What is it? How to get it/Registration Installing Using Version History More Information

This image has had several effects applied: The apple's outline is straight graphite; The upper right and area below the apple is graphite with texture; straight texture is on the apple's surface. The left and right apples had filter strokes applied (Pointillize and Crystallize). Note: filter strokes are unsupported. Use at your own risk!

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About

Graphite is a Photoshop plug-in filter which provides a freehand pencil tool and texturizer. The plugin functions as a mini-paint program within the host program, which might be Photoshop, PhotoDeluxe, Painter, or any other program which supports Photoshop plug-in filters. Best results are obtained in conjunction with a pressure- and tilt-sensitive digitizing tablet. The software also works with a mouse. This file assumes that you are familiar with your paint software.

With Graphite you can apply graphite rubbing with varying textures, pencil hardness, size and shape. Effects are applied freehand, rather than by selection, preview and application. Eraser functionality is provided to gradually remove modifications and revert to the original image. Some of the primary features include the following:

• Apply color to the canvas with varying surface textures
• Graduallly apply surface texture/bump maps to the original image
• Selectively remove modifications with an eraser function, reverting to the original image
• Vary the width of the stroke based on the orientation of the tablet stylus, if available

This software was developed to take full advantage of the tilt and pressure sensitivity of a modern graphics tablet and stylus, and to provide a wider variety of painting tools within Photoshop. Look for additional tools coming soon.

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Getting the Program/Registration

There is a demo (BinHex/Stuffit, PPC, 68k, or FAT) version of this software available for download. The demo is fully functional but limits the textures available for use. The demo can be converted into a full version of the software by registering. You can register online, or if you prefer, you can register using the Register program included in the download. Here are the instructions for running the Register program.

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Installation

Drop the Graphite filter into your paint program's Plug-Ins folder. When you start your paint program, the menu containing Plug-In filters should contain an item called Brush, and which leads to a sub-menu containing Graphite.

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Using

This plugin brings up a moveable, resizeable window displaying all or a portion of the selected image. You can immediately begin drawing in the main image. While available memory determines how much of the image may be seen at one time, you can scroll to any part of the image or image selection. From here it should be straightforward to figure what everything does, so you joystick-heads can skip the rest of the documentation.

Next to the OK and Cancel buttons is a thumbnail of the entire current selection. Clicking and dragging on the thumbnail moves a rectangle corresponding to the area in the canvas window. You may also scroll from the canvas window by holding the Control key while dragging.

In the lower right of the main dialog is a texture swatch. Clicking in the swatch hides or shows the texture picking window. Additional PICT format textures may be pasted into the window via the clipboard, or dragged there from another application which supports dragging PICTs. The textures may also be exported in a similar manner (unlike Painter); the standard Edit menu functions are available for manipulating textures. The demo version limits the texture set available.

Textures may be dragged onto the canvas to be used as the current texture. In general, lighter-valued textures require less pressure to receive color than do darker-valued textures. The sample textures include dark, light, high-contrast and low-contrast examples.

To resize the brush, hold down the Command and Option keys, then click and drag on the canvas until the circle drawn is of the desired size.

If your tablet/stylus doesn't support eraser information, holding down the Option key when you start a stroke produces the same effect as using the stylus eraser function. Clear under the edit menu will revert the entire visible image to the original.

Depending on the stylus tilt, you get a narrow or wide stroke which is darkest at the tip and gradually fades in intensity away from the tip. If you don't have a tablet, or the tablet doesn't support tilt, you can only draw the narrow strokes.

Under the Settings menu are the titles of several floating control windows which can be displayed or hidden as needed. These windows allow control over the following options:

• Fade/Profile/Direction How the brush coverage fades out from center to edges; sometimes called "softness" or "hardness". Profile, or the shape of the brush tip, affects the brush fade. This control also affects the roundness, and rotation relative to the stylus angle.
• Dab Spacing How far apart dabs are applied in a brush stroke
• Textures/Lighting Change the azimuth and elevation of the bump map lighting. These values only take effect when the hardness is set to the blank texturizing setting (shown below). The textures in this window may be dragged to the canvas to use as the current texture.
• Save/Load/Delete Settings So you can keep your favorite brush combinations

Hardness Affects the color and amount of texture in a stroke. Graphite H and B values from EE to 9H are provided, as well as a blank value. Selecting a blank value applies the texture/bump map to the image, similar to texturizing plugins. Click on the black end of the pencil to change. Point Angle Tilt threshold at which a wider stroke is drawn. Drag at the right edge of the wooden pencil point to change. Tip Length Length of wider strokes. Drag at the right edge of the black pencil tip to change.

One of the windows displays a sample stroke which is updated as the other options are modified.

Version History

• 1.0.6
  Larger texture selection window appears in the Textures/Lighting floater.
• 1.0.5
  Extended brush control, allowing rounder/flatter brushes and fixed rotation relative to pen direction. Optimized brush creation results in much faster startup times on PPC and 68k versions. Filter strokes are available, but unsupported. Added support for older tablet models.
• 1.0.4
  More robust larger brushes. Added better compatibility with Calcomp tablets. Now works properly with transparent layers. Reduced disk footprint. Note: version in about box and finder info may incorrectly read "1.1".
• 1.0.3
  Added capability to save multiple different settings. 68k version released. Note: version in about box and finder info incorrectly reads "1.0.2".
• 1.0
  First public release.

More information

This file is a snapshot of the Graphite page. Please refer to that link for the most recent information.

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All content herein and related software is Copyright (c) 1997-1998 by Timothy Wall, Wall Art Software. The Register program was authored by Peter N. Lewis of Stairways Software.