How to flatten impasto

[Martinity]

Is there any way to flatten the impasto layer without loosing the impasto effect? Only way I found was to make a clone of the painting, but it seems a bit tidious doing it like that.

[Jin]

Hi Martinity,

In Painter, the Impasto Layer is not visible and can't be flattened to the Canvas like other Layers can be.

It's either turned on to display Impasto lighting and depth, or it's turned off making the brushstrokes flat. To toggle Impasto lighting and depth on and off:

• Click the Impasto icon at the upper right corner of the image window

• Use Canvas > Surface Lighting and click the Enable Impasto box at the bottom of the Surface Lighting dialog box.

So.. I'm not sure what you want to do unless you meant to ask how the image can be flattened and retain the Impasto effect or how a Layer with Impasto painting on it can be flattened to the Canvas.

The easiest way to flatten your image and retain Impasto depth and lighting is to drop the Layers to the Canvas. Using this method, Impasto can be turned off or on and Canvas > Surface Lighting controls will still affect the existing Impasto brushstrokes.

If that's not workable in the particular situation, use File > Clone instead. Using this method, the Impasto Layer can be turned on or off without affecting the original brushstrokes and Canvas > Surface Lighting controls can't be used to affect those original brushstrokes by adjusting Appearance of Depth sliders. Overall lighting of the image can be adjusted, however.

Saving the file to other formats such as PSD, TIFF, JPG, and GIF will also disconnect the Painter-specific Impasto Layer from the image and only when new Impasto brushstrokes are made will the effect of Impasto depth and lighting be controllable again and, then, only on the new Impasto brushstrokes.



Jinny