Hi Again,
Another newbee question. I'm looking at a Preset called Simple Head under Mosiaic. This is just an example, it could be any of them.
So I am trying to learn what, if anything I can/should edit and change in a particular preset.
If I Edit the preset I see 2 drop downs, psa seq context and generic. The context one has a lot of drop downs.
1) Are these typically edited, or are they left alone? What parameters are typically adjusted?
2) Looking down at the Editor window, I see 3 actions that will run. Are these typically edited, or left alone?
3) Generally, do we normally edit these presets, or just use them as is in combination with other presets?
4) Are there any presets created by users that can be downloaded by others? Anything would be great, but I am looking to learn to make cool Mosaic presets.
Many thanks in advance,
Gary
Replies
5) Continuing...for the preset "Text Banded" under Mosaic, how do I change the text that is displayed? I don't see where the text comes from in the preset.
6) Under Mosaic with Text, preset Chunky Blocks of Text, where does the text come from, and how would I know that or figure it out on my own?
So to figure out what a PASeq is doing, you can import it.
Then you can run a specific action step by clicking the red keyframe cell associated with that action step.
When you run the action step, the main Editor will change to reflect the adjustable parameter settings associated with the specific actions tep you just ran.
So we clicked a paint synthesizer action step.
You can then go through the individual control panels to see how they are configured for the paint effect.
If you look in Brush Source control panel, you will see it is setup for a Text brush source.
As to how would you figure out what the paint synthesizer does.
Well, how do you do that in any program? Any program that has a sophesticated set of diverse functionality.
You could read the Users Guide pdf if you enjoy that kind of thing.
It covers everything in the program.
The knowledge base blog posts at synthetik.com are also a good way to get exposed to new things. So there are blog posts on various text paint effects there for example. Look for something that interests you there, then read the article for an explanation of how the effect was made.
If you see a photo art post here on the uers forum, you coudl ask the artist for some tips on how they made it.
Another way i just detailed in the first part of this post is to choose specific factory presets you like, then look at how they are programmed in Studio Artist to achieve that effect you like.
7) Is there any way to loop through a set of presets and save a "gallery" of images of what the presets look like? Or, does such a gallery already exist?
I ask because there are too many for my little brain to remember - a gallery would be really cool.
You could use Gallery Show to do it.
Or you could use the Batch Process with a PASeq actions to do it.
8) Last question. The Mosaic Tiling and Half Tone section seems super cool. Any advice/examples/links on how to artfully combine those basic effects with other Presets elsewhere in SA?
Thanks again,
Gary
9) Sorry. Another question. For the PAS Dogs and Cats on Chipped Paint, I do not see how to change the image?. I looked in the editor, bit nothing seems to fit.
Load (import) the PASeq preset.
Run the specific action step you are interested in investigating and/or editing.
So press the red keyframe cell for that action step to run it.
If is a paint synthesizer action step, then look in the Editor in paint synthesizer classic operation mode to see what it does (how it is programmed).
So we have covered the Brush Source control panel several times as the first place to look for things like image brushes or image folder brushes.
And we can see that it is using an image folder brush, from the folder named Silouhette CatsDogs.
All of the factory paint presets (and associated PASeq presets) use image and image folder brush assets stored in the Brush folder inside of your main Studio Artist folder.
If you want to change the image folder bring used, you can run the File : Paint Synthesizer: New Image Folder Brush menu command.
So you could use that menu command to edit the image folder bring used for the paint effect.
Always a good idea to run your edited paint synthesizer effect with the action button after editing it to make sure it does what you think you tried to change it to do.
If you want to record that paint synthesizer editing change back into the PASeq action step you started with, then you would need to do that.
You could either option click the red keyframe associated with that AutoPaint - Dogs and Cats action step, or you could hold down the control key and click the left side of the action step, and then run the 'Interface to Action Step' context menu command.
Here's a tip on the PASeq Editor Options.
So those adjustable parameters for a PASeq have to do with overall settings values for the PASeq. They have nothing to do with the actual action steps that are recorded and played back in the PASeq.
Remember, a PASeq is a script of multiple action steps. Action steps that record and play back individual effect operations that are generated in different Studio Artist operation modes. So things like paint synthesizer actions, or IpOp actions.
If you click on an individual action step, then the Editor will change to reflect the parameters you can edit associated with the specific operation mode effect. So if you click on a paint action step, then the paint synthesizer parameters come up for editing in the Editor.
Those PASeq Editor settings are things like whether the PASeq plays back the status of the layers, or the staus of the mask check box when the action steps play back.
The Context submenu are all editiable paramters associated with PASeq Contexts only.
I was actually looking at individual presets, not PASeq. I should have made that clearer. Just trying to figure out what, if anything I need to worry about in there. Apparentl;y, as you say, they have to do with scipts so in the individual preset context I won't mess with them. Thanks!