Tuesday, April 18, 2017

Directly Painting onto my Phone

I have been itching to try this out for a while (David Hockney has been doing it for years) and my new phone seemed the perfect excuse to try out some software. I had downloaded the free or trial versions of a number of app Wacom’s Bamboo Paper, Autodesk Sketchbook, Corel painter mobile, Adobe Sketch and an app I had been using previously called Marker.

I have to admit it was a joyful trial, more a test of my patience. Autosdesk & adobe’s app would work without signing up for an account (not here in the land of low band width. So did Corel it wanted to upgrade because my trial had run out? Strange since I just started to use it, but it did let me work. Wacom’s Bamboo Paper is really set up to exploit their pens but I could use the basic set of brushes. They also want you to purchase additional items. No thanks, for me its try before you buy. I just want to try out plein air sketching directly onto the phone!

1492410893613 created with Marker app    Created with Bamboo Paper

So I did get to try three options, first using Marker which simulates using marker pens. Way to bright and very limited colours but it free and easy to use. The Wacom Bamboo paper is a nice little sketch book/journal into which you add you new pages and sketch on them. The tools available in the free version are limited but quiet serviceable, I can see myself experimenting more with these. I was expecting corel painter to be easy to pick up (since I have the full corel painter software 2017 now) however the touch screen mode is different enough to frustrate me, particularly in choosing colours. I gave up my first attempt took a picture to trace over and ended up testing out the colour cloning ability (with a very purple result). I think it is an issue of picking colours on a highly reflective surface or maybe I’ve been out in the sun too long.

the old bearded heath created with Corel PainterThe Old bearded Heath as a clone painting

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