Particle Strokes overview Extension 4 items #
Paint with swarms of light.
You draw the stroke and a swarm of particles follows your hand, then keeps painting for a few seconds after you let go. That after-run is half the picture: a flick of the wrist carries on curling long after the wrist has stopped.
You paint on the canvas in the middle. The sheet color behind it is a backdrop only, so what you insert is a transparent layer. Every stroke is recorded and replayed rather than flattened, so reopening the layer lands on the same picture and Undo takes strokes back one at a time.
Insert strokes
#Renders what you painted at export size and lands it as a re-editable layer. Reopen it and every stroke is still there to change.
Sheet
#What you paint against: chequerboard, dark, or a color you pick. It is a backdrop for your eyes only and never lands in the layer.
Mirror
#Repeats the stroke around the centre, up to twelvefold, so a scribble comes out as a mandala.
Stop on release
#Ends the stroke exactly where you let go, for the times you want to place a mark rather than watch a swarm carry on.
Particle Strokes movement Extension 6 items #
Twenty movements decide how the swarm behaves.
The movement is the single biggest decision in the extension. Flame circles your pointer into tongues, Trail runs after it, Ribbon and Strand lay parallel threads, Spring overshoots and swings back, Vortex and Orbit turn it into spirals and rings, Rain falls with wind, Jitter rattles into charcoal grain, and Stick flies briefly and then stays put.
Movement
#Flame, Trail, Ribbon, Strand, Spring, Vortex, Fuzz, Sparks, Chain, Repel, Rain, Orbit, Jitter, Stick, Wave, Bounce, Zigzag, Drain, Float and Loop.
Amount, Size, Spacing
#How many particles, how big their marks, and how far apart those marks sit along the path. Spacing is what turns a stroke from a solid line into single marks strung along it, so a leaf-shaped stamp really does scatter leaves.
Scatter, Unrest, Pull, Swirl
#How far the swarm spreads from the path, how restless each particle is, how hard the path pulls them back, and how much they turn about it.
Marks per second
#A live count of how many marks the current settings lay down. It is shown because the number decides whether a stroke reads as particles or as a painted line.
Glow
#A real pass, not a blur over the top: bright parts are lifted out at a Threshold, blurred at two Spreads and added back with an Exposure.
Blend
#How each mark meets the ones before it: Add, Screen, Lighten or Normal. The first three are what make light look like light.
Particle Strokes stamp maker Extension 5 items #
Every particle leaves a stamp, and you can draw that stamp.
The stamp is a shape, so whatever you leave transparent stays empty. You build it in a square with six painting tools and seven kinds of element, or you press Surprise and get one of sixteen blueprints, from leaves and feathers to crystals and comets.
A stamp is kept as a recipe rather than as pixels, so it stays editable and comes out sharp at any export size.
Tools
#Paint, Erase, Dots, Disc, Ring and Star.
Elements
#Polygon, Bar, Leaf, Arc, Icon, Emoji and Image. Drag one to move it; each has its own settings such as Sides, Waist, Vein, Sweep and Line width.
Surprise
#Rolls a whole stamp from one of sixteen blueprints: Stardust, Notched ring, Rays, Blossom, Halo star, Comet, Orbits, Cell, Shards, Arc pair, Snowflake, Bubble, Spark, Gear, Ripple and Nib.
Motion
#What the stamp itself does while it travels: Still, Orbit, Spin, Swing, Drift, Flicker or Open up, with a Rate and an Offset.
Back to the dot
#Drops the drawn stamp and goes back to the plain round particle.
Particle Strokes dynamics Extension 3 items #
Give a stroke a shape instead of a constant fog.
Dynamics are switched on as a whole rather than always running. Chance varies the grain from one particle to the next, and speed makes slow strokes lay down fat grain and fast ones thin.
A curve panel, like a tone curve, lets you draw a shape for each of six things separately: size, amount, scatter, opacity, pull and swirl. A stroke can swell while its scatter narrows and its pull lets go.
Curve shapes
#Fifteen ready shapes: Flat, Ease in, Ease out, Ease in and out, Vase, Spike, Swell, Pulse, Ramp up, Ramp down, Rise hold fall, Sine, Triangle, Zigzag and Steps.
Roll the curves
#Fills a couple of the six curves with something worth looking at, for when you want a starting point rather than a blank grid.
Color from
#Where a particle takes its color: fixed, over its life, one each and then fixed, from hand speed, or along the stroke. Hue turn shifts it as the stroke runs.