Exploring VectorStyler - Part II

 

Introduction
After losing the files I saved on a network drive in VectorStyler, as stated in the previous blog entry, I decided to save them on the system drive, which in itself worked well. The problem is that my computer is too old and lacks the power to properly create advanced graphics - realistic vector portraits - as I found out this time with exporting the various stages of development in the png-file format. My old rig has a first gen i7 Intel CPU from 2008 (....), has dead slow 16 GB 1333 MHz RAM memory and an extinct NVidia GeForce 750 Ti, which in today's world probably is considered to be a prehistoric system. I am therefore considering to upgrade to the Minisforum Neptune HX90G with an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX CPU, 64 GB RAM memory and a M2 512 GB SSD, that has a dedicated GPU - the Radion RX 6650M, while taking up very little space (2.8 liter case). I prefer this x486 AMD mini PC over its Mac competition, because it offers the right to repair and upgradability, plus the fact that the software I purchased, is written for the Windows platform.

The reason that I continue to experiment in this constantly updated, ongoing blog entry with VectorStyler in spite of the problems I encounter with running the program properly, is that it has an absolutely huge potential and many of its incorporated functions already work excellently, while some still require a bit of tweaking. Its developer - a single person, named Csaba Ráduly Baka has so far done a most outstanding job creating and developing the project, in a way that made me convinced of the fact that at some point the bugs will be written out of the code and even more new features will be added. So, this series of blogposts is an on-the-fly test / review / in depth exploration that will last as long as VectorStyler will continue to be developed into a mature state, even when I may encounter additional obstacles.

Export Problem & portrait stage sequence
Because I was unable to export the vector portrait in png-format properly, I made screendumps so that I can still place the progress sequence of the various stages of development in this blog entry. The most recent one is at the top and the oldest one is at the bottom. Where necessary I will enter a comment below the screendumps in addition to the image captions. One crucial aspect of my drawing technique is that I place the reference image on top of all other objects and make it transparent, so that it is easy to retrieve whenever necessary, while its transparency can be changed whenever I temporarily need a more clear image. This is useful especially when a drawing contains hundreds or even thousands of (clipped: objects inside of other objects) objects. From what I have seen in tutorials on Youtube, most artists place the reference image or photo below all others, but for me this does not work for the reason mentioned here.

When the portrait is completed, I will post the vstyler-file in the VS forum, for fellow users to inspect. Note: all photos of Maria Orsic on the Internet are a kind of grainy and jagged black & white type of images, that probably do not do her beauty justice, but I do my utmost to make the best of it. The lack of quality in the photos implies that I was forced to interpret aspects of her face in order to be able to create a portrait that includes the attributes of a realistic depiction of a person. In addition I permitted myself the liberty to lean towards a personal elucidation of miss Orsic' stunning appearance, that also is known as 'artistic freedom', which is a style signature that is present in all the portraits I create.

Tools used in VectorStyler
An other thing is that I did not draw this portrait using the Mesh Gradient tool, which I feel is tedious and time consuming to work with, but I drew separate objects (most of which are clipped several layers deep and blurred, that I named accurately in the Layers panel so that I can find them back at a later point in time for further editing. Also, all objects that are drawn are vectors that will rescale and remain sharp in every size into which the image is rescaled, while the mesh tool is a simulation of pixels in vector format that requires a great amount of calculation when rescaling the image. For instance: many of the shadows consist of a single line with 2 (or in some cases a few more) nodes that probably require less computing power when the image is being rescaled. Editing objects at a later point in time, I find easier also when they are separate objects, each of which can be tuned to what it needs to be, which is especially useful when balancing shapes and colours when an image is in the final stages of the design process.

Brief tutorial on creating objects with varying blur levels
I uploaded a brief tutorial on the VectorStyler forum on how to create objects that have areas of varying blur level ratios along their circumference, that is a technique I often use in drawing realistic vector portraits. The usual type of vector portraits created in Adobe Illustrator almost always have hard edged areas (shadows, creases, hair, facial parts like eyes, ears, nostrils, eyebrows etc.) that make them unrealistic, even though they are presented as realistic vector portraits. Adobe's marketing department has managed to successfully sell Illustrator's shortcomings as a feature and, as commonly is the case, the ignorant majority of the market fell for the carefully concocted scam. An example of such an awful portrait you find here. No offence, but I don't think these portraits qualify as realistic, nor do they deserve to be the maistream standard in that conjured category. But as long as most people prefer to think with their spinal cord, such basically ridiculous type of 'artwork' will be considered to be 'great' by those that have no clue of what greatness is. I have been creating realistic vector portraits for years now and examples of what I mean by that can be found in my website; those portraits hardly have any hard edges, which is exactly what does make them realistic. The process described in this blog entry is the first realistic vector portrait that I drew in VectorStyler - the ones on my website were created in Affinity Designer. I am seriously considering switching from the latter program to the former one mentioned in the previous sentence, which is why I am creating the portrait shown below as a test.

Added the darker areas in the hair and began drawing the left ear

In spite of the calculation / rendering problems my computer presents me, I decided to do a little more drawing. The old machine causes the program to freeze often and say that it is not responding (which lasts up to several minutes at best), but I was dissatisfied with the appearance of the previous stage. In this 12th stint I drew some darker accent areas in the hair, so that at least there is a hint into which direction I am taking this 100% vector portrait. Also corrected the lower eyelid of the right eye. I still need to tweak the colours, intensity, gradients in these areas and add more detail, but I'm afraid that would be challenging this archaic device beyond its limits. After the Minisforum mini PC has arrived and has been set up, I will continue to explore the superb Vectorstyler by way of this project.

Added some more shadows and drew the hair base

At this point the program on this very old computer is behaving very strange, which probably is the result of a dramatic lack of computing power, even when all other programs were closed. I ordered a new computer as described above and will continue when that one has arrived. The hair was done according to the technique I described in the seventh stage. It allowed me to draw a gradual transition area between the hair and forehead. The accents in the hair could not be rendered, which confirmed my suspicion that my machine simply was unable to handle the computations.

Tinkering with shadows on the face

Applying subtle shadows on a face, probably is one of the challenges of creating portraits. If a shadow is off just a minute amount in colour, intensity or blur ratio, there is a risk that entire portrait goes down the drain. So, this took me longer than I expected and I still am far from done. I discovered that in the gradient colour tool each node can separately be given a colour but also an opacity level. Nodes can be added by clicking on the gradient indicator line and typing '+', they can be removed from it by simply dragging the node off the line. Very intuitive. The easy way to draw subtle accents probably is to clip one area into an other (several layers of clipping) which also works well and is easier to control. I will try that in the next stage. In the previous stage I wrote that I wished the blur ratio had a bigger range until I discovered that the interactive tool includes nodes on the top and bottom of the reference circle to adjust the range, which is virtually without limit, unfortunately only in one direction. The developer Csaba Ráduly Baka must have advanced artistic skills besides being a brilliant programmer, because these functional details would never have been considered for implementation by a brilliant programmer who has no artistic skills or too little of them.

Added base shadow on mid and left site of the face

This is the seventh stage already. Edited the mouth somewhat. Tweaking the big shadow until I became senseless - with the blur ratio tool (which I wished would have a more extended range), opacity and gradient colours with a proper number of nodes. Probably some clipping of additional objects will be necessary to get things right. I uploaded a tutorial on how to create objects with a varying level of blurriness along their edge in the VectoStyler forum. Had I been more proficient with gradient colour editing (which is present in VectorStyler) I would probably have used it, but to be honest I dislike that tool from my experience with it in other drawing vector programs. I do like the mesh gradient transparency tool, but I still need to  practice it more in order to efficiently use it. I have to leave the image alone for a while and return to it at a later point in time. I'm sure artists are familiar to this type of situation in which the proper settings just elude them, while that seems to be no problem further into the future (I hope). Part of this problem is caused by the fact that I drew the shadow in one piece, in order to minimize the number of objects, which does not always work...... Also, my ancient rig is beginning to struggle, so purchasing a new, more powerful one kind of climbed on my bucket list. First I have to check the budget though, since being able to buy food is important.

Experimenting with dark background

Editing colour intensity of the blurred shadow area at the right side of face mainly to see how that would appear against a dark background. Most of my vector portraits have a transparent background so that I can place them before any type of background and change my mind whenever it seems appropriate to do. Colour balancing therefore is important.

Added mouth and chin line

Besides working on the mouth and chin area and correcting mistakes in the eyes area, I have begun experimenting with mesh transparency, which is an absolutely brilliant function that is present in none of the programs competing with VectorStyler. I will need this function at a later point in this design, but I don't feel familiar enough with it to apply it already. It is just one of the many functions offered by VectorStyler that devs of its competition have not figured out yet how to code. Still a heap to learn for me!

Added shadow to the right side of nose

While tweaking the left eye VectorStyler froze and offered a weird message without saying what was wrong. After closing the program and restarting it, I was offered the option to retrieve a back up, which worked just fine. Immediately the developer responded on the forum and reported a bug. This type of swift support I have never experienced anywhere in my long involvement with software. Great!

Added shadow on the right side of face

Besides adding the shadow on the face' right side did some tweaking of the right eye. Shadowing requires a subtle approach, both in intensity, giving objects a blur ratio and applying colour accents. There still are details that bug me, but I am sure that I will get them sorted out at some point, as I become more familiar with VectorStyler.

Added right eye

Copied left eye to the right. Reshaped elements with the move- and node tool. Adjusted colour accents and lighting, mainly in clipped objects. Renamed copied left eye objects to right eye parts in Layers panel, this because there already are many objects in the drawing that I need to retrieve at a later point in time for further editing, when looking to rebalance colour intensity, because in portraiture moving and reshaping (parts of) objects just a few pixels determines the quality of the likeness, as do do colour accents.

Added shadow behind the left eye

So far, I have mainly been using the Gaussian blur function, object clipping and interactive transparency, all of which work superbly. Many image effect functions - such as blurring - can interactively be fine tuned on the spot, which offers artists the option to exactly and instantly see the result of their tweaking.

Started drawing the face contour and left eye

When drawing realistic vector portraits, I always start with the eyes, because they are the dominant factor in facial features. For drawing I use the pen tool and the node tool to fine tune. Most objects are given a Gaussian blur effect. Colour management in VectorStyler is very easy to use with great precision.

Stage 15 - vector outline

Vecor drawing of tiger

 

I was drawing a different artwork in which I decided to add this tiger. While creating the big cat I thought it might be a nice piece by itself. It is all vector, zero pixels, drawn in Affinity Designer. So far (Sept 27 2020) the base has been drawn. I will probably add the tiger's fur later, using my Huion tablet. Oldest stage at the bottom, newest on top. A good design takes time, including the time to distance oneself from the creation to apply better contemplated and less biased changes / improvements at a later time. As far as I'm concerned anyway.

The most recent stand alone tiger, does not fit the sequence chronologically, but that was because I edited the embedded tiger in the poster image and later created a new file of the embedded tiger. Being an artist sometimes can be complex and confusing. But that probably goes for countless other people as well. Most of whom think they're at the top of the food chain, which isn't always a correct interpretation. A view for instance, that will certainly be discarded when confronted with a hungry tiger. It is an inexorable fate determined by nature; carnivores are predators that must kill to live. Humans excepted, because they kill whenever they can invent a reason to kill. Such is the nature of man. This predatory propensity brought tigers to the brink of extinction. 

Stage 7 experiment 3 - Oct 01 2020 - 00:42 hrs
 

Stageless T-shirt design  

Stage 5 experiment 1 - Oct 01 2020 - 00:42 hrs
 

Stage 3 - Sept 27 2020 - 10:00 hrs

Stage 2 - Sept 26 2020 - 21:00 hrs

Stage 1 - Sept 26 2020 - 10:00 hrs

Vector self portrait

This is a work in progress (as per May 21 2020), created in Affinity Designer from a photo shot at X-mas eve in 2014. In the meanwhile I've grown too old and ugly to have (versions of) my mug clutter up my blog entries. It explains the choice for this old image that won't hurt your eyes. The long hair is the biological antenna field on top of my skull that allows me to pick up impulses from elsewhere and elsewhen. It also reduces hairdresser costs and distinguishes my appearance from the trendy yet boring standard look that proves people have a mindless herd mentality, which makes them as predictable as f××k (pardon my French).

This work does not contain a single pixel; it consists of 100% vectors. There is virtually nothing that can't be done in this vector drawing program that bitmap editors are capable of, with the distinction that the images created with it can be re-scaled to any size without loss of quality. It is why I draw realistic portraits exclusively in vectors. Still experimenting with different techniques to create a realistic vector portrait after some four years of doodling in Affinity Designer. The functions offered by this program to draw such a work are many. It suits portrait artists like me magnificently. This time around the challenge I set myself, was to get the maximum result with as little objects as possible. I may fail miserably, but would it kill me? Nope, I guess it won't. 

I work on this portrait intermittently because I spend time living as well. The oldest stage at the bottom, the newest on top. At the very bottom is a vector outline view of the eleventh stage. Click on one of the images to see them in Google's Lightbox. In the Lightbox the mouse scroll wheel can be used to flick through the images quickly. This is possible on a desktop PC and probably also on a Mac. Unfortunately Google in its infinite wisdom (and its desire to make huge profits) recently decided to allow only small images in the Lightbox. So, here's a properly sized version of it on the server of my website. Bear in mind that it's not yet finished, I still need to do some more work on the portrait. Stay tuned.

Shades & goatee added

Stage 13 May 24 2020 - 23:15 hrs 

Stage 11 May 22 2020 - 19:46 hrs 

Stage 10 May 21 2020 - 20:01 hrs  

Update May 21 2020 - 01:28 hrs 

Update May 20 2020 - 23:23 hrs 

Update May 20 - 21:20 hrs 

Update May 20 2020 - 19:00 hrs 

Update May 20 2020 - 17:45 hrs

Stage 11 vector outline view 

Vector portrait of Mike Ehrmantraut (Breaking Bad)

This is the vector portrait of Jonathan Banks who played Mike Ehrmantraut in 'Breaking Bad'. The portrait was created in Affinity Designer in which I still am experimenting because I continue to discover different ways to create certain effects. In this particular work I often used the clipping of strokes, (custom made) brushes and objects (shapes). I used Gaussian blur a lot on both the clipping objects as the clipped objects, which can go several levels deep without a problem. ALL objects are given the parameter: scale with object, so that the image can in theory be re-scaled to any size without loss of quality.

February 18 2022 - Stage 20 - 20 hours

Some details, like the eyes, are intentionally drawn differently from what they look like in the reference image to enhance the visual impact of the image without giving up likeness. In every portrait the eyes determine 'the look' of the artwork. The choice of more or less differing colours can also be used to create a more dramatic effect. These are among my most used tricks to draw portraits that are more than just accurate copies of photographs. I prefer to create some sort of visual metaphor that reflects the way I perceive characters in an attempt to highlight the essence of their personality by revealing what (I think that) hides behind which is obviously noticeable at first glance, because everyone wears a mask, a fact of which some are not even aware that they do. I like to suggest to the observer to look beyond without encouraging to dissect in an invasive way, because when observing becomes judging one can no longer enjoy art. 

Custom designed vector Brushes can be used as textured shapes in various ways that I may explain in a video tutorial when I have enough money to by a decent cam and get the hang of video editing software. It is a very interesting option for artists that use a lot of organic texture in their artwork, but it is not an obvious thing to do. Affinity Designer is able to handle the unusual array of functions applied quite well; it doesn't crash. This currently (May 09 2020) is a work in progress. It is still far from perfect, but I learned a lot. Again (seems to be a never ending process). The various stages of development you see below - the oldest stage at the bottom, the newest one on top. At the bottom of this page is the vector outline view of stage 13 for the vector initiates. Click on one of the images to enter Google's Lightbox that allows to quickly scroll through the images with the mouse wheel (for those viewing this page on a PC anyway).

May 19 2020 - stage 19 - 19 hours

May 09 2020 - Stage 15 13 - 14 hours of work

May 08 2020 - 13th stage - 11-12 hours so far

Stage 19 vector outline view

Renault Alpine A110 vector drawing

This Renault Alpine is my all time favorite car. Its lines are almost sensual, a caress to the eye, but it is as aggressive as one can get from a small bore block that was placed in the back (not a mid engine). Especially the front is brilliantly designed. The outstanding design was created by the legendary Giovanni Michelotti, who drew many fabulous cars. This image is entirely created in vectors in Affinity Designer. The drawing does not contain a single pixel, it contains vectors only. The texts are still editable, because I tinkered with the Character functions - tilting of individual letters, height, width and spacing between the letters.


A few remarks considering this project:

• When exporting to a size (a lot) smaller than the dimensions it was drawn in, jagged edges appear in the near horizontal and near vertical edges and lines. When exporting to the native size (in png) and re-scaling afterwards, this problem no longer exists
• For this particular work exporting in the Bilinear Resampler with the Apple RGB ICC colour profile ticked and palettized deslected works best with the profile embedded. This profile can be saved and used in other projects. The colours are richer and of slightly darker tone than the standard settings in Affinity Designer
• The most tedious objects to draw were the head light lenses, the radiator grilll, alloy wheels and bonnet hinges. Still Affinity designer allows to adjust these easily and quickly afterwards
• The Character functions in Affinity Designer allow to create realistic text that is observed from an angle, while the text remains editable. This is a hugely useful feature for projects that contain text that isn't viewed from an angle perpendicular and centered to the text
• The Gaussian blur function, combined with gradient colouring and transparency, allow to create hyper realistic vector images that require far less time than the mesh-fill function in Illustrator and CorelDRAW (to create the same) and makes adjusting afterwards a much faster process than what is offered by the competition. When re-scaling the image to a larger size it stays sharper than images created with mesh-fill techniques that is basically replacing pixels with vectors, which only takes away jagged edges but does not change the relative pixel density of the image. When using the mesh-fill technique in which a transition is originally drawn in 10 steps, it remains 10 steps no matter what re-scaling is applied, while using the non mesh-fill method of Affinity Designer the transition is simply recalculated with every act of re-scaling, which equals a smooth infinite number of steps, without 10 steps having to coordinate the effect of individual steps
• The alloy wheels are drawn in Rhinoceros 3D, turned into the proper viewing position and then placed into Affinity Designer to trace and edit. This also applies to the tire groove patterns. In doing so I can design my own wheel and tire patterns, while keeping their appearance realistic and in the correct perspective. Later these objects will be traced manually to keep the drawing all vector, so that it can be re-scaled to any size without loss of quality
• The size in which this drawing was created is eight times bigger than the exported png's in this post. When printed in approximately 70 x 35 cm the details will appear much better than is visible here
• The reference image was a poor quality drawing  (the image that is, not the artist's drawing skill) and had mistakes in them, but it was a more dynamic image than any photo I was able to find nevertheless. I needed to look at many different photographs to give the car an authentic appearance. Still I added some detail that make it unique (which is what I always do in every drawing and painting that I create)
• There may be two versions - one the street version of the car and the other a stickered rally version. The stickers will be on a separate layer so they can be turned on and off at will. I must find the time to do this though
• I struggled with the left front wheel well, because in the reference image the car has extended bulgy wheel wells, which I dislike, until stage 19 where this was corrected, since this stage the car now has its original subtle wheel well. I came across this problem because there previously wasn't enough space for the lateral blinker and type insignia, that are placed behind the front tire wheel well and flush with the top of it. Now there is. Check out the difference between stage 18 and 19 by clicking on the stage 19 image and flicking between the two stages in Google's Lightbox

It is still a work in progress at this time (I started this project on April 3 2020). The oldest stage is at the bottom, the newest on top. Click an image to go to the Google Lightbox that allows to swiftly flick through the stages by turning the scroll wheel of the mouse. Unfortunately this works in desktop computers only.

Stage 19 15:19 hrs, April 17 2020

Stage 18 11:42 hrs, April 14 2020

Stage 17 13:24 hrs, April 10 2020

Stage 16 23:00 hrs, April 9 2020

Stage 15 23:00 hrs, April 8 2020

Stage 12 12:50 hrs, April 6 2020

Stage 8 23:00 hrs, April 5 2020

Stage 4 13:00 hrs, April 4 2020

Stage 1 14:30 hrs, April 3 2020

===========================================

Outline view, 3D parts and reference image

Stage 18 vector outline view -
Alloy wheels and tires must still be traced
The wriggly red lines below the editable texts
indicate the entries (Vectorwhiz and Cibie)
are not present in the dictionary
while Renault actually is

Alloy wheel drawn in Rhino 3D
seen from a different angle

Tire drawn in Rhino 3D
seen from a different angle

Reference image