Want to get started painting

[Mike Tribble]

I want to get started painting car skins but have no idea where to begin. What software do I need? I can't spend $700 on Photoshop! Are there low cost / no cost /freeware programs that will work? I know some of you guys are experts at this stuff and I'm going to try to pick your brains for some advice. I don't propose to be a wizz at this just like to be able to paint up a car for my personal use.

Thanks in advance for all helps.

MT

[Ron_Schuermann]

PaintShop Pro os the other lower cost item that a lot of people use.

[Mike Tribble]

PaintShop Pro os the other lower cost item that a lot of people use.

Thanks Ron I'll check it out


MT

[Ron_Schuermann]

I think Tim Collier uses that. I use Photoshop myself.

[Mike Tribble]

Ok, I downloaded a 30 day trial of Paint Shop Pro. Now what? I'm such a noob!

[TimCollier]

I use Paint Shop Pro 8 which I bought for $80 at Circuit City a couple of years ago....

Now, as for HOW to paint, well, if you have no experience at all with painting programs, you need to learn how to do a few things such as using layers, selection tools, color replacement, and selection tool modifiers. Do a search on the Net for some tutorials on using PSP. Even better is to take a look at a car in a template format with the layers, then look at another Paint Shop file of the same car painted up and see how the layers are used.

I can post example work later tonight after the GTS race...but the best guy to go to for Paint help is Mike Tyler. That guy's a freakin' wizard!!! Of course, there's plenty of guys here who do damn fine paint jobs....Dunlop's cars always look great, and John Rowland has done several cars for GTS, as well as Porsches and Meganes and more.

But more than anything else, just play around with a template and don't labor too hard at it at first, then we can talk about getting into a sim like rFactor, which is very easy to do.

Also, grab logos for your car from places like http://www.brandsoftheworld.com

Good luck and ask all the questions you may have...hell, I'd love to learn how Mike does most of the stuff he does!

[Ron_Schuermann]

You need to get the templates.
http://780bradford.com/champion/foru...ight=templates

And Car Viewer (a java program that lets you view your car as it is being painted).
RFactor http://www.thepits.us/board/viewtopic.php?t=1189
I am looking for GT Legends Car Viewer

[Ron_Schuermann]

Then you paint in "Layers"

Paint your base coat on Layer 1, then as you add more paint, paint them on seperate layers, so you can just get rid of a layer if you don't like it.

When you are all done, you will "flatten" your image, or merge all the layers into one.