Mimicking COPIC or Prisma art markers in painter

[Ben Her]

I am fairly new to painter (using v.8 on WinXP with an Intuos). I seem to have gotten the hang of my tablet and the pressure tracking on the pen, but I am having problems emulating some of my preferred "meat-space" materials.

Ok, here goes:

I am trying to emulate the effect of COPIC art markers... I suppose the popular marker in the US might be Prisma.

The copic blending is unique, but I imagine I could emulate it in painter. Painters markers build way too quickly, and pretty much go straight to black. Even lowering the opacity doesn't seem to help a great deal.

The brush I want to make should get thicker with pressure, but not necessarily darker. It should not build at all initially - in the real world, COPICs don't really build till after they dry (maybe 30 seconds?) and even this build is a slow one.

Any thoughts / experience?

[Jin]

Hi,

I have almost no experience with traditional markers, but you might try this to see if it helps:

Choose the Felt Markers' Design Marker 20.

In the Brush Creator/Stroke Designer tab's General section change the Method to Cover, Subcategory to Soft Cover, Opacity to 4% and Opacity Expression to Pressure.

That may give you a starting point at least, and some ideas you can build on.

Good luck, :)

[Ben Her]

Sorry, I meant to say thanks earlier for your advice! It just took me awhile to get back to work again. When I feel a little more confident with my output, I'll post a link or 2 in the forum.

Thanks again!

[scottg]

Hey Ben

I would appreciate you posting youre brush variant numbers for the markers that you build. I've been trying to do the same but with no luck. Thanks

scottg
nefandus.com

[vfxart]

sigh... there used to be a site... a fellow had taken the time to create painter brushes that mimiced the Prismacolor cool greys. I haven't been able to find it, and I think it only was useful for older versions, 5.5 maybe. Anyone come across such yet? Can't recall his name. George __ I think... argh.

[prcrash]

I was able to grab the most important settings from the old Concept Markers file. Here you go...

General
dab type - circular
stroke - single
method - wet
Subcategory - Grainy Wet Abrasive
Opacity - 24%
Grain - 58%
Size
size - 12 (4 for the small tip)
Min. size - 100%
size step - 5%
Spacing
Spacing - 1%
Min Spacing - 2.0
Damping - 50%

And the RGB Values for the whole range of cool greys...

10% - 224.228.230
20% - 207.210.213
30% - 194.197.200
40% - 169.174.179
50% - 132.138.144
60% - 115.122.129
70% - 98.104.110
80% - 63.66.69
90% - 36.38.40

[yashrg]

Wow! thanks! that really helps!

[yashrg]

how about a blender? what kind of blender should I use with this?

[Arshes Nei]

how about a blender? what kind of blender should I use with this?

Just adjust your resat and bleed. Turning one of the brushes down to a 0 resat and high bleed percentage will get some nice results.

[Jin]

If you use Method: Wet in Painter 7 or following versions, you'll be using the newer Watercolor brush technology, more complex and quite different in the way it works.... not what Shane Caudle used for his Prismacolor Brushes and the accompanying Custom Palettes: Concept Art Brushes + Controls and Concept Art Brushes. Shane used Painter 6 Water Color which is much more simple and has a much more simple look.

Use Method: Digital Wet and you'll get the brush technology used in the Painter 6 and earlier version Water Color brush category (which is, again, what Shane used) and in Painter 8 and following version Digital Watercolors which include all of the Painter 6 Water Color variants and which is improved over Painter 6 and earlier version Water Color.


Jin

[Jin]

how about a blender? what kind of blender should I use with this?

Read my post above which explains why you'll need use Method: Digital Wet which is the Method used for Digital Watercolor in Painter 8 and following versions.

In the Digital Watercolor brush category, you'll find brush variants that can be used to blend while the paint is still wet. For instance, try the Pure Water Bristle or Pure Water Brush variants. You'll probably need to lower Opacity down to a low percent to get the best results, then use very light pressure while blending.

If you have trouble blending, reset your Brush Tracking (Preferences > Brush Tracking).

Good luck.


Jin

[yashrg]

i do have one question tho. how to erase the white marks the pure water brush makes? i was working in layers and the top layer had this white artifact that I couldn't erase for the love of god! and i totally freaked out. then i realized it was the mark i accidentally made using water brush.

[Jin]

yashrg,

Digital Watercolor is meant, when painted on Layers, to have the Layer set to Composite Method Gel. That makes the white edges transparent, as intended.

The same is true when we paint using Watercolor. The Watercolor Layer is automatically set to Composite Method Gel.

This also provides the intended look of transparent watercolor.

If you can't manage this, try doing your blending after dropping the Layers to the Canvas and use one or more of the Blenders' variants.


Good luck!


Jin

.

[yashrg]

oh. thanks. I was just kinda taken aback by what i saw, not knowing why it was so. I think I'm ok with the gel blending mode.