Studio Artist lets you turn on or off alpha compositing in the Canvas View.
Note that this is very different then other programs like photoshop, where alpha compositing is always on.
Studio Artist layers are composed of a RGBA raster image buffer (and a bezier path frame buffer). You can use the A alpha channel image in many different flexible ways in Studio Artist. So, in addition to using it as a buffer for an alpha transparency mask for the layer, you could use it as a temporary storage buffer for image processing effects, as a way to associated a specific selection mask with a layer, as a depth buffer, as a stereo disparity map. The choice is up to you so that you can be creative with it.
Here's a tip introduction to layers.
If you want to turn on Alpha Compositing for the Canvas View, you can do so.
You can use the Canvas : Alpha : Enable for View menu toggle to turn alpha compositing in the Canvas View on and off.
Here is a tip on working with alpha channels in layers.
Saving a canvas view as an image with an embedded alpha channel.
Yes, you can do this. You need to have the Canvas Alpha Enabled for View.
And you need to use a raster image format for your output that supports embedded alpha (not all do mr jpg). We suggest using PNG for your output format when you want to save an image with an embedded alpha channel.
What about embedded alpha channels in movie file output. Sure, you can do it. And again, what you use to generate the output alpha channel can be very flexible.
Here's a tip on generating movies with embedded alpha channels.
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I'm going to preemptively apologize if i ever sound grumpy when discussing this. The question does come up a lot. I have answered it a lot.
Here's the thing. We assume that all of our users have looked through the Studio Artist Tips Site. It's a great 'getting started' resource for Studio Artist information.
It's right there in the main Help menu inside of Studio Artist (in case you forget about it or where it is located).
If you have not been there before, please check it out.
If you have been there before, take another look. You might learn something new.
If there are other topics you feel we should cover in there, please speak up here on the user forum. Or you can email me personally if you want to. We will be updating things in tips anyway soon to cover 'new' things. So any feedback on additional 'getting started' topics we need to cover is really useful for us. Again, we know the program, so we might think certain things are totally obvious, but if you aren't inside of the Studio Artist universe, maybe not.
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