PC World Review of ArtRage – 4 out of 5 Stars! “ArtRage makes creating natural-looking art easy and fun” by Erez Zukerman
Erez Zukerman
ArtRage’s interface is simple to pick up, with most functions in easy reach. I tested it with a simple stylus and one of the new breed of touchscreen-enabled laptops, the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13. Radial toolbars at the bottom two corners of the screen let me quickly switch tools and adjust colors without fiddling with menus. Other tools show up as floating panels, which are easy to drag and resize using large, comfortable grippers, and automatically wink out of existence as you paint near them. You can pan, zoom, and rotate the canvas with two fingers, making for a very natural workflow. While most of the interface is touch-friendly, it’s not all quite there yet: Adjusting layer opacity still requires the keyboard, for example. Stencils and rulers make it easy to constrain your work.
When zooming in for detail work, it often helps to keep the big picture in mind. When watching videos made with SpeedyPainter, I noticed just how often artists would zoom in and out, again and again, to get a sense of how the work is progressing. ArtRage helps avoid this by offering a feature called Views. A View works like a little Polaroid snap of your painting that lies on top of your canvas while you zoom in to work on the details. Just like a physical Polaroid, you can drag the View around and rotate it. Unlike its real-world counterpart, you can also change a View’s size, and zoom in or out on its contents. The same concept is used to show pieces of scrap canvas or other files for reference.
Polaroid-like Views of your work keep the big picture in view while zooming in for detail work. ArtRage feels deep and capable, but remains accessible and easy to start with. The attractive price tag doesn’t hurt, either. Like most other painting software, it is usable with a mouse, but shines when used with a pen tablet or a touchscreen. If you’re looking for an affordable and simple way to get into digital painting, try ArtRage out.
ArtRage 4.0 http://www.pcworld.com/product/1253377/artrage-4-0.html At a Glance ArtRage is easy and pleasant to start working with, especially if you have a pen tablet or a touchscreen computer.
View full product specs » http://www.pcworld.com/product/1253377/artrage-4-0.html
Price when rated: $50 (feature-limited demo)
Pros •Easy-to-use interface •Attractive price