~ Gold's Paint.NET Tutorials ~

OMIGAWD Hai! Welkom tu mai tred bowt paynt.net :)

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Paint.NET is a FREEWARE Image editor.

It's like MSPaint, but on steroids. ;)

If you don't have it, then get it now!

For (almost) all of these tutorials I'll be using a basic 300x150 signature-sized canvas.

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]~ 1. Introduction ~ This thing... Yeh...

]~ 2. Tools

]~ 3. Gradients

]~ 4. Layers & Other Tools

]~ 5. Effects

]~ 6. Metallic effects

]~ 7. When I think of it 'twill come

]~ Post #3. Installing Fonts

]~ Post #3. Random Sig Script guide

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~ Tools (Basic - Toolbar) ~

There are many, many tools in the toolbar alone, and great effects can be made with them...

Here I'll explain them.

Here's your toolbar on the left (by default):

Top Left: Rectangle selection tool - Use this to select a rectangular space on that layer (Layers are explained further down). Press Ctrl whilst using this to create a perfect square.

Top Right: Move Selected Pixels - Use this to enlarge/decrease the selection by dragging the nubs (buttons), move the selection, or rotate the selection by right clicking on the image and moving the mouse.

2nd Left: Lassoo selection tool - Use this to freehand select an area.

2nd Right: Move selection area - Use this to move/enlarge/decrease the area of the selection, but not the image inside it.

3rd Left: Elipse selection tool - Use this to select an elipsical (?) area on that layer (layers explained later on). Press Ctrl whilst using this to create a perfect circular selection.

3rd Right: Zoom tool - Left click to zoom in as far as 3200%. Right click to zoom out as far as 1%. Press mouse wheel/middle click whilst zoomed in more than can fit on your screen to move around without using scrollbars.

4th Left: Magic wand tool - Select all of the area covered by the pixels of the colour you click on (must be touching each other) . Press Shift whilst using this to select all of the area covered by that colour in the whole image. Press Ctrl whilst using this to select more than one area of colour. (Best to experiment with this, as I find it hard to describe)

4th Right: Text tool - Use this to create text. Change font, alignment and other things such as bold in the toolbar along the top.

5th Left: Paintbrush tool - Use this to draw. Change the brush size to the a bit left of the font change box. Left click to draw in primary colour, right click to draw in secondary colour.

5th Right: Eraser - This completely erases anything you use this over, and makes it transparent. Handy for creating renders. Change size same as above.

6th Left: Pencil tool - Draws 1 pixel at a time, and left click to draw in primary colour, right click to draw in secondary colour.

6th Right: Colour Picker - Select the primary and secondary colours by right or left clicking on the colour you want on the appropriate layer.

7th Left: Clone tool - Press Ctrl and click to select a place where to copy from. Then use left click to colour over, and it'll recreate the exact same picture, but move the exact amount of pixels away from the copy origin (that you made by right clicking) to the place where you placed that first pixel. Another one to experiment with, as I can't describe this too well.

7th Right: Recolour tool - Left clicking will replace any of your secondary colour with your primary colour, and right clicking with replace any of your primary colour with your secondary colour.

8th Left:Fill tool - Left click to fill the area with your primary colour, and right click to fill the area with your secondary colour. Tolerance varies the amount of area filled (in a way - This is really hard to explain but I'll try include it in a later guide).

8th Right: Line/Curve tool - Left click to draw a line with the Primary colour, right click to draw a line with the secondary colour. Drag the nubs (buttons) to create different curves. If antialiasing is on, there will be a blend from the colour of the line to the colour of the image it's being applied to. Antialiasing will be explained better later on.

9th Left: Rectangle Tool - Can give six different results according to right click/left click, and which option is selected in the toolbar at the top, on the same row as the font change box. The left one is just the outline; left click gives an outline of the primary colour, right click gives an outline of the secondary colour. The middle one is fill, no outline; left click to get the fill of the secondary colour, right click to get the fill of the primary colour. The right one is fill and outline; This is like the two combined, with the same left click/right click variants.

Antialiasing applies to this.

Press Shift while using to create a perfect square.

9th Right: Same as above, but gives a rounded rectangle, not sharp edged one.

Press Shft while using to create a perfect edged square.

10th Left: Same again as above, but gives an elipse, not a rectangle.

Press Shift while using to create a perfect circle.

10th Right: Same as above, but you create a freeform (hand-drawn) shape.

Tolerance Bar - This is used mostly with the Magic Wand and Fill tools. The higher the tolerance is, the closer the colour needs to be to the fill colour, or it'll be coloured over. (I think... This is hard to explain) Just play around with filling different areas with different tolerance levels and see if you can figure it out.

Primary Colour - This is the box below the Tolerance bar. In this case it's light blue, as I have that selected on the colour wheel under Primary.

Secondary Colour - This is the box underneath the Primary colour box, and in this case it's white.

Switch Primary + Secondary colours - This is the little arrow on the right of the Primary, and Above the secondary. It switches the two colours.

Default colours - The little Black and White box opposite the Switch colours Arrow. It changes the primary and secondary colours back to their default colours (Black and White)

That's the side toolbar summed up, pretty much.

Now onto Gradients!

More tools can be found later on in this guide.

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~ Gradients ~

Ok, so there are two ways to do Gradients.

~1) The easy way

Ok, one of the most basic ways is amazing easy, yet doesn't always produce what you want.

Step 1) Zoom in and pencil 1 pixel of the colour you want the gradient to start with on a (preferably) blank layer/canvas.

Step 2) Directly below it, pencil 1 pixel of the colour you want the gradient to end with.

Step 3) Now use the Rectangular selection tool to select those 2 pixels (only).

You should now have something similar to this:

Step 4) Zoom out and switch to the Move Selected pixels tool and drag the 'nubs (buttonny things)' outwards so the very bottom pixel touches the very bottom of the canvas, and so the very top pixel touches the top of the canvas.

Complete! When you deselect this it'll instantly turn into a gradient!

Something like this is what you should have:

Try playing about with positioning of the colours as to receive different results as to where the gradient comes from/fades to.

~2) The hard(ish) way

Step 1) Select the colour you want to start the Gradient, and switch it to the Secondary colour (Arrows near colour display).

Step 2) Select Draw Rectangle tool, on Fill only

Step 3) Draw a Rectangle of the starting colour covering about a third of the space you want to have the gradient on.

Step 4) Repeat the same, but change the colour to make it in between the Starting and finishing colours, and cover the 2nd third of canvas.

Step 5) Repeat again, but use the finishing colour of the gradient, and fill the last third of it.

Now you should have something like this:

Step 6) Now go into Effects -> Blurs -> Gaussian Blur. Drag the bar along until you get the desired blend. I normally use 54, but just fiddle about and see which you like.

And now this:

Tip: Try Changing the amount of canvas covered by each colour to try and create a faster/slower blending gradient.

~ Layers ~

Layers are another extremely helpful tool of Paint.NET that make it so much easier to use.

Layers are like whole new images, but they build up in layers over the background layer.

When you start a new canvas, or open a file (Unless it's a PDN that has been saved with layers) you'll have only 1 layer; the background layer by default.

By using different layers you can make it easy to edit a picture if necessary, like changing text, and making translucent masks.

You can use a new layer to stop the image beneath the editing you want to do being deleted. Plus you can move it around without having to select only that so it doesn't drag any background with it, like in MSP(aint).

So let's start with the basics, as always.

If you haven't disabled it, you should have a small sub-window named "Layers" whenever you have Paint.NET open.

It'll look a little like this:

Now I'll explain the buttons.

Far left: Add new layer - This creates a new layer.

2nd from left: Delete layer - This deletes the whole layer completely, without removing anything from any other seperate layers. (Only possible to use if you have more than 1 layer)

3rd from left: Duplicate layer - This will duplicate the selected layer exactly, and paste it onto a new layer.

3rd from right: Move layer up - If you have multiple layers you can change the order so certain layers show over/under other certain layers. This one moves the selected layer up.

2nd from right: Move layer down - Same as above, but moves the selected layer down.

Far right: Layer properties - Takes you to a menu listing the properties of the selected layer. Here you can edit its name, opacity (Opaque, Translucent and Transparent) and set a blending mode.

Making a layer more translucent/lowering opaque can be very handy for tinting images and making nice effects for signatures.

That's about it for now on Layers. If you have any tips/suggestions/recommendations please post/PM me them.

~ Installing Fonts ~

1) Download a font of your choice

2) Extract (Unzip) that file

3) Cut the extracted TTF (TrueType Font) File

4) Go to C:/Windows/Fonts - I think It's Library/Fonts for Mac users.

5) Paste it in, it'll install itself.

6) Select the font from the drop down toolbar.

Done. :)

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~ Random Sig Script guide ~

1) Go to: http://www.uzzisoft.net/randomsigscript

2) Register

3) Login

4) ->Add pictures

5) Browse and select the files you want to upload from your computer - DON'T USE HOSTED LINKS

6) ->Login Home

7) Copy the link

8) Put around it and stick it in your sig area (Tip.It forums -> Profile)

Done. :)

4th post !! :mrgreen:

Oh darn, I wanted to be hunted down. :cry:

Nice tut. ^_^

Hai Nubz!

Very precise guide you got here. Ive linked it under the TGT's thread and I expect it will be listed under the gallerie's as well.

Nice job. phr33 st00f plx?!!!!!111

Thanks.

I just have the basic guides up at the moment, but I'll soon put up a load more for you all to sniff. :)

This program really deserves you to at least test it, so do it! Get it and try it!

It's amazing and I think you'll agree with a bit of experimenting and following a few of my guides. :D

EDIT: Hehe, cheers a ton Cad. :P

WOOT now with this i no exactly wat im doing for once rofl

YOU THEIF! THAT WAS MY IDEA! ARGH!

ah well, saves me the effort...

looking good, but kinda basic.

PJB21

Thanks Coffe. :D

Paint.NET FTW!

EDIT: Lmao PJB, Sorry. :P

Pjtom asked for one, so I thought 'WTP? (What the potatoes)" and made it. :D

But I did save you the effort! :P

I'll be adding more tomorrow, but I'll have to go soon. School tomorrow. >_<

Everyone is stealing from you now aren't they, pjb, lol. Gold, I wish you'd put more in your guide! I already did the gradient! :evil:

I'll be adding more tomorrow, but I'll have to go soon. School tomorrow. >_<

Yeh, I know it's in the very early stages, just keep experimenting and see if it crops up soon. :P

Ok, can't wait for the updated tut.

Should hopefully get:

]~ 4. Layers & Other Tools

]~ 5. Effects

]~ 6. Metallic effects

Done tomorrow.

And more if I can get some more ideas/anyone can post ideas.

Night all. :D

Nice tutorial. I'll add it to the sticky if you don't mind. I might try it myself although Paint seems to work well for me. :P

NOW I see this after I spent an hour looking for a thing to resize my images -.-

Pee...em...gee...

THIS OWNZ...

8-)

Nice tut!

Helpfull, I hope to see it complete :D

I may try out paint.net ^^

~komodo

hmm i just downloaded it and its wayyyy confusing , but ill get the hang of it i hope :D

:o Stickified! (Kinda)

w000000t!

And er... yehh. :)

Cheers for all the compliments guys. I'm gonna work on it some more when I get back from school.

Back to work. :D

Other gradients tut up, next is layers and other toolbar explanation.

Hey gold... after you finsih making this tut could you make an apophysis tut? coz i still dont get how to use the dam prog :shock: lol

Yeh, I will, though it'll be brief, as I don't know how to use it that well myself... It'll probably be in 1 or 2 posts on this thread.

Ok kl Thnx :D