Digital Dream Studio V2

Digital Dream Studio V2

Step by Step Guide

[ article written especially for O Mundo da Fotografia Digital magazine]

Step 1: Handling Layers and Work Surface

You can either open a file or create a new one. Whatever the case, on the upper side of the control panel (in the right of the screen), you have layer control options, including creating a new layer (upon clicking you will be prompted for loading layer bitmap and opacity map from file; if you cancel those prompts, an empty layer will be created, with the specified properties).

Layer properties are name, width, height, XY position, global opacity, on-channel RGB opacities and blending mode. After selecting a layer (in the screenshot the selected layer is number 3, name “Girl”), you can modify its properties and you must click the “Update” button for them to become permanent.

Other layer features are modifying painting order, using the á,â ↓or “Move” (to a specified position) buttons. The “Crop” button opens a separate window dedicated to cropping the selected layer (there, use the “Selection bounding-box” button to wrap crop area around the selection).

The “Bitmap” and “Opacity” buttons show, in a separate window, the bitmap and the opacity map of the selected layer.

Bitmap as well as opacity can be loaded from file (“Load”), from the DDS library (“Library”; from the new window select the image you want, then click “Send to layer”). Also, they can be sent to one of the DDS Plug-ins: click the “Send to” button corresponding to either Bitmap or Opacity if you want to send them separately, or click “Send bitmap and opacity to” if you want to send them together. The plug-in in which the data is loaded is selected from the plug-in panel, in the lower part of the control panel. If a plug-in should freeze and become unresponsive, click the “Cut-Off” button in the menu bar, in order to sever the link between the main program and the plug-in.

If you to save bitmap, opacity or both into the library, click one of the three buttons below the “Send to library” caption.

The work surface is the canvas onto which the layers are painted. You may specify its width, height, relative XY position, drawing scale and name. Individual work surfaces, with their settings, can be saved using the “Add” button and you can later load them using the “Load” button.

Step 2: Selection Tools

After a layer has been set up, there are basically two steps in editing it. The first step would be selection: what layer should be modified, in which region and to what degree. Assigned to the work surface there is a selection map which specifies what transparency should be used for applying the effect in each layer.

There are various tools for editing selection maps (all of which can be found in the “Selection and related effects panel”, on the right):

 

• Brush - classical brush
• Spray/Airbrush – physical simulation of particles sprayed of selection map. Airbrush uses current brush settings to imprint with pressure sensitivity (the more you hold the brush in one region, the more intense the selection gets).
• Shapes – you can define your own parametric shapes (or use DDS presets), implicit shapes or Iterated Function System (IFS). Defining your own IFS shapes would require some knowledge of math, so if you are not comfortable with that, you can always visit the DDS homepage and download some .ifs files and load them into the program.
• SplinePen – allows you to define curves that go through the key-points you define. After the curve is defined, it can be imprinted onto the selection map as a shape, with various types of contour.
• Filling – it basically works as any filling tool, only it offers a wider range of features (dispersion mode, color space used, color source and so on).
• Gradient – it allows painting the defined gradient onto the selection map.

 

For settings related to each tool, right-click the corresponding button. If you have trouble handling the settings, use the EasyBOX displayed on the left of the screen; double click on the desired tool and all settings (including those related to effects; see Step 3 for details) will be automatically performed for you.

If the “No Selection” button is selected, selection map will not be showed. “Selection A” means that selection will be shown in blue, while the image will be shown in shades of yellow. “Selection B” means that the selection will be showed as a semitransparent area of the color defined by clicking the “C” button. By right clicking either “Selection A” or “Selection B” you will open a new window with special selection related features: color selection, grow/shrink, blur/sharpen, pattern overlay.

You can invert the selection map by clicking the “Neg.” button or you can reset it to a constant value by clicking “Const.”.

The “T. Surface” will enable a tool that moves the work surface in the specified direction (drag and drop on the work surface). The “T. Layer” will do the same thing for the selected layer. “Auto Select” will enable automatic selection of the top-most layer onto which you click.

“Transform” opens a new window, allowing you to linearly transform the contour of the layer, namely the four edges of its bounding box.

“Send to” will send the selection map to the selected plug-in.

The shortcut key for resetting the entire selection to zero is Ctrl+K.
Step 3: Applying Effects

After you finish selecting the area of interest, you may apply one of the many effects offered by DDS. You can find the “Effects” menu in upper side of the screen. Also, important related settings are to be found by clicking the “Effects” button in the “Selection and related effects” panel (see screenshot on the previous page).

The default effect is “Constant Color”, which means applying the same color uniformly over the selected area. In the lower side of the “Associated effect” window, you can select a texture to be loaded and applied on the selected canvas area. By pressing Alt and dragging the mouse over the work surface, you can define the texture offset from the chosen reference (selected layer, surface or point of appliance). By keeping the second “Auto” button (the one in line with “Load layer”) selected, you can use texture as a “Clone brush”. Combined with certain brush settings, “Texture” can also be used as a “Stamping tool”. If you do not want to make the settings yourself, choose either “Clone brush” or “Stamp brush” from EasyBOX.

One important thing when it comes to effects is blending mode. This defines how the new pixel value is overlaid onto the old one. Choose one of the 54 blending modes. Another new feature DDS brings is advanced control over alpha-blending – this means the layer opacity in one area can be determined by itself and by selection opacity and vice versa. Global and channel opacity can also be set. You may also decide if the applied effect is restricted to the layer surface or if the layer is expanded in order to include the entire selected area. Of course, you could write the equations for blending modes (alpha and RGB/HSL), but that is only if you are good with math.

Other effects include convolutions (3x3, MxN, In-Line, Linear, Non-Linear Blur; also Sharpen, Edge Detect, MAX/MIN filters), color correction, color gradients (which patterns defined by equations of imported from *.dat files, that some DDS plug-ins generate), edge enhance and SUSAN adaptive filters, Gaussian JPEG Repair method.

For rapidly applying the effect selected in the “Associated effect” window, click the “GO” button (“Selection and related effects” panel) or press Ctrl-G. If you want the effect to be applied automatically, each time the selection map is modified, keep the “Auto” button selected.

Use Ctrl-Z for Undo/Redo; use Ctrl-F for Undo/Redo Fader. Use the “History” panel for more advanced features related to undo/redo.