[Bishop_Six]

Hey all. I wanted to get your opinions about these two programs. I have photoshop, but I've been messing around with painter classic and the painter 8 demo. It seems to me that painter is an immensely powerful program with all the various media and brushes. Though I've seen plenty of good brushwork and texture from photoshop users. I'm just wondering what you all think about the pros and cons of these programs, what one program does better than the other, etc. It kind of seems like with all the options of painter, why would you use photoshop for painting any more? Any thoughts? Opinions?

[gLitterbug]

I haven�t tried painter for some time now, but last time I did the interface kind of repelled me, I�m used to pshop and appreciate most of it (I�m using only variations of a simple round brush), but probably it�s just a question of familiarity.

When I bought my first Wacom, it had "Dabbler" bundled with it, which was just what painter classic is today. I used it alot and really liked it, but somehow I switched to pshop some day and never went back, yet.

[balistic]

Photoshop really isn't designed for painting, it's meant to be an image editor. That doesn't stop a lot of really talented cats from applying gouche/chalk techniques to get some excellent painterly things out of it. Painter, on the other hand, focuses more on reproducing traditional media from the outset, and when blending colors uses a different (less digital-looking) model than PS. The image editing stuff in Painter is more of an afterthough. You can fake oil paint in Painter, you really can't in Photoshop.

And then you've got the hybrid nobody uses:

Personally, I like Corel Photo-Paint. Its brush engine rivals Painter (minus the bleedy watercolor), you can work in an oil-like environment if you want, but it's also got all of the image editing capabilties of Photoshop (and then some). The downside to Photo-Paint is that Corel barely promotes or supports it, and you can only get it as part of the Draw bundle.
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brian.prince|light.comp.paint

[ceenda]

I enjoy working in Painter much more than Photoshop. It's just alot more fun to use, I think. But I like Photoshop's direct way of applying colour. I wish Painter would allow you to use that kind of colour application as a brush category.

Thing is, even though Painter is made for painting, I've not really encountered many pieces of matte work or high-quality painting done in Painter. Most of the Pros seem to use Photoshop and even with Painter their work seems to lose a certain something.

Also, the image-adjustment tools in Painter are awful... put nicely. The brightness/contrast tool creates horrendous results that I don't quite understand and the colour adjustment is pretty useless. More often than not you end up having to take Painter work into Photoshop to adjust colours etc.

I agree about Corel Photopaint. I have version 7 but I simply can't get my Wacom working correctly. The pressure settings are in a sub-category of the brush dialogue menu and I've tried inverting them, turning them off and on and it still doesn't work. I just get opacity as all or nothing.

[neff]

I prefer Paintshop Pro 8, its not that professional, but its easy to handle
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[Lompoc42]

This seems to be a pretty common debate without much resolution, only opinion. You can argue that photoshop 7 and now CS are trying to appeal to fine artist with its now large selection of painterly items. It still lacks in its ability to mimic traditional mediums, which is Painters absolute strong point, however I have seen some absolutely astounding work done in both. I think its all a matter of how you first learned to do fine art. If you've done nothing but sketch and draw you'll probably feel fine in both programs (probably preferring photoshop in the end). However if you've painted or inked etc. Painter will probably lead in you into more familiar territory right from the get go. I think as time goes on we'll probably see Photoshop incorporate the things that make Painter unique and become the uber-image making/editing program.

I've tried photo-paint and was not pleased with the interface or the feel of the program. I guess I've just been using photoshop for far too long.

I think what it ultimately boils down to is playing with both a great deal and finding out which one is more comfortable. A lot of people use both from what I can see. The major advantage to Photoshop is its use of RAM allocation. Painter WILL slow up when there's lots of layers and paint. Sorry to be a long winded n00b. [/url]

[balistic]

[Drunken Monkey]

i know for a fact that painter will give you tumors.
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[eyewoo]

Listen to Drunken Monkey... there is wisdom there...

I much prefer Photoshop, though I haven't tried the latest version of Painter.

Beside the fact that Photoshop's interface is a better design, it is more a creative *digital* tool than Painter. It was designed to digitally manipulate pixels so that photographs could be creatively altered. I'm sure the original designers had little idea they were also putting the program on a path to creative non-photographic imagery.

With Painter, the intent was to create a program that mimics traditional brush work, which somehow seems to get in the way of the digital medium --- that medium (at least for me) being all about using adjustment functions, manipulating created and sampled images, and a modicum of digital pen/brush work - all the stuff Photoshop was designed for. With the exception of the pen/brush work, Photoshop just does it better than Painter, which gets so bogged down in trying to make digital images look like traditional painting.

Don't get me wrong... I'm going to keep in touch with Painter... And I have never been afraid to change my views when and if they get outdated...
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[Monteiro]

Painter is wonderful to works with appearance very natural. For me it`s incomparable when you use a good tablet. Painter was made to paint using principles basics of art and the results are excellents.
The force of Photoshop is the adjust of colors, contrasts, levels, tons, etc...
In this point, it`s incomparable. I always work in Photoshop after Painter.

[Cpt.Obvious]

I'm working on PS, and I'm rather satisfied. It has perfect interface and lot of shortcuts that help me to work on full screen mode in 60% of time. CS has made great jump from other editions and for me seems to be perfect.
I know that painer has mush mush better color palette and great traditional imitating brushes, but mainly in PS I use standard round brush with only some scatter etc fixes.
I agree that ''postproduction'' tools in photoshop are great. Contrast, adjustment etc can do the pic really really good
Cheers,
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[Duracel]

If i would like to have a perfect traditional media i would paint traditional.
So, i'd like to have a good "digital"-painting programm.

Painter gives too much attention on imitating the real, instead of focussing on what is possible "digital".
My "Problem" in using Painter is ... while all those brushes try to imitade traditional effects as deceptive as possible, they use every "unlogical mixture" to achieve those effects - but those methods are often quite confusing.
So, Photoshop-Brushes are all based on a single round brush - thats all. And then, you can add special functions to this brush ... its a full "modular concept".
I never get a base-brush in Painter(there is noone, or? Tried only days, not months in Painter7), and if i want to combine a water-color effect with an smearing-oil-brush im fucked.

I dont want to get a "traditional" look, but a "good" look!
Its important to me that i have full control over my brushes, so i can use what i want ... i dont want to "search how i get what i want as it is in different fuckin' tradional media"; and i say "no thx" to all top-features i still hate in traditional, but come along with painter automatically.
Simple options you can handle in your mind, but complex while combined. Thats the key. Digital-media is not limited to the traditional possibilities ... as Corel seem to think sometimes.

So, Photoshop have still less options(i.e. i miss an option to "invert" pen-pressure dynamics, or to have as many options for the "dual-brush", too) .. especially i miss an as usable smear-option as painter or open-canvas have.


So i would love a Painter, where i could kill all Presets and start learning to use all brush-functions based on a basic one. Or a Photoshop where Adobe fucked on their "not more than 5 changes between two versions"-principle and add as many options in the brusheninge as are useful.
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Lars G�tze

www.duracel.de Gallery

Detailling a speedpainting is nothing but speedpainting in detail.

[nanobot�]

I personally find the combination of CorelDRAW and PHOTO-PAINT to be the most powerful. I must admit though, Corel is extremely poor with stability. It seems their programs crash quite a bit. Aside from that though, if you start in CorelDRAW to get the lines just right (if you're doing a cartoon), then import that into PHOTO-PAINT and add some airbrushing effects, it looks pretty dang good in the end.

I've tried Adobe Photoshop many times but the thing that bothers me the most is how it's little control panels don't dock, so they always take the foreground of the image I'm working on. Maybe I just don't understand the workspace well enough to hold any weight here, but my experience isn't very good with Photoshop. I can't say I've given it a real "honest" chance yet though.

[eyewoo]

[Gort]

Honestly I am bit let down that none of you song the praises of PC Paint.


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"You can't stop the waves but you can learn to surf" - Jack Kornfield

[Riven]

I was a big supporter of the Painter program, but maybe it is just me - what on earth is Corel doing with Painter 8 and now 8.1? It seems slow, clunky and cluttered in comparision to Photoshop and the earlier versions of painter. The interface is still frsutrating. The brush engine makes me feel like I am trying to paint with spatula tied to the end of a golf club.

Maybe I need some Painter guru's advice - I like the program, I want to support the program, but it's collecting dust on my shelf for it only lasts maybe a month before I get frustrated with it and uninstall it. It seems the the earlier versions were more efficient. I would buy Painter 6 if I could find it and it was supported