a unique amount of perspective setting...the warp tool is missing anyway) faster and better in preview than the one in Photoshop even transforming 15 layers 3000x2000 pixels~
-any brush can be turned from painting brush to paint remover brush (I don't mean eraser, it is much more interesting) keeping all your setting anyway (blending, dilution, persistance of color)
-simple but enough color adjustment for any layers you want you can see directly on your canvas
-selection tool more efficient than the one in Photoshop when working with lineart.
.........and more..

Now contrary to Photoshop, sketchbook pro, painter and openCanvas, SAI is not able to use brush using projected image...maybe with the version 2. It is able to use brush with textured shape combined with grain, but nothing precise (ie like a tree, detailed leaves...) you can rotate or scale in real time.

But the weakest point I think, is you need to discover the program yourself (I mean about the workflow) as the only tutorials available are mostly about cheap cartoon works. So it gives a wrong opinion that this program is not good with natural media rendering.
The other weak point is it is sold without any texture (brush, papers, brush grain) so if you need to test it quickly, you will not be able to see the power of the program.
Open Canvas is another one which you can get some good results with, though I'm not sure exactly how much it costs. I think it's like $75?Forget about openCanvas, they are stopping international support and next versions will be japanese only (maybe because PaintTool SAI)

[JohnMalcolm1970]

Artrage (http://www.artrage.com/) at $25 or Corel's Painter SketchPad at $119 might be worth a look at too. With Elements the main drawback will be the lack of custom brush controls (AFAIK it has some). I suppose it all depends what kind of look you are going for. Both of these are probably more suited to stuff that mimicks real media and looks a bit painterly.

You can get demos of just about all of the products mentioned by myself and others... that might be the best way of deciding which to go for.

[cyree]

Thanks for all the great info guys, this is the best community of artists on the internet hands down.

[Portus]

Yeah Opencanvas is no more, they ended dev support for the English version.

Hecartha check the english faq of SAI:
http://www.systemax.jp/en/sai/faq.html

Q.I think it's too waste that this application use 64bits per each pixels.
We select 64bit per pixels for both speed and quality. In the first stage of development, we carefully tested both 32bpp and 64bpp, and the result of 64bpp was better than 32bpp both speed and quality. Certainly more memory required than 32bpp, but for our primary aim, 64bpp is more worthy we thought.

For $50 your only options are SAI, old Corel Painter version on eBay or ArtRage if you like to play more and work less since AR is a gimmick fest. If you have the patience to setup Gimp Paint System and all the rest of the stuff you have to install can be worth to check.

[hecartha]

Hecartha check the english faq of SAI:
http://www.systemax.jp/en/sai/faq.htmlOh, thanks, I have not seen this faq before.

[mathomas]

I applaud your not wanting to steal software! Don't get too worried about having the high-end tools. Attached is a coloring job I just did with Photoshop Elements and a Wacom Bamboo. Note that this is my first PS Elements concept coloring attempt, so it's no masterpiece. After this, however, I do have a feeling Elements has plenty of power for what we mortals need to do. Try it and see!


PS - ArtRage is great for the price, though it does have some gimmicky tools. On the other hand, you don't have to use the gimmicky ones. Some of the other tools are really great!