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

[happymonster]

And I've improved things since the last update already.. And more big ideas in my head for the palette stuff. It's a continual process of (organic?) evolution.

The tile map idea is REALLY nice! I will add that to the spreadsheet and try to update it this weekend.
Cheers!

[happymonster]

I would like people's opinion on this.. I've been playing around with the palette view and I was wondering what you think about this optional palette view.
Basically as you can see, the palette width is halved, and the colour space selector (which ever kind) will be shown on the right. The black space below is where a horizontal brightness gradient will go.

I know the palette entries become quite small, but you will be to able to make the entry sizes bigger (and show less colours) in the colour options.
The advantage of this is that you can do both colour changes, and palette manipulation/comparison at the same time.

The colour space shown here is 112 x 112 (and the GUI panel has a width of 224 pixels), so that's over 12,000 colours before adding a brightness dimension. Do you think it's too small to use or ok?

[surt]

So long as it's optional, then it's a good thing.
I've don't think I've ever used a paint program which allowed simultaneous access to selecting a palette index and selecting a colour for that index from a planar colour selector, usually it's through a modal dialog which equals bad, so this is a very nice feature.
Ideally one would be able to cycle between three modes: palette only, planar colour selector only, both together.
I do think it's somewhat small as is, but give the user the ability to size the panel (and as a result its contents), then the responsibility is on their shoulders.

A small matter of ergonomics: given the user should be picking colours from the palette more often then from the planar colour selector, putting the palette on the right should reduce mouse travel somewhat.

In case you missed them in amongst the cruft :

Something to make it better: the colour sliders would be more informative if they were showing the colour gradient of each colour component. Then you get to preview the colour you are goning to select before you select it .
For example the gimp colour selector:

A matter of taste: square swatches in the palette (option would be nice).

[Helm]

I personally don't think I've chosen a color from the planar selector for pixel art in years. I make my colors by choosing a value and then adding a hue and saturation to that value on the fly later on. I don't think a lot of pixel artists waste a lot of time with visible colorspaces like that, they just take up space.

[happymonster]

Well, two different opinions there on how pixel artists work.. Hehe..

Surt: That's a good point about putting it on the right, I will do that. And yes I was thinking about a off, half-size, full size option.

I will also add gradient style colour sliders in the future.
As for the square swatches, That will make the palette smaller in full-size mode, but could be an option..

[happymonster]

Ok. Color Space Variation 2 (Hue x Brightness), with the palette on the right and square swatches. A gradient bar would go underneath for the saturation (probably all the way across the panel).

[surt]

I make my colors by choosing a value and then adding a hue and saturation to that value on the fly later on.

I would think a planar colour selector as configured previously, with intensity separate from hue and saturation, would be perfect for just that situation.

Well, two different opinions there on how pixel artists work.. Hehe..

Well, I don't actually use planar colour selectors at all (in graphics gale it's locked in a modal dialog), but I can see their merit, particularly for pixel artists who may not yet be fully comfortable with the colour space, and I probably would use it if it was no hassle.

Ok. Color Space Variation 2 (Hue x Brightness), with the palette on the right and square swatches. A gradient bar would go underneath for the saturation (probably all the way across the panel).

Will it be possible to select different configurations of components on the planar colour selector? I think all HSx component configurations have some potential merit.
Do you really need to put the third component on the planar selector as well? You've got sliders for all three components (or six if you want to do RGB on the planar selector) just below (and maybe move the colour contexts out of the way to above the palette, and swap the positions of HSx and RGB sliders to reduce mouse travel).
The square swatches are so much prettier. 

[happymonster]

Will it be possible to select different configurations of components on the planar colour selector? I think all HSx component configurations have some potential merit.

Yes, I will have the Hue x Sat, and Hue x Lum as already shown as well as Sat x Lum. There will also be some more colour views to choose from (harmonies, etc..)

Do you really need to put the third component on the planar selector as well? You've got sliders for all three components (or six if you want to do RGB on the planar selector) just below (and maybe move the colour contexts out of the way to above the palette, and swap the positions of HSx and RGB sliders to reduce mouse travel).

That's true.. the only thing is if the sliders are in something like a Lab colour space I suppose.

I really want to have the palette entries a bit bigger than this, (as well as showing colour view), but I don't think I can do it and keep them square without shrinking the color view space..

[surt]

thing is if the sliders are in something like a Lab colour space I suppose.

How about having the secondary sliders and the planar selector always work within the same colour space?

A small thing: it'd be nice to be able to pick the numeric colour space representation of your choice: byte, unit, percent, hex.

[happymonster]

Ohh.. now you're starting to make it complicated!