How to use ArtPaint

This chapter discusses the general principles of how to use ArtPaint.

Getting started

On launching the program displays three windows on screen: Drawing window, Palette window and Tool window. The Drawing window is initially blank and it has a button labelled "SET SIZE". You can then resize the window to reflect the size of the picture you want to paint (window dimensions are shown in the left top corner). When you are satisfied with the window size you can press the "SET SIZE"-button and then start painting.
The Palette window contains two color controls of which the higher controls the high-color and the lower controls the low-color (low-color doesn't have much use yet).

Using tools

Tools are selected from the ToolWindow. Each mousebutton can have it's tool assigned separately from other buttons. Tools are same for all the drawing windows. They are used by pressing down the mousebutton and holding it until the operation is finished.

Draw modes

Draw mode can be selected from a menu in a drawing window. The selection affects that particular window it was made in. So each window can have unique drawing mode.

Using filters

You can select a filter from the menu in a Drawing window. The effect takes place as soon as the calculations are complete. Some of the filters require that the image is in greyscale to work correctly. You can change to greyscale from Colors-menu in a Drawing window. Note that the filters don't deal with the edges of images at the moment so the edges will start to look bad after filters have been applied few times.

Using controller

The parameters of program can be controlled through an external controller that is plugged into the GeekPort on a BeBox-computer. Line-width and RGB-values of color can be changed while drawing (this is a real experience that is not to be missed).

Drag and drop

The program supports drag and drop from ImageViewer-application. After you have placed the dragged image on canvas the program enters a mixer mode. You can now fade the dragged image out with the left mousebutton and fade in with the right mousebutton. The middle button exits the mixer mode. There are also two different modes in mixer. Full image mixer and mixer that mixes the area that has radius of line-width. This mode can be selected from the mixer control window that opens after dragging. Note that this feature doesn't work at the moment in any other than 32-bit screen-modes. Also if you drag from somewhere else than ImageViewer you risk crashing the program. And as this feature is not completely finished you should make sure that the dragged image fits completely in the window (if it crosses the window border something nasty might happen).