The Canvangelist #12

T H E
C A N
V A N
G E L
I
S T
NOVEMBER
2003
can•van•gel•list (n.) 1. One who preaches the virtues of
Canvas to the masses. 2. A free ezine made with Canvas.
3. The little guy in the Padre suit who represents 1 & 2.
We're drowning in digital images!
Digital cameras continue to come down in
price and acquiring stock photos online
has become increasingly popular. Even
Kodak is backing off from investing
resources in the traditional film business!
Ever-improved and ever-cheaper digital
cameras are finding their way into the
hands of more consumers and pro
photographers than ever before.
But don't panic, help for managing all of
the thousands of your new images is at
hand! In this, the Second Anniversary
issue of The Canvangelist, we take a look
at seven different applications that help
you quickly and efficiently manage and
share your digital photos.
One is by the new owners of Canvas
itself, ACD Systems. The rest are either
from large, well-known digital asset
management companies or smaller, lesser
known shareware developers.
All of them get the job done.
Also in this issue we have a
special guest article by Dave
Rumfelt, representitive of
Canvas Wizards Publishing. Be
sure to check out his great new Canvas
Enhancement CDs on page 28. Very
useful for Canvas artists and illustrators!
If you haven't already, be sure to visit
www.canvangelist.com for info about
ordering The Canvangelist Collection
DVD, a unique resource full of over 1000
royalty-free digital asset photos, Canvasbased tutorials, original Canvas artwork,
presentation backgrounds and more.
We have several features later in this
issue offering information about many
new and updated imaging applications,
including the amazing Studio Artist 2.0
and beautiful PhotoGraphic Edges 6.
In other news, ACD/America recently
released a free updater for Canvas 9,
version 9.0.2. Download your copy and
see if it doesn't solve any technical
problems you may be having.
All in all, this is another exciting issue of
The Canvangelist as well as an
exciting time to be a Canvas
user! Thanks as always for
reading.
Mike Bedford
(Little Padre guy)
The Canvangelist
Our friends at ArtToday, Inc. have a couple of special treats for Canvangelist readers! First,
Effect by KPT Hyper Tiling
photos.com is offering us a year's subscription to their stock photo service for only $299 (a
savings of $200 off regular pricing!). Sign up at www.photos.com/promo/canvangelist. Then
over at www.graphics.com/modules.php?name=Gallery we now have an ACD Canvas image
gallery set up just for Canvas artists! Simply click on the link near the top of the page to apply
for your own free gallery, then show the world what you and Canvas can do together! I've
already put the first batch of my Canvas illustrations on display...
If you've shot hundreds or thousands of digital photos and the small-sized image preview in
Canvas' Place Image dialog is just not cutting it for you anymore, your needs have been anticipated and
answered lately by what seems to be an ever-growing number of imaging software developers. I
contacted a number of these companies and the result is an overview of several cross-platform and Maconly digital asset management software packages. Each of the following five pages shows a screenshot
of the software in action (featuring image galleries from The Canvangelist Collection DVD) along with a
brief description of the program and a list of its strongest features. And believe it or not, there are many
more than these to choose from! So fear not–keep shooting, and keep organized.
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Texture generated in Texture Anarchy. Photos from The Canvangelist Collection DVD. Cut out and composited in Canvas.
ACDSee has long been a leader in
digital image management on the PC,
and continues to be. The Mac version
of ACDSee is (aside from their recent
acquisition of Canvas) the only Mac
offering from ACD, and the version I
illustrate here. Since version 6 for
Windows was just released, I will give
special emphasis to its new features.
Back in April, 2003, ACD
Systems of Victoria, BC
Canada announced their
plans to acquire Deneba
Systems, makers of Canvas.
With the merger complete,
we especially look forward
to seeing what marriage of
technologies is in store for
those who know and use
both companies' products.
MACINTOSH VERSION 1.6:
•View, browse and organize images quickly
•Play MPEG movie and MP3 sound clips
•Open over 40 multimedia formats
•Export to 10 image formats
•Batch rename, rotate and export
•Save HTML layouts and slide shows
•Acquire images from your scanner
•Browse offline, unmounted image volumes
www.acdsystems.com
WINDOWS VERSION 6 New Features:
•Rate image quality numerically
•Burn photos to CD/DVD
•Search and Browse the results from
multiple folders/categories at once using
Easy Select and Selective Browsing
•Use the Image Basket to store selected
images for editing and sharing
•Edit images using editing tools
•Use the magnifying glass feature
to examine image quality in detail
•Three Step Acquire Wizard finds images on
your digital camera, scanner and CDs
•Create HTML or standalone slide shows
•Hollywood-style transitions in photo shows
•Advanced sorting and searching option
•Support for partial or full database backups
•Update older ACDSee databases to 6.0
The goal of Extensis Portfolio 6 is to "end the chaos" involved in naming,
tracking and accessing your digital files as you strive to complete electronic
file-based projects. Assistance includes:
•Copying and renaming files from your digital camera
•Using words or phrases to pinpoint your files
•Previewing stock photos without the CD mounted
•Creating slideshows and websites of images
•Collecting and burning images to CD
End the
c h a os !
NEW FEATURES in version 6 include:
•Synchronization of Portfolio catalogs with your data
•Floating Portfolio Express Palette for quick access to your catalogs
from within other applications
•Collect & Publish with links between your images and a generated
free browser
•Instant cataloging of any file, folder or disk via contextual menu
www.extensis.com
DO SOMETHING with your media!
•Import 128 media formats whether directly from the camera, via drag-and-
The folks at iView
Multimedia want to
help you not only
manage and
appreciate the many
image and font files
you have gradually
accumulated, but to
DO something with
them! Export as a
website, make a slide
show, send an email
attachment. A
complete solution!
www.iviewmultimedia.com
drop from files, folders, the entire hard drive, a web browser, the clip board, etc.
•MediaPro catalogs include thumbnails of each file, media information, tags and
descriptions and a file path back to the original item
•View your catalogs as a list, as thumbnails, or play back movies (see screenshot
below), QTVR, Flash and music. View layered Photoshop files using the Pager tool.
•Search and view thumbnails while keeping catalogs offline
•Freely share catalogs with friends and associates using the royalty-free,
cross-platform software iView
media catalog Reader
•Assign text and voice annotations
to media, even if discs and drives
are offline
•Create flexible slideshows that
can be exported as QuickTime
•Resize, remove red-eye, make
tonal adjustments to images
•Automation using AppleScript
•Store and back up media to CD
•And much more!
Microspot Ltd., located in Kent,
UK, offers a suite of Photo Tools on
one CD that helps you organize, store,
edit and print your photos. In this
section on image browsers we'll take a
look at their PhotoXtra universal
media collector. (On page 26 you can
find out more about the other two
applications included in the suite,
PhotoFix and PrintMix).
PhotoXtra supports the creation of
multiple albums to which you can add
content by the simple dragging or
copying and pasting of files or data.
Even record sound and add it to the
album! Then easily sort, search
and view your data. Drag your
media back out of the album
into other applications for
editing; create slide shows,
QuickTime movies or HTML
documents to share your
www.microspot.com
catalogs with others.
Lock or password protect
your files to prevent editing.
Add URLs to catalog items
dragged from the internet.
When combined with PhotoFix and
PrintMix, PhotoXtra rounds out a
most useful imaging arsenal! Buy all 3 as a suite and save 50% off the total price of the individual packages.
From NattaWorks in Japan comes PhotoGrid, a $15 shareware image app for Mac OS 8-X.
PhotoGrid, billed as a "quick image viewer," offers the functions found in applications much higher in price,
such as a Finder-like TreeView where you can quickly navigate through folders and files, live-drag resizable
thumbnail view, moving and copying of image files, drag-and-drop support, and a slideshow feature
complete with fade, loop, stop and random options. Rearrange a group of images into new categorized
folders, rotate images to display
upright, delete any unwanted images,
view technical information such as
resolution, color mode, codec, creation
and modification date and full path
about each image, and open any image
from a list of predetermined external
editing applications.
Not bad for a mere fifteen bucks!
www.nattaworks.com
cameraid.com
Over in Finland, Juri Munkki has
been working on an inexpensive
application specifically designed to aid
you when shooting photos with a
digital camera. Cameraid downloads
images directly from your camera for
browsing in the viewer window, one
image at a time like a slide projector
(right), up to thousands of images in a
session (as many as your RAM allows).
Keyboard shortcuts are provided to aid
your navigation through the photos
(especially the arrow keys).
The Shortcuts menu (upper right) is
the central area for accessing
Cameraid's capabilities, organized
under Batch Processing and Memory
Card Reader options as well as Cameraid-related Web Page
Bookmarks. Open a folder or disk worth of images using drag
and drop, then grade your photos to identify keepers and
clunkers. The batch processing dialog (right) offers powerful
functions (each with sub-options) such as selection, renaming,
copying, scaling, HTML image galleries, specific file handling
procedures, thumbnail style control, advanced image correction and a means of saving memos for other
users about batch processes you may have customized and used.
Meanwhile, Bozena Losvik of HexCat software has created ViewIt (below), a "small, fast extensible
and very easy to use image viewer" that can import most of the popular image file formats and display them
as thumbnails or in full-screen mode. As you would expect, a user-defined slide show feature is included. A
plug-in architecture allows users to add additional features to ViewIt as desired. Use the film strip to scroll
through the images (see screenshot below left) and select those you wish to view at full size. When you're
finished organizing, print full-page images or even a sheet of previews and filenames.
www.hexcat.com
.
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Brushes are no
You can use Brushes like rubber stamps to
create some very compelling images by combining a
variety of brush stamps together to make standalone images or background images for Web sites,
or other background effects. The resulting effects
can range from subtle to disturbing. Whatever your
aim is in doing so, creating images with Canvas'
Brushes is actually lots of fun.
Make your brush palette from various images and
image fragments by simply making an image
selection, then in the Brushes palette Option
Menu, choosing Define Brush. Some of your brush
images should remain recognizable while others
should look like blobs and shadows. Combining
odd and disparate stamps helps add depth and
interest to an otherwise flat and static image.
A brush’s stamped image will change in size
relative to the resolution of the image object
being painted into and the resolution of the
original image that the brush’s stamp was
captured from. The higher the resolution of the
image area, the smaller the brush shape will
appear when stamped. If you have the Brush
Size option on in the Configuration Center you
will see the actual outline size of the brush being used
relative to the resolution of the image object. This also makes it easier to see
where your stamp will be applied in relation to the rest of the image and stamps.
I find it best to use a solid color for the background and usually prefer black but even white works
well. It’s up to you and the results you wish to achieve.
Stamping is really a very straightforward process. Simply pick out an interesting brush, position it
where you want it to go and click. If it doesn’t quite look right, Undo and click in a new spot. I use
this process to eliminate brushes that don’t work well and then find another brush that works better.
You’ll be surprised by some of the art that suddenly emerges. Seemingly disparate stamps when
combined together can actually create an interesting
visual story.
Here are a couple of ideas for additional ways to use
brushes as image effects. Select a digital photograph
of some plate steel or similar metal, and use a dark
gray Brush Ink with the Mode set to Hard Light to
give the stamps an etched metal effect (as shown at
left). Try using a digital photograph (or even a scan) of
some wood and a
dark brown Brush
Ink with the Mode
Make an image
set to Overlay to
selection, choose
give the stamps a
woodburning
Define Brush, and
effect (example at
create compelling
immediate left).
new image effects!
(con't.)
Try applying your defined image stamps over vintage photographs,
posters or letters (left). Travel photos work great as sources too.
You can grunge up a brush by stamping with one brush and then
stamping over the result with another brush that has its Brush Ink set
to the same color used for the background, thus erasing through the
earlier stamp effect. In the first text example below, the same second
brush was stamped a couple of times in different locations over the
first brush's effects.
A distressed effect similar to the one described above can be applied
to text or objects using the Sprite tool. Just select the Sprite tool, click on
the text or objects and stamp away. The effect in this case is created by
use of non-destructive masking. Thus the underlying text stays “live” and
can be edited even after the effect has been applied.
Interesting textures can be made by repeated clicks with the same brush
(below left). Adding Opacity before each click adds of touch of the effect of ink on a rubber stamp
wearing out while being used. You can also make the results look more handmade by not worrying
about the accuracy of the stamps’ placement.
Even a single stamp without the
addition of further effects can add a lot
of meaning to an old photograph, as
shown by the addition of "lipstick" to
the girl's portrait (below right).
Experiment liberally with this
simple Canvas image brush
procedure and most of all,
have fun!
Stamp over a text object with one defined
image brush, then repeat the effect.
Contributor Dave Rumfelt has just released two
collections of Canvas add-ons, Canvas Enhancement
Pack Volumes 1 and 2, filled with thousands of ready to
use brushes and other goodies. See the ad on page 28
and visit www.CanvasWizards.com for more details.
Your Canvas Printing Press
Publishing with Canvas is a breeze! By Mike Bedford
The Canvangelist ezine you now read was a long time
Go t a n
'A' on t
his one
!
From Suburban Trends newspaper
in the making. My aspirations for making some sort of
magazine date back to 1972's construction paper-and-pen
"Srap Book" (as you can see, my first major typo also dates
back to this same production!). Complete with a smiley face
and Burger King promo stickers, the "Scrap Book" was a
handwritten journal of my thoughts and experiences at the
time, painstakingly penned onto lined notebook paper.
There was no Canvas at that time, nor were personal
computers anywhere near to becoming personal or even accessible to the masses. I guess it
was a case of being born too early to be enjoying such useful technologies...
A couple of years later, staying true to my construction paper-and-pen
technique, "Stories Of '74" came along, full of original humorous fiction and
a story about making a reflector telescope in the backyard using a mirror
made of ice (inspired by my dog's frozen water dish)! Other personal journals
and school writings followed (below). Early 1975 saw me grab another stack
The Canvangelist
of construction paper and Scotch tape a collection of my home-developed
publishing empire
black-and-white prints onto the pages, accompanied by brief descriptions of
began thirty years
the
scenes around my small hometown (the previous Fall's incarnation of this
ago with these two
book is shown above). Somehow this venture made the front page and inside
simple construction
paper publications.
of the local newspaper (lower left and below) and got me a letter from our
Now, Canvas' PDF
area's representative in Washington, D.C and a meeting with the town's Mayor.
format export
Fast-forward to 1988, after 13 years of high school and college yearbook and
is all the rage.
local newspaper photojournalism. I was
supervising the production of a summer
camp newspaper and came face to face
with my first Macintosh. But it wasn't until
1992, near the end of my Master's degree in
Communication, that I actually sat down and
learned to do proper desktop publishing. That
yearbook production class hooked me!
Sometime around 1996, while I spent my time
working with Photoshop 3 and QuarkXPress 3, I
saw a magazine ad for Canvas 5 (I
describe this experience in
issue #1). There followed a
few years of discovering
how Canvas differed from
the apps I had been using,
and building up a portfolio of
Canvas-made images and
illustrations. Then came the
fateful day in November 2001
when I was playing around in
Canvas, trying to duplicate the
look of an old school primer I
found on the web. It went very well! That one page Illustration quickly
grew into the 10-page premier issue of The Canvangelist! Issue #2
All I needed
immediately followed, and the rest is history.
back then was
On the next page I'll show you the mechanics of putting together each
paper, pen and
Scotch tape!
new issue. With your copy of Canvas, you can publish too!
(con't.)
Canvas' "city without walls" approach to layout means you can
freely place text, drawings, screenshots, etc. all over the work
area (below). I do all of my image duplication, retouching and
resizing and even some copy editing right here, moving ready
elements into the main layout (red box) and applying
transparency effects as necessary. Shown here is the AV Brothers'
Puzzle Pro 2 review (page 19) in the process of being designed.
The Document Layout palette (above) is where
a lot of production activity takes place. Double
click to name the page; click the new layer icon
at the bottom of the palette to add layers to
each page. I normally use two layers, the
bottom one for the images (which I eventually
select, group and render into one, shown
below) and one for text (to keep it from
getting rendered along with the images).
Right-click to
remove extra
points in the
vector container
after Combining
The element that requires the most attention to detail
in the whole process is adding text. My practice is to
design the background images first, keeping in mind
where text might go later. Once the final background
image is in place, I click on the Text layer and create a
vector container into which the text will be added.
There are three ways to do this: 1) Draw a simple text
box or linked boxes. 2) Draw overlapping rectangles,
select them all, choose Combine>Add to make them
into one shape (above) or 3) Use the Polygon tool to do
the same thing manually and in one shot. Select the no
fill/no stroke container and the text waiting on the
sidelines, choose Text>Wrap>Inside Shape. Done!
After each issue's
design is settled and
finished, I Save As
PDF from Canvas
itself (below and
right) at 72 ppi, using
JPEG compression. It's
my Canvas printing
press in action!
I
M
A
G
I
N
G
Who could have
imagined that you
could alter simple
pixels in so many
ways! In this issue
we explore the
bottomless creative
possibilities found in
Studio Artist 2.0, and
then examine other
creative and practical
imaging applications.
A
P
P
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S
Original image (top), duplicated with effects applied. Gradient masked and rendered in Canvas.
I'm an artist! Wait, I'm a
photographer! No, an artist! An
artist AND photographer! Or
am I an oil painter and sketch
artist? Ansel Adams Monet??
Dare I say that I think we have officially reached the point where we can stop
signing up for traditional painting and drawing classes and stay parked in front of our
computers, gleefully experimenting with a copy of Synthetik Software's Studio Artist
2.0 graphics synthesizer-? Well, it sure looks like it to me! Coming from one who can't
actually paint or draw, this bold conclusion may not carry much weight, but look at the
examples of "art" I created on these three pages using only my digital photos as source
material and some experimenting! No messy paint splatter, no crumbly charcoal and
pastels to clean up later. Just a little time well spent in my new art studio is all.
Well, let me take back what I said about classes–Studio Artist (available now for Mac
OS 8-X, with Windows support coming soon) ships with 3 CDs full of training videos to
help you get some idea of what this incredibly deep application can do. They supply 8
hours' worth of QuickTime videos because this program is not static, either while it's
working or in the results it creates. Choose
your art style options, click the Action
button, and watch the artist inside your
screen literally and rapidly paint or draw,
stroke by stroke, until your "artwork" is
complete. Or manually draw your strokes
in your own time. Turn your video footage
into moving artistic interpretations as well!
The Studio Artist interface (below) is not
what you may be used to, but this doesn't
impede your interaction much at all.
Studio Artist:
Where Art & Science Collide
www.synthetik.com
Paint patch wet glaze
Pomona College
entrance,
Pomona, CA
Paint patch pencils grease
Paint patch scribble
Interface appearance aside, Studio Artist 2.0 is exactly that–a
program for artists, not a business graphics application. It is
different from all others by virtue of being coded in Honolulu,
Hawaii (for starters), but especially in that it takes its operational
and metaphorical cues from music synthesizers.
Studio Artist uses modular preset and userdefined patches as artistic procedures that
can be applied manually or automated if
desired. While the application ships with
2000 editable painting tool presets, these
are considered only
the beginning! Users
are encouraged to
create their own
custom patches from
the
various
art
modules available.
Each new art patch
stores information
Paint patch sketch soft
about brush shape,
fill color, and more.
(This reminds me
of the General MIDI music standard, where a signal
containing note, pitch and duration information
generates a corresponding sound on a synthesizer).
Synthetik makes practical use of cognitive neuroscience
research into the functioning of visual perception and
coded its Studio Artist to be, well, artistic! Either on its
own, or as an assistant to a trained human artist. When
creating the examples on these pages,
being new to Studio Artist and not a
real artist myself, I relied on these
You could draw this by hand, but
intelligent
assisted drawing features
why–? Studio Artist's intelligent
built inside of the application to create
assistant drawing function gets
the job done fast and well.
artistic interpretations of my digital
photos. I and those to whom I
demonstrated it
were amazed at
not only the realism of the artistic effects, but the manner and
speed in which they were created. I opened a source image,
chose from among the many operation modes (I tended to favor
the sketch and watercolor effects), and let 'er rip. (You can also
open one image and use a second as a source for the effects.)
The result? Art! And decent art at that,
if I do say so myself.
After spending some enjoyable time
experimenting, playing, exploring and
generating image-based artwork, I can
highly recommend Studio Artist 2 to
anyone who is already an artist, who
wants to be an artist or who doesn't
want to be an artist but wants to create
amazing computer based artwork
quickly, with great results.
NEW FEATURES FOR
STUDIO ARTIST VERSION 2.0:
There is a world of options
awaiting you in each and
every pulldown menu
•Paint Tools now have over 300
adjustable parameters
•Intelligent-Assisted painting
•Upgrades and enhancements to
Paint Synthesizer Brushes
•Support for advanced Wacom
Intuos tablet functions
•Many new Presets for Paint
Synthesizer, Image Processing,
Texture Synthesizer and Paint
Action Sequence
•Improved Canvas Layers
Improved movie output
•Drawing optimizations
•Interface improvements
•New image processing effects
•Enhanced Paint Action Sequencer
•Morphing and warping
improvements
•Much more!
What artistic
medium do
you feel like
working
with today?
Image operations
offer presets that
may be more
familiar to those
who already use
image editing
applications to
apply filters.
Image operation hue shift
Paint patch utility wide bristle
Original
Paint synthesizer
Never Do SQUARE Again!
Adding creative edge and
frame effects to your favorite
photos is one thing, but Auto FX's new
Photo/Graphic Edges 6.0 takes the process to a whole new level! Not only are you supplied with
3 CDs full of professionally prepared content, you can layer these effects using SmartLayers
technology AND use the 230 artistic brushes to paint on edge effects, as I have done at upper
left. The application runs as a plug-in or a standalone for maximum compatibility, and offers
unlimited undos (the applied effects are
not permanently written to your original
file until you actually save it). Begin your
work by choosing from among 14 overall
photographic effects, within the confines
of which you pick and choose edges to apply
as you explore the endless possibilities: Acid
Edge, Ambient Brush, Burned Edge, Distort
Edge, Edge Brush, Edges, Frames, Montage,
Photo Border, Photo Tabs, Putty Edges,
Smudged Edge, Transfer and
Vignette. Included in
the screenshot at
right are the
Burned Edge
Effect and
Smart Layers in action
while below I have
multiple adjustable edges
going on within one
image for a beautiful
and unique look!
Version 6 is backward
compatible with
the earlier
versions.
Original
10,000 Edges
1000 Textures
175 Frames
230 Brushes
210 Light Tiles
PDF Manual
300 presets
www.autofx.com
AV Bros. Puzzle Pro 2.0: A very puzzling piece of software...
From Petah-Tiqwa, Israel comes the new AV Bros. Puzzle
Pro 2.0 plug-in, which has as its main purpose the creation of
jigsaw and other puzzle piece effects in your images. A most
powerful program, Puzzle Pro 2 offers you complete control
over the shape, size and lighting of the pieces you create. In
addition to puzzle pieces, you can create maze, honeycomb
and engraved effects! Prepare to spend some extra time with
the 51-page PDF Help doc and their website in order to
understand and get the most out of this plug-in.
Puzzle Pro 2.0 works its magic in two main windows
(aside from the various other detailed adjustment and
Preset palettes that appear from the depths of the app!):
The Cutter panel (lower right) is where the actual puzzle
piece shape is edited, and the Main window (above),
which can take the form of Layout, Puzzle and Adjust
modes, is where you select which actual puzzle pieces will be affected or
not by the effects. Individual puzzle pieces can be selected and colored,
as well as deleted or exported as separate pieces into their own
Photoshop layers (which can be accessed separately in Canvas; you'll be
interested to know Canvas is actually listed as one of the
officially supported host apps for Puzzle Pro 2!).
The screenshot below shows how you can manually
edit the custom shape of each puzzle piece.
Jerusalem Wailing Wall
and Qumran cave photos
now available on The
Canvangelist Collection DVD
Sample features:
•Using a Splitter not only
as a shape for cutting an
image, but also as an
object to be drawn
•Saving the knife's shape as
an .EPS, .AI or .AVPH
(Puzzle Pro 2.0 format) files
•Using the channels of the
document (document's
current selection, RGB,
CMYK or Gray channels,
alpha channels and layer
transparency) as a source
for selection
•Bevel, Gaussian Blur,
Motion Blur, Opacity, Color
Overlay, Hue/Saturation and
Brightness/Contrast effects
•Saving the selected pieces
as a multilayer .PSD file
Jan Esmann, artist and software
developer from Denmark, has updated his
Power Retouche suite of Photoshop
plug-ins so both the Mac and Windows
versions are complete and identical. The
suite offers a full range of image
correction and enhancement options. On
this page I used the Edgeline and Posterize
plug-ins and a Canvas gradient mask to
create the background image (see
separate screenshots).
An example using the
Studio B/W plug-in is
shown at the bottom
of the page.
Original
Visit the website for free
tutorials and user guides
for each plug-in!
powerretouche.com
www.asiva.com
Selection by masking and adjusting the attributes of
individual objects in images have to be among the most performed
image editing activities. The folks at Asiva (Shapiro Consulting
Group) are best known for their video matte removal software.
Now, this same unique technology is available in plug-in form for
use with editing your still images. The three plug-ins on these two
pages are based on the technology found in AsivaPhoto, but are
offered as plug-ins so you can work in a more familiar environment.
The Asiva plug-ins make their selections not by primitive use of
a Lasso, but by color range. Quicker, easier and more accurate.
Asiva Shift+Gain (above) exists to help you change the colors in
an image, as I have done here with this photo from Germany
(the original image is used in the background). The three curve
windows are for selecting the target color range that you wish to
alter. From top to bottom are Hue, Saturation and Value Maps.
In my examples, I shifted the color values in the image and got
two completely different artistic results. A more practical use
would be changing the colors of clothing for publication in a
catalog or advertisement. Use the eyedropper to select the value
you wish to work on, then adjust the sliders to suit.
Adjusting gain is the alternate operation performed by this
plug-in, using the same approach and tools.
Next we will look at the other two new plug-ins from Asiva,
Correct+Apply Color and Sharpen+Soften.
Asiva is known for its expertise
Let there be light in this dining room!
Finally, Asiva technology can be applied to the
sharpening and softening of an image. Again there are
another 60 pages of manual to digest (attesting to the
power of these plug-ins), but again I will summarize:
Choose either Sharpen or Soften from the pulldown
menu. As with the other Asiva plug-ins, you can apply
sharpening/softening to only a specified tonal range,
using the three Maps common to all three plug-ins. Using
this approach, you can apply differing levels of treatment
to highlights, midtones and shadows, such as in a
portrait. This is a far cry from the usual meat-handed,
across-the-board unsharp masking or Gaussian blurring!
Asiva recommends you get up to speed with your
knowledge of color theory to get the most out of all of
their plug-ins. Of course, the manuals discuss Color
Spaces and Color Models, including Tristimulus Values (!).
The photo from
Europe used on
page 21 is
available on The
Canvangelist DVD
in hi-res form.
www.asiva.com
when it comes to color theory. Just so
you know–the PDF guide for the
Correct+Apply Color plug-in (left) is 60
pages long! Let me try and summarize:
To correct/alter a color, click and drag to
select the existing color. Click on the
Target Color rectangle, and choose a new
color. Immediately, the original color is
changed to the target color!
Applying a selected target color works
in the same manner, except that you
begin with a prepared color and apply it
to the specified color range in your image
(replacing skin tones, for example) using
the Blend Amount Slider.
Throw away your camera filters, and while you're at it,
ditch your wetlab darkroom! They're all replaced with the
Digital Film Lab by Digital Film Tools of Los Angeles.
As you can see here, Digital Film Lab is capable of some
radical reinterpretations of your 8- or 16-bit images, using
DFT's in-house proprietary software packaged as a plug-in
you can now own. For the background image, I used the Post
Color Correct module. The blown-out image of the house
below was created with Overexposure, while the
scenic image was made moody by
using the Gradient module.
Modules:
•Color Correct
•Bleach Bypass
•Low Contrast
•Flashing
•Overexpose
•Diffusion
•Blur
•Grad Grain
•Post Color
Correct
www.digitalfilmtools.com
www.asf.com
You'll recall that we
reviewed Digital ROC
and SHO in issue #9
(page 10), and enjoyed the great results they gave on color-challenged
images. Windows users were the first to enjoy the plug-in version of
Applied Science Fiction/Kodak's Austin Development Center's Digital
GEM, and now Mac users can too. Digital GEM addresses the noise
inherent in 8-bit digital images (regardless of original source) and offers
you options for sharpening as well.
In the example shown here, I am reducing JPEG artifacting in a digitally
captured image. In addition to the expected sharpening option, you can
also add artistic softening effects by pulling the Clarity slider in the
opposite direction than you would to sharpen.
I admire imaging applications that offer fun and/or useful filters,
and Paintfx 1.2.1 by Mien Software does both! (Paintfx is brother to
MediaEdit, which is used for creating image effects for video.) Take, for
instance, the Pixelate effect (shown below). On page 2 of issue #9 of
The Canvangelist I used Canvas' Image>Area>Resolution option to
lower the resolution of an image until all that remained were large pixel
blocks. Achieving just the right effect
was hit-or-miss. But Paintfx makes
experimenting with variable pixelization
settings as easy as moving the Weight
slider until the pixels are just right!
The Effects menu gathers all the fun
creative filter
o p t i o n s
t o g e t h e r.
Image Filter
options
are
shown in the list at right. Effects also
include additional filter options and
image adjustments. In the example
above I am using Sobel FindEdges.
You'll note the Toolbox (far left)
includes the standard image editing
www.miennetwork.com
tools and brushes found in more
expensive apps. A steal for $19.95!
Pictographics' new iCorrect
EditLab 4 helped me see my
old Switzerland photos in a
whole new light! For 18
years since I shot it, the
mountain scene at bottom
(probably shot on some odd
brand of slide film) has had a
nasty yellow/green cast in
the clouds. A few seconds
with iCorrect (screenshot
below) and blue skies are
here again! Let's take a look
at how this treatment works.
There are four main tabs in the
iCorrect interface through which you
progress logically as you correct your
image: 1) Color balance (shown in
the main screenshot) is used to
remove color casts that affect the
entire image. Click on neutral values
throughout the image and let
iCorrect adjust the values for you. 2)
The black and white point selection
tab (upper right) actually alters the
tonal range, much like using Levels. You can manually select the perfect black
and white areas of the image, use the histogram sliders as shown here, or use
the SmartColor auto option. 3) The Global brightness/contrast/saturation tab
(center right) is used for redistributing tones as needed. 4) Hue selective
editing (right) works on user defined hue regions while leaving others
unaffected. Use the color ring to select the particular hue you wish to edit.
So we've got four powerful options for auto or hands-on color correction!
www.picto.com
A complete photo editing, storing
and printing suite of applications!
Earlier in this issue (page 7) we
took at look at Microspot's PhotoXtra
photo organizer. They also offer two
other Mac OS-X only
companion applications,
PhotoFix (left) and PrintMix
(bottom). PhotoFix has some
interesting effects included,
such as the Shrink Distortion
filter (shown at left, along with
the original uncorrected digital
image) and an effective
Hue/Saturation dialog (below).
PhotoFix, using only minimal
system resources, can also
handle common image editing
tasks such as retouching, masking,
cloning and airbrushing. If you're an
iPhoto user, you can drag those image
files directly into PhotoFix for editing.
Use the TWAIN support to scan images
directly into PhotoFix or import them
from your digital camera.
Wingy-thinged
blue person
sculpture shot
outside of LA's
Staples Center.
When you're finished
editing and prepping
your images, Microspot's
PrintMix is a handy app for
showing off your work!
Arrange and present
various configurations of
your photos using the
provided Layout options
(right) for printing on one
sheet of paper. This saves
and makes the most of
your expensive resources.
Use the Frames options
to add borders to the
images, as I have to the
image in the layout.
All three of Microspot's
apps can be purchased as
a cost-saving bundle.
L E T T E R S
I know your ezine and read it often! I have saved all of the issues so far for reference...what a great
resource you provide. Between your site and the excellent website Deneba [now ACD] provides
there is a lot of good information. / Regards, Sara Froehlich, www.eclecticacademy.com
Great site you have on Canvas, Mike. I am marketing manager at Eclectic Academy, by way of
introduction. I have been playing with Canvas through several versions but really don't know much
about it so plan to take Sara's [January, 2004 Canvas 9] class. It is an awesome program. Just
wanted to touch base and compliment what you are doing. / Cheers, Ann Roberts
... another great issue... ... and timely for me as well... ... i continue to explore the use of plug ins...
... and the smartscale you reviewed this issue... ... *may* come in very handy for my current
project... Thanks again for all the great info over the past couple of years. It has been integral in my
evolution from complete novice to "hack". ;-) / eric
Thank you! It looks great; can't wait to read IT ALL. / Robb
I downloaded the latest Canvangelist. It's always interesting reading. We tend to get myopic about
our own projects, which is why your mag is such a gift. Thanks. Will
Amazing stuff again, Mike. How do you do it? My only criticism ... I feel intimidated ... 8-) / Geoff
Well done Mike! Looks great like all the others. / Regards, Adrian
I've been appreciating your tutorials. Keep up the great work. / Michael
Sure, I know the publication, it's great. / Regards, Chris Dickman, Graphics.com
Many thanks for sending along the publications especially #9 do appreciate the review.
Thanks again for your interest and support.
Best regards, Michael K. Conley, V.P. Marketing, Kodak's Austin Development Center