Software: Alien Skin Snap Art

[Diane]

Press release:
http://www.creativepro.com/story/news/24973.html?cprose=7-50

Reviews:
http://www.alienskin.com/snapart/snapart_reviews.html
Kevin L. Kitchens - http://photographyvoice.com/pv/revie...e/snapart.aspx

Take these as a grain of salt. Download and try the demo yourself.

For product information, system requirements, pricing, etc:
http://www.alienskin.com/snapart/index.html

Compatibility note:

Despite what it says regarding "system requirements," so far it has been reported that Snap Art works fine with Photoshop 7, PaintShop Pro 9 and Painter 8.

It probably works with PSP 10, Elements 2, 3 and 4, too. If in doubt it doesn't hurt to try the demo.

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Free goodies and tech Q/A

* Alien Skin's support forum for free Snap Art preset downloads, tech Q/A, printing tips, etc:
http://www.alienskin.com/forum/forum...sp?FID=31&PN=1

Galleries, Examples:
* Snap Art Example Book created by David Janik-Jones:
http://www.alienskin.com/snapart/snapart_downloads.html


* http://www.alienskin.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=668

* http://web.mac.com/orrail/iWeb/ORRAIL%27S/Photo%20Paintings.html

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Have you tried Alien Skin's Snap Art?

I don't think I care for this plugin. Results I get are not so great.

I do better with Impressionist, and Paint Engine.

~Diane

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DIDN'T LIKE IT AT FIRST...THEN CHANGED MY MIND
January, 2007

For what it's worth my first impressions of Snap Art were quite negative. This initial reaction was based on the gallery of examples in the at the Alien Skin website and my personal experiences applying the presets that came installed with the program (demo download). In most cases I felt the results rendered by the factory settings were not useful in terms of the types of digital artwork I like to do.

But after using SA for nearly every day of the allotted 30-day trial period I changed my mind and purchased this plugin. Why? With use I liked it more and more.

I went through each filter, thoroughly exercising the installed presets and experimenting with individual control combinations. For nearly every Snap Art filter I discovered setting combinations that yielded results I liked, in some cases a whole lot. (As time goes along I will upload some of my custom preset "discoveries" to share.)

Like some exotic foods I found Snap Art to be an acquired taste: I had to try it several times before I began to understood how to use it to achieve results I liked.

So, don't let negative reports disuade you from trying it out.

~Danny~

[Xaran]

Have to agree there the sketch effect is awful...

Christine

[Steve Conway]

Have seen some things done with it that I like. Some of the oil painting is very good.

It has two drawbacks. It is VERY expensive, about $145 U.S. And it only works on the lastest versions of PS and Paint Shop Pro, neither of which I have.

Steve

[DannyRaphael]

Originally Posted by Steve Conway

Have seen some things done with it that I like. Some of the oil painting is very good.

It has two drawbacks. It is VERY expensive, about $145 U.S. And it only works on the lastest versions of PS and Paint Shop Pro, neither of which I have.

Steve

Take a look at ALL the examples in the sample gallery http://www.alienskin.com/snapart/snapart_examples.html.

Note: The same "before" image is used for several effects, so cycle through the entire gallery to get the full picture of SA's capabilities.

Those who download/install the plugin for evaluation, post some example results, including the "before" for comparison purposes.

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FYI: Those who already have an Alien Skin product installed qualify for the $99 (US) "upgrade" price.

~Danny~

[Steve Conway]

Originally Posted by DannyRaphael

Take a look at ALL the examples in the sample gallery http://www.alienskin.com/snapart/snapart_examples.html.

Note: The same "before" image is used for several effects, so cycle through the entire gallery to get the full picture of SA's capabilities.

Those who download/install the plugin for evaluation, post some example results, including the "before" for comparison purposes.

------------

FYI: Those who already have an Alien Skin product installed qualify for the $99 (US) "upgrade" price.

~Danny~

Ok everybody, a slight change in my last post re. Snap Art. I have it working now in PSP 9. It does not state anywhere that I could find, that you have to install it directly into the plugin folder of every program you want to use it in. When I finally found this out, I re-installed it and it works fine.

Only tried the oil paint effect so far. Here is before and after on a barn image.

Steve

[Steve Conway]

Some more examples of the barn in Snap Art.

Keep in mind each of these effects have hundreds of settings, I have only picked one for each example.

color pencil...comics....impasto & pastel landscape sketch

Steve

[Steve Conway]

More barn images.

Pen & ink...pencil sketch...pointillism...stylize...& watercolor.

Steve

[DannyRaphael]

These examples are great, Steve... They sure help one visualize the possibilities.

Many thanks... ~Danny~

[chillin]

It’s very flexible, awesome plugin

[Steve Conway]

Originally Posted by DannyRaphael

These examples are great, Steve... They sure help one visualize the possibilities.

Many thanks... ~Danny~

My pleasure. The problem I see is the price. Otherwise it has some good features for getting the exact look you are after.

Still have about 28 days left on the demo.

Maybe I'll get a cup and sit on a street corner.

Steve

[borderline]

I worked on the development team for Snap Art so I am glad some of you have tried it out. In writing the filters we did do a bit of research on this and the dpreview retouching forums to get some inspiration. Thanks to everyone!

Snap Art will probably work ok with older versions of Photoshop too. The reason we only support for CS or later is because we only do testing on the listed hosts (it would be way too time consuming to do all of our testing the many versions and hosts out there). But we often find that it will work anyway and the problems are cosmetic UI issues. You should try the demo for the full 30 days (it is fully functional) to see if there are any problems- it is up to you to decide if it works with what you have (if it is not listed).

Anyway, I'm sorry to hear some of you have had less success with the product. Some photo/filter combinations are much more difficult to get nice looking results. Most of the time, you can go through the settings and find something that works but in some cases, or if you want a certain look it takes some experience. For example, Pencil Sketch is actually one of my favorite filters in the set but it can be difficult to get the look that you want because it is capable of such a variety of effects. For instance, the first (left) attached image is the factory default setting of a picture of my daughter. It is rather abstract and sketchy and hard to recognize. The second is from the same image, but I increased coverage and more importantly, I adjusted the color to black and white conversion parameters to get the tones I was looking for. For this filter (and pen and ink), you are losing a lot of perceptual information when you discard the color information, so the black and white conversion process (tone tab) is very important. I usually start there. Also, I seem to get better results when the coverage is high. I will agree that this filter can be a bit tough to use if you want photorealism.

When we write our filters there is often a trade-off between the power of what a filter can do and how easy to use it is. For this product we really wanted to get away from the really computery looking effects and try to make pictures that look like a human made them and which are also capable of creating abstract works of art (but that are 1-click). For that reason, it is possible to make unrecognizable results.

Anyway, I hope you can get a chance to try the demo- it is fully functional for 30 days. I think that with a little experience you should be able to see how much time you can save using it and also have some fun.

Thanks,
Tom

[Kraellin]

borderline,

welcome to RP.

and thanks for coming in and talking about your product. it's always great to have developers come in and discuss their products. that whole 'computery' effect would make an interesting topic somewhere here on RP.

cute daughter

[DannyRaphael]

Hi Tom:

I too would like to add my welcome and appreciation for your insider commentary and advice.

Inspired by your comment, I downloaded the demo and can confirm SA works fine with Photoshop 7.01 as well as Painter 8. It makes a world of difference assessing SA's capabilities and features based on hands-on experience vs. looking at example images.

re: Tom's pencil settings
Why is that combination that yields quite realistic results not included among the installed presets -- or is it and I've yet to find it? (I thought I tried all of them.)

~Danny~

[DannyRaphael]

For example, Pencil Sketch is actually one of my favorite filters in the set but it can be difficult to get the look that you want because it is capable of such a variety of effects. For instance, the first (left) attached image is the factory default setting of a picture of my daughter. It is rather abstract and sketchy and hard to recognize.

The second is from the same image, but I increased coverage and more importantly, I adjusted the color to black and white conversion parameters to get the tones I was looking for.

For this filter (and pen and ink), you are losing a lot of perceptual information when you discard the color information, so the black and white conversion process (tone tab) is very important. I usually start there.

Also, I seem to get better results when the coverage is high.

Ya lost me here...
1. Did you use the Pencil Sketch filter on the second interpretation or the Pen and Ink filter?

2. re: the black and white conversion process (tone tab)
* Is the Automatic Color Conversion control checked or unchecked here?
* Are you doing the tonal adjustments with the channel controls?
* Is this set of controls similar in concept to Photoshop's Channel Mixer (monochrome option on) where one generally shoots for a sum of percentages in the neighborhood of 100%?

[Xaran]

I'll have to give this more of a test run seeing that sketch example - but I second Danny on why is there not a preset for it - this could make the difference in my buying or not.

Can presets be imported from a text file?

Christine