The Art of Project Dogwaffle

Dan Ritchie shows how he uses his very own digital painting program (call it a Photoshop alternative if you must) for fun projects from animations to still life to very funky animations and video effects with particle brushes. It's all in the brush, and it's powered by Project Dogwaffle.

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• digital
• painting
• video
• editing
• special
• effects
• photoshop
• painter
• paint
• shop
• corel
• draw
• gimp
• art
• graphics
• 2D
• 3D

[staigerman]

The layering system in PD Pro 3/4/5 is not the same as in Photoshop, it doesn't do opaque layers with transparency, it does 'modification' layers (darken, brighten, etc...) typically used for painting highlights and shadows.

You could load the image ito the brush as a custom brush though, resample and rotate that, and then stamp it down where you want it.

It's more brush centric then layer oriented. At least for now

There are some transform plugins that let you rotate the current image too.

[Thejeter5770]

is this better than gimp

[staigerman]

@Thejeter5770 ... better for what in particular? There are soo many things you can do with either of these programs. Gimp is free. Dogwaffle has a free version too. If you compare that version, well, still may depend on what you're looking for. Animation? Particle brushes? Try either and if you like one over the other, you found the one you like better. It's very personal as to what you like better in a program, its interface, the paint effects,. etc...

[WarnerBrikProduction]

hey, I was wondering, can anyone help me out? I have drawn some backrounds and characters on ms paint, and I want to put them into dogwaffle to use them as my drawings instead of redrawing them in the accual program. Can anyone tell me how I do this? I would really appreciate your help, thanks.

[staigerman]

@WarnerBrikProduction I assume you've saved your drawings and backgrounds from MS Paint to image files? Just load these images files one by one or if they're the same size as a sequence if they define an animation sequence. You'll needa version that supports this, perhaps the Pro 3 or 4. PErhaps even PD 2 can do it. You can also load an image sequence of background imagery in as an animation, from the Animation menu, and then open an additional image file into the custom brush from Brush menu.

[WarnerBrikProduction]

@staigerman Yes, but i can't afford to buy the pro three or four. I need a free animation program. I am using the free version of dogwaffle. so, is there any way I can upload my pictures onto that?

[staigerman]

@WarnerBrikProduction In the free version you can't load AVI, but you can load an image sequence. So if you have a way to extract the frames from your avi clip that might get you in the right direction. Howevever you'll have to manually stomp the brush onto each frame as you paint the object across the sequence. VEry tedious.

[pdhowler]

@Zamakazi Sorry, no, the freeware version (v1.2) does not have the same types of layering system. It does have the Swap buffer as an alternate layer but that's about it. There are ways to get v3.5 for free through TrialPay. v7 is the latest version

[Zamakazi]

Um i have the free version..... does it have a layers menu like you use in the video? cuz i cant find it

[pdhowler]

@ozboybrian newest tutorials at youtube - dot - com -slash- pdhowler

[pdhowler]

@pdhowler

Note that layers are not 'opaque' style, not 32-bit per layer, i.e. no alpha per each layer. But many other layer modes nonetheless. Including one or two modes where the layer lets you dedicate a color as the transparent key and all other colors are opaque.

[pdhowler]

@pdhowler

Transparent background yes but not the PS way. You can make a selection, that is in the alpha channel. Save to PNG or a bunhc of others like Default Targa as 32-bit, and the selection will be saved to represent the transparent pixels. Some brushes set the alpha selection along the drawn path, such as particle brushes in alpha mode. Or you can paint on alpha too. Tons of ways.

This is a pretty good tool for making graphics for games. Do you use Png as image file format?

[pdhowler]

@ozboybrian There are a number of Transform filters, some with fine nudging of angles and other parameters. Change size yes. (Image -> Resample for example.

[pdhowler]

@EdXLover Make a selection of what you want to rease and paint that to the background color. Fill it with high tolerance or use the right mouse button to draw to the secondary color which acts as the background color.

It's not the way as in Photoshop or many other tools. It's different.

If you have a Wacom tablet you can usually turn around the pen to use the eraser, if it is properly configured that will work same as right-button drawing.

[pdhowler]

@humanobeing1 Well for an eraser we don't really have a tool for that, instead you can draw at the same color as the background color which is the second color of two active colors. The primary color is left-button drawing, the secondary color is used for right-button drawing, erasing...

There are some other diffs but that's the essence for starters.

[humanobeing1]

can anybody tell that where can i find the eraser in project dogwaffle ?

[EdXLover]

I have a question, how do I erase a line wihout erasing the whole picture? I just got it.