Background music is Copyright © 1996, 1997 by Michael D. Walthius. All Rights Reserved.
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next thing discussed in chapter 7 is the creation of fractal
patterns. Detailer's fractal pattern creator is accessed via the
pattern/make fractal pattern drop down menu. The dialog box thus
activated has a preview of the fractal pattern. Numerous options are
available. The power slider determines the degree of detail. The
feature size slider determines the number of features per tile. The
softness slider sets the softness of the features. The size buttons
determine the size of the tile. There are 3 channel options: height
as luminance, gradient bearing and surface normal. Height as
luminance is good for bump maps. 
The
light areas are the high points and the dark areas are low points.
Gradient bearing "uses the red channel to display the bearing of
the down angle of a height field" and if you understand that
statement then please enlighten me! Surface normal "uses the
green and blue channels to represent the X and Y components of the
surface normal (angle perpendicular to the surface at a given point)
of the height field" and again I seek enlightenment!! 
I
just play with them until I get what I like. The last subject of
chapter 7 deals with the application of image materials and confines
the discussion to fills. When using the paint bucket icon the
controls palette should be examined. The control allows the selection
of gradation, pattern or color fill. It also allows the user to fill
either the image or the mask plus it provides a thumbnail of the
fill. The other fill technique is to access the edit/fill drop down
menu which will then display the fill dialog box. The thumbnail here
is much larger than the thumbnail in the controls palette and allows
the degree of opacity to be set. It will automatically fill a mask if
there is one and will fill the entire image if there isn't one.
hapter
8 addresses painting. Both images and models may be painted in
Detailer. The brush tool is used and painting may be performed either
directly on the model or on its adjacent texture map. The controls
palette is once again important since it is there that the user can
set the draw style to freehand 
or
straight strokes and also to set the opacity and grain. Detailer
supports stylus pressure effects. They can be a wider brush stroke
with greater pressure, greater color penetration with greater
pressure, etc. I counted 19 different basic brushes that include
pencils, water, chalk, charcoal, pens, felt pens, airbrush, artists,
watercolor, image hose, etc. Each brush has numerous variants. 
All
the brushes and their variants are instantly available from both pop
up lists and icons on the brushes palette. Several things need to be
considered when selecting a brush. Two important methods are build up
or cover. Crayons provide build up color. Multiple crayon marks of
red, green and blue will turn black. A yellow crayon applied will not
have much effect. Oil however is a cover type substance. Yellow oil
over black will cover the black. Eraser, drip, mask, cloning and wet
are some other brush methods. Anti-aliasing must also be considered.
Anti-aliased brushes have soft edges. The paper's texture will
interact with the brush. For the adjacent sample I used the soft
charcoal brush. The first mark is basic paper. The second mark is
with big grain rough. The third mark is with diagonal1. The fourth
mark is with tri-weave. The fifth mark is with the puzzle texture.
Opacity and grain was set to 100% for each mark. All were done with a
mouse. The brush control palette, previously discussed, allows nearly
any type of brush imaginable to be created. The rest of chapter 8
contains sample images of how each brush paints and provides a brief
description of it.
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9 addresses advanced painting. The brush size pallet is accessed via
the controls/size drop down menu. A thumbnail shows what the brush
tip will look like. There are 6 different brush tip profiles
available. The procedures are to make the various adjustments then
click on the build button and Detailer will build the brush. The size
slider adjusts the size of the brush. 
The
size slider sets the difference between the largest and smallest
stroke width for brushes that change their width based on pressure or
speed. The size step slider determines how the brush transitions
between sizes. When the slider is to the right, the transition is
more abrupt. The squeeze slider can change a brush from round to
elliptical. The angle slider controls the angle of an elliptical
brush. The ang rng is for angle range. To appreciate this feature the
advanced control sliders will have to adjusted to have the brush
angle change with the direction. The adjacent image with red paint
was done with the ang rng slider at zero degrees. The next image in
blue was with the ang rng set to 180 degrees. 
The
ang step slider controls the angular increment. 
There
are 4 dab types. Circular is controlled via the brush size palette
and is a fairly solid brush. Bristle is for a bristle type brush. 1
pixel is for single pixel editing and high zoom levels. Captured is
for captured brushes and will be discussed later. The spacing palette
is accessed via the controls/spacing drop down menu. This palette
allows several brush characteristics to be specified. 
The
spacing/size slider controls the distance between brush dabs for
each stroke. A 1% setting ensures a continuous stroke whereas a 100%
setting will cause each dab to be spaced a distance that is equal to
the radius of the dab. The minimum spacing slider specifies the
number of pixels between dabs. In the adjacent image the left
vertical stroke is with both sliders set to the extreme left. The
middle stroke is with the spacing/size slider to the extreme right
and the right most stroke is with the minimum spacing slider set to
the extreme right. There are 4 stroke types that the spacing palette
controls. The single stroke brush has one path while the multi stroke
brush lays down several randomly distributed dabs that may overlap
and are not parallel. The rake lays down a series of even
distributed, parallel dabs. The hose works like a hose that sprays
images and will be covered later. The bristles slider works in
conjunction with the multi and rake stroke types and controls the
number of bristles. 
The
random palette is accessed via the controls/random drop down menu.
The dab location placement slider controls a jitter effect. The
farther it is slid to the right the more random the dabs become along
the path of the stroke. The clone location sliders pertain strictly
to cloning. 
Cloning
is the process of copying information from one image and using it to
create another image or to add to the same image. With the
variability slider set to zero the image or portion thereof is cloned
precisely however a setting beyond zero will cause the image to be
displaced to a greater degree as the slider is moved to the right.
The how often slider interacts somewhat with the variability slider.
Some variability must be present for the how often slider to have any
effect. The effect it does have controls how often the variability
offsets occur. All the way to the right means a minimal frequency to
the offsets and vice versa. The random brush stroke grain check box
will randomize the grain for each brush stroke. The random clone
source will randomize the source of the clone that the user sets
prior to cloning. The well palette is accessed via the control drop
down menu. The resaturation slider controls the amount of color that
starts out with the stroke. When the slider is less than 10% the
color doesn't start off instantly but fades in as the stroke
progresses. The bleed slider is to control how much the brush's
colors mix with any colors that might be underneath. The dryout
slider is to set how quickly the brush runs out of paint. The bleed
and dryout controls interact with each other.
he
next subject chapter 9 discusses is the sliders palette which is
accessed via the control drop down menu. The sliders palette is
essentially a matrix device for tying eight different brush
characteristics and variables to eight different brush controls. The
fun part is that any brush characteristic can be tied to any control.
I won't go over all of them. Some have already be discussed. Bearing,
tilt and pressure all apply to the use of a stylus and drawing
tablet. All of the brush characteristics are also adjustable via
various palettes that have already been discussed. There are 7 brush
methods which are accessed via the pop up menu at the bottom of the
brush palette. Each method has a variety of sub categories which are
accessed via the next lower pop up menu. Each brush variant may be
saved via the brushes/variant drop down menu. Saved variants may also
be deleted. Brush shapes may be captured in Detailer. Just draw the
shape you wish to have in black on a white background, marquee a
square mask around it then access the brushes/capture brush drop down
menu. The captured brush can be enlarged, squeezed, etc. with the
brush size palette. The brush can be used on another image and, if
satisfied, the brush can be saved.
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10 deals with selections and masks. Selections may be made to images
but not to models. 
Selections
are areas that you can isolate to apply some sort of an effect. They
can also be protected from effects. Copying, floating and moving are
some other things that pertain to selections. Selections are
identified by marching ants that most bitmap editors also use or by a
black and yellow line. The mask is an 8 bit overlay that protects an
area from changes or encloses an area to be changed. The lower left
corner of the image window has some pop ups that pertain to the
drawing mode and the visibility mode. 
The
pop up on the extreme left has 3 icons. The one on the extreme left
is for the mask disabled drawing mode. The middle one is for the
masked inside drawing mode and the one on the right is for the masked
outside drawing mode. The next pop up concerns visibility modes. The
first one on the left is for a clear view, the next is to view the
red mask and the one on the right is to view the selection. 
The
rectangular, oval, lasso and magic wand tools are used to make
selections. The shift key can be held down to obtain a square or
circle. The lasso tool is a freehand selection tool and allows
additions and subtractions from existing selections by choosing the
appropriate button on the controls palette.
The magic wand tool is accessed from the edit drop down menu. When
the magic wand is chosen the magic wand dialog box with its HSV
sliders appears. The selection is made by simply holding down the
left mouse button while dragging the cursor over the image. When the
cursor is dragged across an image, the red area denotes the mask.
Additions can be made by either holding down the shift and dragging
again or by adjusting the HSV sliders. The magic wand only selects
adjacent parts of the image based on HSV. If the user desires all
parts of the image to be selected by the magic wand then the image
must first be selected by the rectangular selection tool. 
Even
though floaters are covered in the next chapter some comprehension
of the floater concept is essential since they are frequently
mentioned in this chapter. Floaters are images or portions of images
that float above the canvas. Since each is a seperate image, anything
that can be done to an image can also be done to a floater. Each
canvas and floater has a red mask that can be viewed by clicking on
the view red mask visibility icon. At this point I have describe
something that drove me crazy for a day or two. The selection/masking
process appears to be different for the rectangular selection than it
is for the other selection methods. To be specific, page 189 of the
manual states "to convert a selection to a mask: 1.use any tool
or method to create a selection, 2.set the visibility mode to view
red mask. The selection now forms the canvas mask." 
That
statement appears to be untrue when using the rectangular selection
tool. Examine the 4 adjacent images. Pay particular attention to the
drawing mode and visibility mode icons at the lower left corner of
each image. They are identical. The visibility mode is in the view
mask position for all the images. Note that the elliptical selection,
lasso and magic wand selections are properly masked. The rectangular
selection is not properly masked as the directions say it should be.
I have no explanation for this apparent anomaly and the manual makes
no mention of it. The edit/mask drop down menu provides several mask
controls. There is an invert mask control. 
There
is also a feather mask selection which opens a simple dialog box
that allows the user to specify the number of pixels to 2 decimal
places to feather the mask. Detailer also has method of measuring the
mask density. This could be appropriate where the mask has been
feathered. The eyedropper tool is selected from the toolbar then the
shift key is depressed. The dropper is placed over the image and when
the left mouse button is clicked the controls palette tells the user
what the mask density is. The V number on the control palette
provides percent information and the RGB numbers range from 0 for no
mask to 255 for completely masked. The auto mask feature activates
the auto mask dialog box. This box allows the user to create a mask
according to the texture, image luminance, pattern luminance or the
current color. 
The
color mask option displays a dialog box that allows the user to
create a mask based on a range of HSV values that the user controls.
Feathering is also available as is the ability to invert the mask.
The edit mask mode, which is accessed by clicking the icon circle
with the multicolored pie wedges located on the upper right edge of
the image box, has some advantages and disadvantages for certain
procedures. The advantages are that you can work on the mask to some
extent as if it were an image itself, you can use various brushes to
paint on the mask and a few effects may be available to apply to the
mask. While the manual states that the effects are available to apply
to the mask (implying all of them) I discovered that none of my KPT
plugins were available and very few others were as well. Its big
disadvantage is you are not going to be working on the image itself
in color and for selection purposes only the rectangular tool is
available. Yet another way to create a mask is to paint on the image
with a masking brush. Every brush that comes with Detailer from image
hose to pencils and everything in between has a mask method category
with 6 subcategories. Furthermore there is even a set of masking
brushes that are specifically designed for masking. The manual has
several samples of these special masking brushes.
All pages copyright © Roger A. Moncrief, Indepth Reviews, 1997
Thanks to Judy Gefter, !LuM! and Charles Blaquiere for their advice and counsel, some I heeded and some I didn't.