Corel Painter Brushes
This project is obsolete. Corel Painter introduced new ZIP-based file formats for importing and exporting brush variants, brush categories and brush libraries in Corel Painter 12.
In my last post, I pointed out some of the problems with the way Painter brushes are currently shared. There are so many different ways that work that the whole process becomes very complicated very quickly. Of course the studio|chris Brush Manager solves the installation issues in many cases, but it doesn’t cover everything as mentioned in my last post. With that, I present a draft of the studio|chris Brush Metapackage (“Brush Package” for short) – a brand new file format designed specifically for sharing and installing Painter brushes in a very consistent way – whether you choose to use the Brush Manager or not.
Brush Package icon draft.
The full specification for the file format is still being written, but the in-progress draft is available for review and open for discussion here in this post (feedback, questions, and suggestions are welcomed in the comments!). The new Brush Package format solves every single problem discussed in the previous post amongst others.
Brush Package support will begin with the next version of the Brush Manager.
A Note to Brush Publishers & Painter Instructors
For those of you who switched to creating only Brush Manager compatible ZIP files – thank you! We all have to work together to make installing our shared brushes as easy as possible for users of all skill levels. This new format is intended to continue along the path to simplifying for those that use the Brush Manager, but also for those who do not. As the format shapes up, I’ll need your help once again to switch over to the new format instead of normal ZIP files. I’ll gladly offer help to make the switch if you need it, but with the automated process to be built into the Brush Manager, you shouldn’t – just click a “Package to Share” button, fill in some important details and be ready to rock.
Of course, there are more features that come into play with the new format, but I can’t go into that just yet – but it is going to be great!
The goal of the Studio|chris Brush Installer, and the most recent incarnation, the Studio|chris Brush Manager is and always has been to make installing, sharing and maintaining Corel Painter brushes simple and easy. The installing part is done – sharing is next on the list.
The Beloved ZIP Format
In the beginning, ZIP was chosen as the format to use for sharing and installing brushes for a few good reasons:
- Painter “brushes” are really collections of individual files and folders. ZIP allows you to package all those loose files into a single file for sharing. Can you imagine downloading 27 files one at a time for brushes? I can’t.
- ZIP files are common and easy to make with built-in support in modern operating systems or with commercial or open source software.
- Many brush sets were already created and shared in the ZIP format, meaning those sets were already ready for the installer.
The honeymoon with ZIP is over though. While simple and easy, the ZIP format has introduced some problems in the installer and caused a lot of confusion for some users.
Here’s where it goes sour:
- ZIP is common. Anything can go in ZIP files, and anything does go in ZIP files. Is the ZIP on your desktop Painter brushes, Photoshop brushes, software, a bunch of Word documents or all those old files you couldn’t stand to look at anymore but didn’t want to delete? Yeah, mine too.
- Following the above, if you’re sure your ZIP file contains Painter brushes, are they organized in a library, a category or loose brush files? (I’ll wait while you check – no, don’t really go look.) The Brush Manager expects categories out of the box, and I believe you shouldn’t have to know that – it should just work.
Random Fact: The Brush Manager will work with the others (libraries and loose files) as well, but maybe not the way you’d expect (Remember the goal, simple and easy, so I’m not going to publish how it works [it is all in the settings] with non-categories, but if you’ve figured it out – awesome!).
- For the Mac users, OS X is sometimes set to automatically unzip ZIP files for you after download. Then it tosses the ZIP file in the Trash – hey, we need that – just move it back to the desktop and continue with the installing.
- OS X also doesn’t follow all the rules with making ZIP files from scratch. These files cause the Brush Manager to choke and not install your brushes.
- Painter Brushes are cross-platform. There is no such thing as a “Mac Painter Brush” or “Windows Painter Brush.” Shared brush ZIPs usually have extra files in them that aren’t needed though. OS X doesn’t care about “thumbs.db,” and Windows will never use “DS_STORE.” These files are usually hidden on their respective platform, but the ZIP makes them visible and when they’re installed on the opposite platform, they’re not hidden anymore.
- Even worse, from recent updates, OS X adds yet another invisible “icon” file to some folders – and its name contains an illegal character for the Brush Manager. This one little file makes the entire brush ZIP useless (for the Brush Manager) on both platforms.
- This doesn’t relate to ZIP, specifically, but instead to the illegal character mentioned above. Some shared brush ZIPs contain illegal characters either in their filenames or in the category names inside to make them fancy and stand out. Let’s stop that – design a pretty icon instead! These characters/letters aren’t usually cross-platform and can make for some really ugly results with Painter and the Brush Manager.
There’s more, not relating to ZIP alone, but let’s just leave it at that. ZIP by itself just doesn’t make the cut anymore.
Making the Bad Go Away
A change is on the horizon, and a new standardized file format that sticks to the goal will emerge that defines “Painter Brushes.” Your brush files won’t be mixed in with “that file of stuff I don’t want to look at anymore.” Before I post the in-progress plans, what would you like to see in a universal, easy to make and easy to share Painter brush package? What problems have you had with installing brushes?
Studio|chris is happy to announce the newest release of the Studio|chris Brush Installer, completely refreshed and renamed as the Studio|chris Brush Manager – a dedicated solution to installing and maintaining Corel Painter brush libraries and categories. This release marks the first public release carrying the new Brush Manager name. This is an exciting release because it brings in a lot of features requested by the community and brings compatibility to every version of Painter, all the way back to version 7 and also into the foreseeable future. The preliminary versions of the Brush Installer were merely a proof-of-concept – it’s time to get serious. Here’s what’s new:
- Refreshed user interface – The interface has undergone a massive overhaul to allow a simplified brush installation process and also allow for future updates to bring more functionality.
- The Drop Box – The three installation boxes of the previous version are gone and replaced with a single drop box that just works, no matter your operating system.
- Settings & Utilities Panel – Yes, the Brush Manager now has user settings. This brings in support for the 64-bit versions of Windows, multiple versions of Corel Painter, and custom install locations.
- Application Updates – Located in the Settings panel, users with an active internet connection may choose to install updates to the Brush Manager with two clicks – one to check for updates and one to download and install.
The Brush Manager 0.6 is immediately available for download and installation. Hope you all enjoy it!
Install brushes to Corel Painter with no effort at all. Drop a ZIP file containing a brush category onto the drop box and watch the Brush Manager do all the work for you in seconds!
Also – many thanks to all the testers who have helped along the way. I couldn’t have put this out for everyone without your help.