I'm making a paint program, so useful tools, ideas and features required please

[happymonster]

What do people think about paint mode / effects using something like this:

On the icon
----------------

Left click: Select for painting
Right click: Apply to the whole image (i.e. as a fullscreen filter)
Middle click / other key: Apply to the whole of the current user selected brush

I'm trying to see the best way to do this without duplicating too many icons / panels?

[happymonster]

I've been adding some more paint modes (hence my earlier question). So far I've got working:

Paint, Replace (replace pen colour 0 in image, with pen colour 1), Swap (swaps pen colours in image), Outline, Halftone and Noise (Like an airbrush but moves pixels around a little rather than adding new colour).

These all work for all drawing primitives by the way.

[Helm]

Also don't forget to put a thing like, double clicking in replace mode replaces all pixels of color A with color B. Optionally also removes the redundant index and remaps palette.

[happymonster]

Helm: Replace mode already replaces pixels of color A with colour B, you would have to right click to apply the paint mode to the whole image (in my current plans).
The colour index part is a good idea, but probably would be better as a seperate palette 'tidy / clean up' icon. This isn't something I am focussing on at the moment though.

I'm getting the undo/redo system working again at the moment.

[happymonster]

Ok, undo/redo seems to be working..

I've also got the first version of the PXE file format (layer supporting) implemented with load & save. Still need to add in full layer support though and link that in with the saving.

I think my priorities have been undo/redo, load/save, and then get grabbed brushes working again with the new internal layer/image format. After that I can start to fix the bugs that will have crept in and see how usable it is.

[BlackArmada]

when is a new executable verson going to be available?

[happymonster]

I still need to fix brushes, flood fill and some bugs first. But definately before christmas! 

[CrazyMLC]

I've only read the last page of this thread but I'm very hyped, I love the options between eclipse and circle, 'draw from centre', etc.

I'm going to try and give some feedback but again I've only read the last page.

One of the things that turned me off of using one of the programs I tried, GraphicsGale, is that everything took up so much space.
I have a pretty big monitor and I don't like having to move my head to do everything, I like having everything right in front of me.
When I tried GraphicsGale everything was disorganized, the windows were everywhere, etc, and to be able to have all the windows in the one window, I had to maximize it.
I loved all the features when compared to MSPaint, but I stopped using it because of the simple options that MSPaint has, all you need to do what you're doing is on the interface and everything else is on the menu bar. I'd love to have a simple interface like that but more organized and with all the extra features that makes art easier to make.

Keep it simple stupid.

I'd also like to be able to have multiple files open at once, a feature I didn't see from the screenshots.
Also as for layers, I'd like to be able to have an 'animation mode' where the previous and next layer act like onion skins.
And to only have two colors selected at once, but to be able to set sets of two colors to be able to switch to with the scroll wheel. For example: If I'm making a little cute dragon maybe I want to be able to have two colors of peach for the belly and two colors of red for the rest of the body.

[happymonster]

Thanks!

I also prefer a simpler interface. The latest promotion seems ever so complicated if you are not used to it already..

[happymonster]

I thought I'd better explain about the layers I use in Pixe. As in other paint programs you will be able to have multiple layers and move them around, in order positions, etc..

However, unlike in other paint programs, each layer in Pixe is multi-leveled. Not quite sure what the correct term for this would be, mabe eraseable layers, or scratch layers..? The idea is that say you were painting in oil paints and you wanted to remove a patch of a colour.. you could (if you were really good!) remove the colour layer with a palette knife revealing the old paint underneath. So, with Pixe you have an option to select the right mouse button as erase and this will erase any pixels under the drawn area that are the same colour as your current left mouse button pen. This doesn't mean drawing with a background colour, it means the old pixels are revealed underneath, without having to create a seperate layer.

In practical terms, this allows you to draw shapes over detailed backgrounds, say a white cloud shape over a shaded blue background and remove white pixels without having to redraw the blue shades. Yes, you can do this with layers in promotion / photoshop, or be the Fix Background option in promotion. But they require you to: either create a new layer for each seperate item, or to repeatedly fix background pixels when you start each new action. And if you didn't and you realised you need to erase pixels, then you are stuck.. With the layer system in Pixe you will be able to automatically and transparantly erase any pixels of any colour, anywhere on the  layer no matter when you drew it. Not only that but each layer has 4 levels, so you can erase upto 3 previous layers of 'paint' and each erase action is undo/redoable and the 4 levels for each layer are saved in the PXE file format.

I really think this will be very useful, but you don't have to use it if you want to. It's currently working fully in my development version so you will be able to play with it soon when I release a testing version.