h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Painter, the Rolls-Royce-Alfa-Romeo of paint programs. Photoshop is a cadillac, over-priced and cruising on the reputation it used to have. I'm going to buy Expression when the owners, who bought it back off Metacreations, issue the new version. It's kind of like Adobe Illustrator, for vector-based art, but the denizens of the painter lists say Expression is better.

Anybody else working with a stylus and tablet?

Mind you, Redbeard says if I upgrade from 5.0 to 5.5 in Photoshop, I'll find it has a lot of web-friendly tools for graphics. Since I've already spent the big money, I will probably do that when I get back from New Mexico.

Let's not forget the fashion show next month! I better get in touch with Lintilla, she's not been 'round of late.

A man who has been checking out the weather at some of the New Zealand/Aus Antarctic bases http://www.antdiv.gov.au/stations/live.html pops in.

Morning all. Champagne? Y not.

Don't drain my elf-powers, Løøny. The self-refillable champagne bottle is in the fridge, but if you're going on at same rate as last night, not even I will be able to keep up with you

Thank you. Gets bottle and moves to the veranda to check out the website of atoll Tuvalu http://www.theodora.com/maps/tuvalu_map.html

*dramatic entrance!*

Hola!

*dramatic exit to veranda*

Løøny, pour me a Y of that champagne, while there's still some left!

So often I get half way through a project in Photoshop and then I start again in Painter because it just does the job better.

I thought Expression had been discontinued. To whom has it been sold? In any case, it is not an Illustrator replacement although it is fun and interesting to use. I prefer Macromedia's Freehand myself although I use CorelDraw a lot because I have it on my computer at the university as well as at home.

I nearly always use a stylus and tablet. I'm just thinking of replacing my rather battered old tablet. Peregrin and I are going to the Computer Arts Live 2000 exhibition in London next week. I suspect I shall spend a lot of money.

Freehand and PhotoShop are the industry standard in commercial print shops worldwide.

Amy, the exhibition sounds interesting.

Peregrin and I are looking forward to it. We're taking London by storm. I hope London can cope!

Avoid the Dome, the new walking bridge over the Thames, the beggars, the grime, the crime....

We are going to The Dome! The bridge is closed though.

And I, a dedicated Photoshop user But I use painter... and paintshop... and just about everything else out there. Remember Lil, I have a copy of 5.5 for you.

[t]

Well, the program I was mentioning is MacroMedia FireWorks...the best program in my opinion. All my graphics (and remember, I'm a beginner)were done on that...the glowing on my webpage..all the titles are the same because of some neat style-features...

Sorry, I'm back at WE thismorning, so my m's on the keyboard are dodgy...

Morning

*OJ and an apple donut, please Matina*

There's a challenge for you, Big C: Write posts that contain no "m"s whatsoever. I would have problems, since Amy has an m in the middle, but you have the advantage there.

How is your realisation project coming on? I have added some extra places in h2g2 to my Beyond the Map page http://www.h2g2.com/A413308 and I have a few more things to include yet. My attempts at drawing h2g2 island have not been satisfactory so far.

Oh, it is an island is it?
I had a discussion with Joe about that...I thought it was on the underside of a continent...it's not necessary to know though...

*post was copleted without m's...*
*how post would look like with m's:*

Oh, it is an island is it?
I had a discussion with Joe about that...I thought it was on the bottom of a continent...it's not important though...

Morning all.
Had a look at those webcams looney, they do look like rather impressive places to have the office

As for computer art, I've no idea as I'm no artist.

Looney sez: Freehand and PhotoShop are the industry standard in commercial print shops worldwide.

Painter as it stands has some known bugs -- some of you might remember me losing several days worth of work by trying to save a 52MB file in native Painter format. I am now working in Photoshop format, in Painter, without a single problem. Except, of course, that I can't use certain special effects. But this is a restoration, so it's not an issue.

Anyway, Painter is, in spite of its flaws, considered the best fine arts digital app anywhere, unequalled in its ability to mimic the behaviour of real brushes, pastels, watercolours and so forth. It also mimics the textures of the medium one draws on to an uncanny degree. These two factors alone are putting me way ahead of the Photosloppers in the art of restoring damaged old photos.

There is a plug-in called Deep Paint which can be added to Photoshop, but according to list discussions I have read, this product still doesn't match the breadth of Painter.

I slam Photoshop a lot, but I do come back to it when I have to get the colour gamut of an image ready for print. As you say, it's the industry standard for print shops.


Expression was purchased from the company that created it by Metacreations, Amy, and the original company then bought it back. I think they have been doing a roto-rooter on the code to make it theirs again, and adding improvements before releasing a new version under their own name. I am going to have to look through my old painter-list digests (you can subscribe at [email protected]) to tell you who the owner is. I'll find us the URL.

*Matina has meanwhile brought Lil some OJ and an apple spice donut, having observed her looking covetuously at Amy's doughnut*

Expression 2: http://www.creaturehouse.com/xprnews_frm.htm

[M]

Matina, a Y please!

*surprised indeed to find champagne bottle in fridge, heading for veranda*