Corel Painter 9.5 experiments

Thanks for all the birthday greetings, everyone! Jeff and I had dinner at Centro
(2472 Yonge St., Toronto, ON M4P 2H5 Tel: (416) 483-2211). It's become an annual tradition: once a year, I pick a top-end restaurant in Toronto for dinner. I ordered ostrich just because I've never tried it. It was good, more like beef than chicken, but not as tender as I had hoped. I loved how the desserts are offered: in tiny sample sizes ($4 each). We shared a mini banana split which looked nothing like a traditional banana split as well as very decadent chocolate croquettes which were served with a lemon custard. Yum. The restaurant was also GREAT for people-watching. :-)

My Corel Painter 9.5 arrived yesterday, a birthday gift from Jeff! I'm super-pleased with the improved brush response...much smoother and quicker. The boxed upgrade also came with two DVDs of training videos from Lynda.com, an online software training site that I've used before. And new user manuals, yay!

Because of work and FKO prep, I haven't had much time to read the manuals or play with the program yet, but I've posted a few of the quick experiments I've done so far. The picture at the top of this page was done using the new Image Hose elements in Corel Painter 9.5 and was the first image I created with my new software.

This was my second, an experiment with the Digital Watercolors:



The Digital Watercolors now allow the user to keep the layers "wet" between sessions, and you can even specify how much of a wet "fringe" you'd like.

I also knew that Corel Painter 9.5 had a new Artists' Oils set of brushes, so tried these out while doing a quick sketch of some gorgeous tulips that Ruth brought me for my birthday:



I used the Eyedropper tool to pick up colours from a photograph I took a few minutes before. I love the way the paints mix on the "paper"...much more like the real thing than previous versions. You can, of course, control almost every aspect of the brushes AND paints, including how they interact with each other. Looking forward to doing more experimenting with these virtual oil paints!

But now I have to finish some work and packing, because I'm leaving for FilKONtario today. Have a great weekend, everyone!

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My talented photographer friends

The photos above were taken by my friend Ray Van Kleef when he, Jeff and I were having brunch at Sugar Cafe (942 Queen St. W. 416.532.5088) yesterday morning.

I've always seen good portrait photography as being a combination of technical knowledge and the ability to capture the essence, but mainly the latter. I don't have the technical know-how so usually aim at the latter. Ray is good at both.

Ray Van Kleef

You can see some of Ray's other photos here. Just a few of my favourite Ray photos:

Bee: Ray took this photo in our garden.

No Joy: I was amused/horrified by the implied story in this photo.

Canoe Lake sunrise

Self-portrait

Beckett Gladney

Another of my friends with amazing photography skills is Beckett Gladney, and you can see her photos here. And here's an interview with Beckett on Utata.

Just a few of my favourite Beckett photos:

Paul and Riley

Alisa and Gracie

The view out the porthole

Saying good-bye

Self-portrait

Dave Huth

I met Dave Huth through my friend Rand. Here's a link to my Blathering about Dave, in case you missed it. I especially enjoyed a recent entry in 90 Seconds of Dave called "Where Does Laughter Come From?" which does a great job at capture the essence of "little kid humour." :-)

Dave is also a gifted portrait photographer, as you can see from this photo collage he did of Rand in his Dave's Friends & Family Photoblog.

Craig White

You should also check out my friend Craig White's Flickr set. Craig focuses more on landscapes and urban settings than people; his TTC shots have been getting a great deal of attention in the past year. This photo, for example, hit #1 on Flickr's "Most Interesting" page. One of my Craig photo favourites is this photo, which also made Flickr's Most Interesting page.

Craig is the editor of MapArt, a company which makes the best maps in the world.

Four more days until FilKONtario.

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Illustration Friday: "Monster"

The drawing above is for Illustration Friday. This week's topic: "Monster." I used Corel Painter 8 tools: Croquil Pen, Gouache, Thick Oils, F/X: Shatter & Fairydust effects. Jeff's getting me the Corel Painter 9.5 upgrade for my birthday, woohoo!

Had a good practice with Allison and Jodi last night. Worked on our concert set for next weekend, but also on a couple of Chris Conway's songs. Turns out he asked us ages ago, but Jodi never got the e-mail! Chris Conway's concert is at 8:30-9:30 pm on Saturday, April 1st at FilKONtario; Chris is the Guest of Honour.

Speaking of FilKONtario guests....



Just found out that Tanya Huff's "Blood" novels are going to be turned into a tv series!

From a CHUM Television press release:

"Blood Ties is based on Tanya Huff's internationally popular 'Blood; novels. When her latest love interest turns out to be a 450-year-old vampire and the caseload of her fledgling P.I. agency shifts from fraud artists and cheating spouses to battles with ghosts, ghouls, zombies and demons, ex-police detective Vicki Nelson realizes that her life will never be the same. The series will be produced by Kaleidoscope Entertainment and goes into production later this summer."

Apparently the head writer is Peter Mohan who has worked on Due South, Eerie Indiana, Relic Hunter, La Femme Nikita, Honey I Shrunk the Kids, Top Cops and Highlander among other shows. How very cool; I'm a big fan of Tanya's Blood series.

Tanya is the Filk Waif (Toastmaster) at next weekend's FilKONtario, by the way, and her concert is at 1:15 pm on the Saturday.

Only one week until FKO! Looking forward to seeing Sibylle Machat this evening; she's flying in from Germany today.

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Off Panel is seeking niche comic strips!

(Update: I asked Kevin and Tom to look over the info in today's Blathering to make sure I wasn't misquoting info, and they've provided some clarification. I've added their info below in bold. -- Debbie)

In yesterday's Blathering, I asked who dropped off our Mystery Package on the weekend. Found out the culprit...thanks to our pal Ray for the crackers!

Will Write For Chocolate has been updated. This week's column topic: "Freelance writers and e-mail: keep it professional." If you have any of your own e-mail pet peeves, please do add them to the WWFC comments section for this week.

Off Panel Productions is seeking new comic artists for their site, by the way, and I get a finder's fee if they sign anyone up because of me. So heck, here's a basic overview for those interested:

Off Panel is looking for comic artists (or people who have comic artist friends :-)) who also have knowledge and appreciation of a specialized field. Mine, for example, is freelance writing. Other comics so far include HCI/UX/usability, paleobiology and managing tech.

They let you keep all rights to your work. You can publish elsewhere at the same time, if you'd like.

You keep 80% of any advertising income. There are no fees, and you're not locked into any time commitment...as long as you give four weeks' notice, you can opt out anytime. (From Off Panel: "The 80% is for any revenue generated through Off Panel. Currently, that means advertising and paid syndication (if someone wants to put the latest
WWFC on their site every week, we have tools for that). Anything made not through our system is 100% yours. E.g., if you made a commission deal.")



Off Panel will provide hosting space, software tools and other infrastructure to upload comics and a blog entry with comments section. Your commitment: one comic strip and blog entry related to your niche topic a week. (From Off Panel: "Weekly is the minimum schedule we'd like to see but people are free to do more frequent schedule, so long as it's predictable and regular! =)")

You can opt for a more frequent schedule if you prefer, but weekly is the minimum. (From Off Panel: "The blog entry can be more than one and we don't actually require the blog entry per week but strongly recommend it. It's the main reason our site managed to grow so fast.")

Warning: You need to do your own marketing/PR as well as find your own advertisers (except for Google AdSense, which they'll set up for you). If you do find advertisers, they'll handle your revenue stream re: payments, etc. (From Offpanel: "We have a self serve system for advertisers and the 'you need to market/pr/find advertisers' is true but the context is that you know and love your subject so you know which sites and vendors are related to your audience. We simply can't tell you that because you're the expert =)")

I'm not expecting to make a huge amount of money off Will Write For Chocolate anytime soon, though eventually I may publish a print collection. But as Jeff pointed out, why not try to make a little money off something I feel compelled to do anyway? :-)

Reasons I signed up with Off Panel:

- They let me keep all rights. This was a biggie.

- They handle the revenue stream. I'd rather focus on the creative part and not the technical/revenue infrastructure building/maintenance. The latter was a time vampire when I worked on Inkspot.

- They're constantly working on ways to improve the site to help their artists.

- I like the weekly deadline.

- I love the idea of gathering niche comic strips in one place. I think this project's going to be pretty successful, and I want to be a part of it.

- I like Kevin Cheng and Tom Chi, the two guys behind Off Panel...though I've never met them, they seem very easygoing and helpful through e-mail and live chat. They collaborate on their own comic OK/Cancel from different continents; Kevin lives in London, UK while Tom lives in Seattle, WA.

You can see a recent CNet article on one of their cartoonists here. There's also info about Off Panel on the second page.

You can see their current strips here. If you're accepted as an Off Panel artist, then you need to come up with six strips before launch. (From Off Panel: "Creators don't have to have samples before contacting us as sometimes, we can help them find the topic to work on before they've started drawing. Samples of previous work help of course but not necessarily samples of the strip they'll be doing.)

If you have other questions, please let me know or you can apply here.

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Illustration Friday: "Tattoo"

Today's Blatherpic was created for Illustration Friday. This week's topic: "Tattoo." I had toyed with the idea of focusing on the drum interpretation instead, but in the end I wanted to do something more fantasy oriented. This time I experimented with Corel's Airbrush Tool. I was too lazy to select areas myself, so opted to make sure all the lines were closed off so I could use the Paintbucket tool to fill different areas with colour. THEN I used the Select Wand to select areas to airbrush.

Interesting to read about the wildly varying sleep patterns of all of you. Glad I'm not the only one needs at least 7 or 8 hours sleep a night. As for those of you who can easily survive on 6 hours or less and still remain cheerful...A POX ON YOU ALL! :-)

And finally, I keep forgetting to post one of my favourite responses to my What kind of book person are YOU poll. There were reams of wonderful posts about the care all of you take with the book, the bookmarks you use, how you would never dog-ear pages, etc.

Then my friend Andy posts:

"I only care about the content, not about the book itself.
So I use books for coasters, doorstops, hammers and missile weapons.
I open them out flat and stack other books on top of them. I write phone numbers in them. I lend them to irresponsible people. I throw books I don't like into the garbage. You hear that? The Garbage! So long, Ann Rice! They get covered with coffee grounds and black bananas! I eat french fries while I read, and get greasy smears on the pages! I read expensive hardcovers in the tub! BWAHAHAHAHAHA!

I was horrified, yes, but I am ashamed to say that I was also highly amused. And yes, Andy is still my friend (though I'm not about to lend him my books anytime soon).

Have a great weekend, everyone.

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