#vector layers

People have asked me how I get my lineart looking so clean and smooth. Well the secret is: there is no secret. It's all done with vector layers!

:3

More art of my oc :P

i made a little tutorial on how i personally use vector layers! i have not covered every sub tool, just the ones i mostly use, but there's a lot more that you can do, so play around with them!

i am not an expert on art, vector layers, or software. i am entirely self taught, so i apologise if some things aren't clear. if you have questions, let me know!

Today we are proud to announce the release of Flame Painter 4, a new edition of a standalone paint and particle effects package for Windows and macOS. This game-changing version charges up the possibilities of digital painting while allowing artists to enhance designs and photographs with captivating life-like organic brushes.

“It’s an incredible journey! Despite seeing it grow from the first line of code, this new version of Flame Painter surpassed even my own expectations of what it is capable of. Your imagination is the only limit while exploring its possibilities.” says the founder and head behind Flame Painter, Peter Blaškovič. “With Flame Painter 4, a new version of this successful art package, creating and perfecting your digital work has never been more effective.”

Flame Painter 4 Key Features

• Particle Systems - The software supports a range of simulation types - Flame, Follow, Ribbon, Liner, Elastic and Fuzzy. The package comes with 3 default systems (Flame, Follow, Ribbon) users know from previous versions. Additionally, the new specially designed systems (Liner, Elastic and Fuzzy) are introduced as add-ons to match your specific workflow needs. We prepared more than 250 brush presets for you to experiment with. 

• Particle Brushes - Flame Painter’s organic brushes are a unique solution nowhere to be found in other software on the market. Flowing, lashing, neon, dots, or even tentacle-like brushstrokes create attention-grabbing effects on your designs. Flame Painter 4 is shipped with hundreds of new brushes.

• Brush Creator - Ideal for creating and customizing the brush designs, the advanced Brush Creator with a wealth of adjustable parameters is at your disposal. With newly introduced variables, the range of possibilities of how the brush can look and behave is really limitless.

• Import of Vector Paths -  Import an SVG file - either to one layer as a bitmap or to multiple layers as a vector which can be further edited according to your needs. Switch between brushes, edit the brush in Brush Creator or select different colors or gradients to match your specific design.

• Editable Vector Layers - Within a click, the vector brush strokes can be modified to achieve desired results. Flame Painter 4 also lets you import your own vector paths and have the particle brush effects follow them.

• Symmetry Tool - Create beautiful symmetrical artwork with any brush using only a few paint strokes with your mouse or tablet pen. Follow your artistic intuition and choose different colors or gradients to produce a fascinating scene. 

Watch the preview of main Flame Painter 4 features

• Advanced Palette Panel - The improved Palette panel gives you many new options for your work. You are able to choose any Color from the Palette which can be displayed as RGB, HSL, HSV, or HSLuv - a special mode which preserves color brightness. Moreover, you can choose from the default list or create own beautiful Gradient transitions for your brush preset and apply them on the stroke, lines or dots. Lastly, you can apply the palette from an Image - this option lets you import your own images.

• Canvas Size - Flame Painter 4 includes new tools to accelerate your creative workflow. Resize of the canvas has been designed to be very easy and interactive - resize by using the control points, or by entering the desired size of a new canvas in the edit boxes.

• Advanced Pick Color Tool - You are able to pick colors from the current layer or all layers with the new Pick Color tool. You can see in detail the previous color, color under your cursor and the newly selected color.  

• Selections - Other new tools shipped with Flame Painter 4 include a Selection tool for selecting a specific area of the canvas and performing operations on this selected area. There are various types of selection tool available: rectangular, elliptical, polygonal, freehand and Magic wand. 

• Improved Fill Tool - Fill tool enables you to fill not only the whole layer with the selected color or gradient but also the already painted strokes with alpha channel.

• New Filters - Professional color filters under the Filter menu allow you to make desired adjustments to your painting or design, with a help of Brightness, Contrast, Hue, Saturation, Lightness, Color Balance and other color filters. Moreover, ‘Black to alpha’ and’ White to alpha’ are very useful, especially when you import a picture with a background you want to get rid of.

• Photoshop Plug-in - Although Flame Painter works as a standalone application, a complimentary Photoshop plug-in ‘Flame Painter Connect’ is available. This handy tool gives you the possibility of exchanging layers between Flame Painter and Photoshop, making your creative process seamless and easy. Flame Painter Connect for Flame Painter 4 is compatible with Photoshop CC 2015 and higher.

• Extensive Brush Library - Browse hundreds of free brushes in the online brush library created by the developers as well as users and choose the ones which fit your design.

• Multi-touch Support - Flame Painter has complete support for multitouch gestures for Wacom, Microsoft or alternative tablet and trackpad devices, including Astropad application.

How to Buy

As of today, Flame Painter 4 is available from our website for the full price of $89.99 USD: https://www.escapemotions.com/shop/ Flame Painter 4 comes in one edition only. It is a follow-up of Flame Painter 3 Professional edition and there will be no Personal edition available.

How to Upgrade

All existing owners of older Flame Painter desktop versions are eligible for more than 50% discount - the upgrade price is $39.99 USD.

Users can upgrade their Flame Painter license directly through the application’s menu: Help > Upgrade to Flame Painter 4 or from our Upgrade page or from our shop https://www.escapemotions.com/shop/. We’ve also sent out newsletters to our subscribers - check your Inbox to find yours.

Upgrading is optional and the upgrade discount will always be available. You can continue using your older Flame Painter version for as long as you like.

Users who purchased Flame Painter 3 within the last three months, i.e. from March 1st, 2019 are eligible for a free upgrade. Log in to your Community profile to download the latest version.

Additional Particle Systems with 120 brush presets + more free brushes available for download on online Brush library.

We’ve also released three particle systems Liner, Fuzzy and Elastic on our website as add-ons for Flame Painter 4. They can be purchased for $19.99 USD each. All three particle systems are bundled together for an introductory price of $39.99 USD.

Get the particle systems from https://www.escapemotions.com/shop/ 

Altogether they include 120 brush presets for immediate use, but this is not a final number. We prepared for you even more free brushes available as an instant download from the online Brush library. Particle systems allow you to further create an unlimited spectrum of new brushes in the Brush Creator.

These particle systems are also a part of the new Flame Painter in a special preview mode and you will be able to test all their controls and visual options on a special “preview” layer.

Make sure you purchase the particle system from the same email address you are registered for Flame Painter 4 with. To load them, just restart the software.

New Registration System

Please note Flame Painter 4 no longer supports registration keys. After you purchase you will be asked to create a Community profile - unique username and password. After you confirm your email address by clicking on the link you receive, you will be able to register your Flame Painter 4 with your email address or username and password. If you own Rebelle 3, you already have a Community account - all you need to do is log in to Flame Painter 4 with your details.

We've been working on this Flame Painter version for over 18 months. We've put everything into it, so sweat and tears of momentary misery and happiness are included. :-) We truly hope you enjoy this new version and all the possibilities it gives you. Let us know how you like it by dropping us an email or via Send feedback option in the Help menu. 

In the last days, we have written about the new design, brushes, painting modes and gradients. This blog is about the layers and all the new possibilities with them.

Flame Painter 2.0 is coming in two versions: Personal and Professional.

In Personal you are able to add three separate layers. You can manipulate them many ways; they can be rearranged, you can duplicate them, or if you need some space, you can collapse more layers into one. You can import pictures or photos, paint over it and remove any layers that you don't need.

In the Professional version you can additionally make unlimited number of layers and you can also add editable Vector Layers. But.. what are the Vector Layers?

  Vector Layers

  I think that Vector Layers are huge. You can paint a flame stroke on a layer and after that - you can modify its color, gradient or opacity, but most importantly edit all brush parameters, change its detail and easily modify the stroke to the desired one. You can change its shape, rescale it, rotate it, or even pick a brush preset and completely modify the stroke, so you do not need to paint it all from the beginning every time. The best part is that you see the changes as how you move the sliders, everything is changed immediately, and you just have to wait a second to re-render a layer. For me this feature is the best one. Seriously. No, not seriously - it's really great fun.:)

  Editable Vector Layer - you can change all parameters after painting (Flame Painter 2 Pro)

  Bounding Box Wheel

  One thing I miss, in every vector or bitmap or 3D editor is an advanced bounding box. One would say, what can be advanced on a bounding box? It can be rescaled or rotated and that’s it. You can resize it in X or Y axes in global or local coordinates and that is all what you can do. What I have always missed, is that many times I need to rescale the object in other angle than in local or global coordinates. So I've invented a wheel. :) A bounding box wheel. (The regular wheel was invented a few years before the bounding box wheel). With this little wheel you can rotate a bounding box in a direction you need and then rescale a curve or shape not only in local or global coordinates, but in any coordinate on this planet!

  Advanced Bounding Box with the Bounding Box Wheel

  The Flame Painter 2.0 has been made from the ground with the focus on intuitive use and with features that helps artist to enjoy creativity as much as possible. We hope you will like it.

All this all will be available from 21st May, so do not forget to update and be among the first ones who can try this magic.

Thank you for your support and your feedback. It is really the fuel for our work.