We put together a new set of Watercolor Paint Presets for Studio Artist 3.5 that are available for download.  These presets run the range from relatively simple basic utility watercolor semi-transparent paint effects to rather elaborate simulations of wet media special effects including water diffusion, edge coloring buildup and bleed effects, paper textures and pigment wash blending effects.

 

 

I’ve found that there are probably as many different opinions as to what constitutes a good digital watercolor effect as there are Studio Artist users.  So we tried to include a wide range of different approaches and stylistic effects in this preset collection.  Feel free to regroup these presets into different categories as you see fit if that would better organize them for your personal workflow and aesthetics.

 

Different presets in the collection use different compositing strategies for paint buildup with repeated overlaying washes.  Some offer a true watercolor wash simulation where paint will buildup to darker colorings only with overlaid washes.  Others allow you to reintroduce your base canvas paper coloring (usually white) and more freely blend varying light and dark colorings with subsequent washes.  

 

Many of the presets use fairly diffuse pigments washes that will require a lot of overlaying of repeated washes to build up a lot of color.  This can easily be adjusted in the Paint Fill Apply control panel by increasing the blend parameters if you want more pronounced coloring effects with a single wash pass.  Interactive modulators like pen pressure might also be controlling the degree of pigment build up, and can easily be added or removed from a particular preset by specifying the appropriate blend modulator.

 

The new Geodesic Source Brush type is used in many of the presets that simulate liquid bleed and spreading effects.  The Geodesic Source Brush type can also be combined with the Particle Pen Mode which generates 2 interlocking diffusion bleeds occurring simultaneously as you paint and can create very elaborate and organic wash effects.  

 

Keep in mind that Dual mode Displace Fill Algorithms with Geodesic Source Brushes tend to work best when the Paint Source Offset Orient popup parameter is set to the Geodesic Source Angle modulator.  The offset displacement is then calculated based on the offset of the current geodesic spreading point relative to the original path point it started from.  This is different from the normal path orient settings where the displacement just tracks the path movement like you would see in a typical smear blend of a wet paint brush.  

 

Remember that all of the Dual mode Displace Fill Algorithms work based on the displacement specified in the Paint Source Offset control panel.  If there is no displacement specified you won’t see any smear or wash effect and the kind of effect you do see is determined by the settings in the Paint Source Offset control panel.

 

If you are into Studio Artist Paint Synthesizer editing its worth examining some of the Paint Fill Setup settings for these presets as they show off various approaches to creating semi-transparent paint effects with rim coloring and bleed like you see in real world watercolor paints.  The strategy for the parameter settings to simulate these kinds of effects is often different than how you would setup a more normal paint effects in Studio Artist.  

 

Again, one of the best ways to learn how to work with the Studio Artist Paint Synthesizer is to take an existing preset you like and start making specific edits in the Paint Synthesizer and see how the change you made changes the drawing behavior of the edited preset.  If you create a new preset you like you can then export it as a preset file so you can use it at a later date.

 

 

Most of these presets are designed to work best with manual drawing with a pressure and tilt sensitive pen and tablet like the Wacom Intuos tablets (my personal favorite).    Pen pressure is used extensively in this set of presets to control the wet bleed of the watercolor effects.  Pen tilt may also be controlling the direction of the wet diffusion in some of the presets.  There are a few auto-regionization presets in this collection and they are designed to work with the Action button for automatic painting effects (as opposed to manual painting with a pen).  Have fun!