Jin Brown's Pixelalley -Tutorial - Creating Frames for Your Paintings... in Painter!

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Creating Frames for Your Paintings..
in Painter!
provided by Jinny Brown e-mail

This tutorial was originally written in June 2001 and shared on a couple of message boards.
I've edited it now to include instructions for Painter 8, Painter 7, Painter 6, and Painter 5/5.5, though the routine is basically the same in all of these versions.

Since a lot of folks learning Corel Painter (also earlier versions Metacreations Painter or Fractal Design Painter) haven't discovered that it's easy and fun to create mats and frames for their paintings, here are a few examples with general descriptions of how they were created:

Boy Painting - Using Paint Engine Filter

There's a description of how the image above was created and also a link to a cool little plugin that works in Painter 6 in the Fun with Brushstrokes section at PixelAlley. I'm not sure if that plugin will work in Painter 5 and Painter 5.5 but it should work in Painter 7 and Painter 8. The image description, as I recall, doesn't mention how the frame was made. I used the basic Select menu commands described in the short tutorial at the bottom of this page, then applied the Bevel World plugin to produce the frame's depth, highlights, and shadows.

(The zig-zags in the frame are due to my selections in Painter 6.1 getting wonky recently. I don't know what causes this but you should not have this problem.)

As you'll see, the example frame on the right, above, also has a zig-zagged frame. In this case, I decided that the peculiar selection problem resulted in a more interesting frame so I didn't bother to change it.. which can be done, by the way.

I used the following methods to create multiple frames around the paintings, then treat them in various ways:

NOTE: Before beginning these steps, increase the size of your Canvas by the combined number of pixels you plan to use for your single or multiple frames. To do this, choose a Canvas color and use Canvas > Set Paper Color. Then use Canvas > Canvas Size and type the appropriate number of pixels into the Top, Left, Bottom, and Right fields.

1. Use Select > All.

NOTE: Keep notes on the number of pixels you use for Contract, Widen, and Border in order to create multiple frames without forgetting how many pixels to contract and make the borders precisely next to each other. Also, it may be helpful to use Select > Save Selection, and note the name of the selection. You can find it either by looking in the Save Selection drop down list or in the:

Painter 8 Channels palette list.
Painter 7 Objects palette's Mask section list.
Painter 6 Objects palette's Mask section list.
Painter 5/5.5 Objects palette's Mask section list.

2. Use Select > Modify > Contract then type in the appropriate number of pixels.

3. Use Select > Modify > Border then type in the appropriate number of pixels.

4. Use any of the following treatments (use these, and/or others that you discover, alone or in combination... experiment and play!):

Effects > Fill, Using: either Current Color or Pattern.

Effects > Fill, Using: Paper and, if you want, adjust the Reflection slider to reflect the current Pattern.

Paint in the selection then use Effects > Surface Control > Apply Surface Texture.

Effects > Surface Control > Apply Lighting.

Make a selection and use Bevel World.

In the Painter 8 Layers palette, click the Dynamic Plugins icon, and choose
Bevel World.
In the Painter 7 Objects palette's Layers section, click the Dynamic Plugins icon, and choose Bevel World.
In the Painter 6 Objects palette's Dynamic Layers section, choose Bevel World, and click the Apply button.
In the Painter 5 and Painter 5.5 Objects palette's P.Float section, choose
Bevel World, and click the Apply button.

Now experiment with the Bevel World sliders. If you adjust the Reflection slider it will reflect the current Pattern.

5. When your frame is finished, to add a drop shadow, use Effects > Objects > Create Drop Shadow. Try the default settings first to get an idea of how they look. Then experiment to get the effect you want.

Have fun!

Jinny_________

Jinny Brown, August 13, 2004

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All Corel Painter screen prints on these pages are used with permission from Corel Corporation.