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Element Selection
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 Element Tab |
Of an Artstream document's 3 basic elements; shapes, stories and text, only shapes and text have paint attributes. A Paint attribute can be assigned to either a shape or text element, based on the Element Tab located at the bottom of the Paint Palette. The raised and highlighted tab represents the selected Element. |
| Component Selection and Color Display | |
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Shape elements, and text elements are included in a document immediately upon entry of their points or key strokes respectively. An element's visibility however is determined by the paint attributes assigned to any of its 3 available components: Fill, Stroke and Shadow. Based on the Element Tab, the paint attributes of any of these 3 components can be set, for shapes or text. Components applicable to shapes and text elements.
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When the color is non-null, the current color for each of these components is displayed, in the color preview window. In this window, the fill color is displayed in the inner box, the stroke color in the thick boundary, and the shadow color in the off center box. A checkerboard background is used to represent the current transparency value. |
| Color Mode Selection | |
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Available Color Modes include:
 icon), is selected
in the color mode bar. When a non-null color is picked, the object is either
filled, stroked, or shadowed, (based on the component selection), in the
current color. |
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Color Palettes and Mixers
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When in the black, white or process color mode, colors can be selected from any of several palettes or designed with color mixers in any of several color spaces. When a Custom color is selected, named colors can be selected from the associated palette. The color wheel and color palettes all allow direct selection from a range of colors. The color mixer allows the mixture of different channels in the current color space. The WYSIWYG toggle enables the sliders to point to the actual resultant color, or when turned off, indicate min. and max. values for each color mode. The color mixer includes control of transparency. The colors on the Paint palette are all represented at their full opacity. The preview window of the Paint palette displays the selected color at it's current transparency level, over a reference background. |
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Brush Styles
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The brush style palette displays the list of all available brushes in the upper window, and the list of brushes currently used in the document in the lower window. The default brush style, a solid brush, represented by a solid trapezoid, is included by default. The current brush can be selected from either the upper, (unused brush) or lower, (used brush), window, but a brush does not appear in the lower window until control points have been added while it was current. Certain parameters of each brush style can be adjusted by double-clicking on the one of the active brushes in the lower window. This launches a palette from which several transformations can be applied. For more detail of how brushes are created and transformed, see the Brush Style section of General Paint Attributes. . |
Some attributes can be assigned to all paint components, while others are component specific. All Paint attributes can be applied to the whole element for a given component, and some can also be applied to the individual anchor points of the stroke and fill, (not shadow), components. The following summarizes the attributes available to all paint components. All listed attributes are assignable to the whole shape element, while entries with asterisks are also assignable to individual anchor points of the fill and stroke components.
| General Paint Attributes Palette | |
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While individual contours can be assigned distinct paint attributes, contours combined into a composite-shape all have the same paint attributes, based on those of the parent, or back most contour. For further information, see the Composite Shapes section.
Color is available for all components. A selected component is enabled only when a non-null color is assigned to it. The destination of the color is determined by the component selection bar on the Paint Palette. Colors may be selected from named or process colors. Process colors can be selected from the color wheel or color palettes, or generated by adjusting the sliders in either the RGB, HSV or CMYK color mixers. Custom colors can be selected from a named list. A color can be applied either shape-wide or to selected anchor points of a stroke or fill.
Transparency is available for all components. Transparency allows any colors beneath the shape to be visible to an adjustable degree, Transparency can be applied to any solid or multi-color brush style, including those with internal transparencies. A transparency value can be applied either shape-wide or to selected anchor points of a stroke or fill.
A semitransparent, multicolored shape.
Brush Styles are available for all components. In Artstream the Brush Style is a very broad and important concept. The Brush Style allows a wide variety of source data to determine where and how densely color is applied by a drawing tool. The ability of Artstream Brush Styles to use resolution-independent Artscript vector data, and its ability to deform this data along, or inside, any path enables Vector Paint®, an innovation pioneered by Mediascape and one of Artstream's most powerful features. The source data for a Brush Style can include:
While this encompasses a very diverse range of source data, any input conforming to the above 3 formats is summarily referred to as a brush style. By default, several brush styles, (all Artscript format), are included in the Paint Palette on startup.
 Brush Style Menu |
New Brush Selection, and Brush Transformation Dialog |
Double clicking the highlighted brush icon launches a
Brush Style Dialog that includes a drop pocket, finder, and file browser launcher to add new
brush styles into the Brush Palette. Also included are option menus to set the
Fit Mode and Cycle Mode of the Brush Style. The Brush Style Dialog
also allows settings for transformations to the Brush Style including
independent X & Y Offset and Scale, and a rotation angle.
| The Fit Menu applies a transformation to the source data based on the following criteria: | ||
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Fit Shape causes the source data to deform along the path of the fill or stroke component. Overrides user transformations. Fit Sides fits the source data to the height and width of the component (fill or stroke), bounding box. Overrides user transformations. Fit Width fits the source data to the width only of the component bounding box, preserving the aspect ratio. Overrides user transformations. Fit Height fits the source data to the height only of the component bounding box, preserving the aspect ratio. Overrides user transformations. Don't Fit applies no default transformation. Allows user transformations. |
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| The Cycle Menu assigns end conditions when source data is smaller than the bounding box of its assigned component | |
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Repeat causes the brush style to repeat until it fills its assigned component. Clamp leaves a single instance of the brush style where the last colors on each edge are spread to fill the assigned component. |
You can define additional brush styles and add them to the palette at any time. Vector brushes can be designed in Artstream, then exported as encapsulated Artscript. See Vector Brush Creation for further details on creating new, resolution independent brushes. Raster, (fixed resolution), brushes can be obtained in any supported raster format.
Overprint is available to all element components. Setting the overprint option for any component allows a shape component beneath an opaque shape to be included in print separations instead of being excluded or knocked-out. This allows any underlying darker colors to contribute ink to the overprinted lighter colors when printed, if desired, The overprint option is set on a shape-wide basis. The effects of an overprint are output device dependent, and are not represented in the display.
