|
Cutouts
Piranesi uses the term 'cutout' for scenery images, such as people, plants, or trees, which can be placed into the scene. Once more Piranesi's 3D knowledge makes the placement work like magic - Piranesi can automatically calculate the correct size and perspective for the cutout depending on where in the scene it is placed, and can also organise all the masking effects depending on what lies in front of and behind it. Cutout placement is one of the most-used features of Piranesi, and Piranesi 3 includes a new cutout manager incorporating:
Locks
Piranesi allows you to 'lock on' to a particular portion of the image, such as a specific wall or those parts of the image which correspond to wooden surfaces. These locks mean that you do not need to create masks in order to limit your painting actions to a particular feature in the scene - Piranesi automatically detects the edges and does not paint beyond them. Piranesi can do this because its Epix format files store a depth and material value as well as a colour value, making Piranesi quicker to use and more accurate than traditional painting programs. It combines the ease and freedom of 2D painting with the precision of 3D models.
More powerful Style Browser
Major overhaul of the Style Browser, to improve its data structuring capabilities and ease of use
Multiple fill applicator
New multiple fill applicator, to apply several successive fills with one click
Multiple raster brush strokes
Ability to cycle through multiple raster brush marks as you paint, giving a less repetitive, more random, effect
New Cutout Manager
Cutouts are elements of scenery, such as people or plants, that can be placed into a Piranesi scene. Piranesi automatically adjusts for perspective and clipping where one part of the scene passes behind another. Placing cutouts is perhaps the most frequently used Piranesi feature, and we have often been asked by users for more tools to manage, tweak, and adjust cutouts. Piranesi 3 delivers these tools by way of a new Cutout Manager, which tracks each cutout until such time as you decide to blend it permanently into the scene. Using the Cutout Manager you can move and tweak your cutouts after placement, or change their visibility or shadow casting characteristics (there's also a new option to control the softness of shadows). Furthermore, you can now save or import a group of cutouts. This is enormously useful because it provides the ability to place cutouts, take a new rendering of the model, and then reapply the cutouts. Because Piranesi knows the locations of the cutouts in 3D space, this technique can be used even when the camera position is changed in the new rendering.
New halftone and adjust filters
New Halftone ('newspaper style') and Adjust (contrast, brightness, saturation, hue) filters
New pen applicator
New Painter applicator features, such as rounded, squared, and raster painter marks; and new settings for orientation, scale, and delay
Non-photorealistic effects
Piranesi is an especially valuable tool in early design stages. In these stages many details are not known, are too expensive to model, and even if they were modelled would distract from the important aspects of the design. Piranesi provides a wealth of effects - many of which would not be possible without Piranesi's 3D knowledge - to give your image an artistic, hand-rendered look (they are referred to as non-photorealistic because the aim is specifically not to produce an image that looks like a photograph). Such images are often more attractive to look at, convey a 'feel' for the scene that a photorealistic image cannot, and draw the client's attention to what is important whilst fading out irrelevant details.
PNG format support
Support for PNG format in import and export operations
Painting in perspective
When you paint with textures - such as brick or wood effects - Piranesi uses its knowledge of the 3D geometry to continuously adjust the texture to honour the scene perspective. For example, if you paint with a brick texture, the bricks get smaller as they get further away, and the horizontal lines of brick courses converge towards the vanishing points of the scene.
Panoramas
Piranesi 3 breaks new ground by introducing animation to non-photorealistic rendering. Panoramic views can be rendered with Piranesi, and saved in .MOV format for display using the industry standard Apple Quicktime® viewer.
Plans and elevations
As of Piranesi version 3, you don't even need a 3D model! Piranesi 3 allows you to import any plan or elevation image as a starting point. Many of Piranesi's effects will work without depth and material information. Because Piranesi knows that the image is plan or elevation, depth and material information can be added by constructing new planes and adding cutouts. Piranesi will let you begin with any PNG, TIF, BMP, or JPG image - all you have to do is tell Piranesi whether to regard it as a plan or elevation. Many of Piranesi's effects will work without depth and material information. Because Piranesi knows that the image is plan or elevation, depth and material information can be added by constructing new planes and adding cutouts.
Styles
Effects or combination of effects - locks, cutouts, textures, fades, blends, and so on - can be saved as a style for future re-use. Piranesi comes complete with a whole range of predefined styles, using 2000 free texture and cutout images. A Style Manager is provided to help you manage your styles and create new ones.
|
