Suminagashi 2 Brushes

Suminagashi_2.zip (108 KB) for Corel Painter 7 and above.

There are no restrictions on use, other than the resources are not to be offered for sale or redistributed without my prior consent. The zipped file is also compatible with the current (0.6.1012) version of the Studio|chris Brush Manager (see link in Painter Utilities section), which will automatically install them as a brush category. All variants are SaveRestoreDamping|SaveRestoreMouseParams compliant.

Note that these variants will only apply media directly on the canvas, or non-transparent regions of a default layer (i.e. one previously filled with white for example). Variants with a Z prefix in their name do not apply any colour of their own, but have a distorting effect on the underlying pixels.

Traditional Suminagashi is a marbling technique that originated in Japan more than 800 years ago, involving the process of marbling plain paper, transforming it into something vibrant and colourful. The term translates literally as ‘ink-floating’. In the following YouTube video, artist, print maker and teacher Rebecca Ramos demonstrates this technique.

Whilst my Corel Painter Suminagashi variants cannot replicate the fluid movement dynamics of the traditional ink media over the surface of the water (although there are several distortion variants included in the library), they can portray a ‘Suminagashi inspired style’, incorporating their own unique brush stroke properties and appearance.

The colour rendering Suminagashi and Suminagashi Grad variants can produce a very fluid, etherial look, even without the aid of softening or distorting variants. Variants with Grad in their name take their color information from the currently selected gradient (Window menu> Library Palettes> Gradients), whilst other variants employ colour variability via. the Color Variability palette (Window menu> Color Palettes> Color Variability).

For my demonstration images, I have chosen very saturated, multiple colours, but you may want to experiment with a more subtle, monochromatic palette.

As previously mentioned, variants in this library prefixed with a Z in their name do not apply any colour of their own, but distort the underlying imagery in a variety of ways. Comparing to the traditional Suminagashi technique, this would be the closest equivalent to disturbing the surface of the floating ink media so that the different colours and regions began to mix and flow into each other.

For these particular variants, I have configured them so that stylus pressure controls the magnitude of the distortion effect.

The usual post rendering adjustments can be made via. Effects menu> Tonal Control> Adjust Colors (or Equalize) for example, or perhaps the Effects menu> Surface control> Dye Concentration dialog.

The Floranagashi variant can produce a sumi-e style branch and foliage effect (left), whilst the Grainagashi variant interacts with the currently selected paper texture. The Z Grainagashi Smear variant does not apply any colour, but smears the underlying pixels in combination with the current paper texture.

There can be some undo and redo of the brush strokes to achieve the desired look with the above variants, but with a little trial and error, they can produce dragon-like forms, even complete with heads. There is something about the Drip method variants which I find quite magical.

In this example, the Fuku Riu (Good Luck Dragon) variant has been used to render the top brush stroke, whilst the Sui Riu (Dragon King/ Rain Dragon) variant was used for the bottom stroke.

For those interested in learning more about Japanese dragons, there is some information at dragonsinn.net

The strokes produced by the Life Form and Life Form Mono variants had the appearance of alien life forms, hence the name. The colours/ values within the strokes are randomised in the Color Variability palette. Use a slower stroke speed to produce a more closed, tubular form, and faster strokes to give a more open ‘backbone’ effect.

I have encountered a stroke rendering bug when using some of the Suminagashi 2 variants. This defect seems to particularly affect variants with a Rake stroke type and Drip method, which could also be the same bug mentioned in my Live Impasto Brushes article.

In the above example, I applied several brush strokes using the Life Form variant (top left in image), applied one of the Z prefixed variants to a blank region of the canvas, then made another stroke using the same Life Form variant (bottom right). These steps were repeated using the Fuku Rui variant (right). A very noticeable degradation in rendering appearance occurs.

There is however a workaround to this. If this issue occurs, choose the Suminagashi variant from the library, click once on the canvas (Cmd/ Ctrl + Z to undo the stroke if the canvas is marked in the operation), then commence painting again with the previously defective variant.

Traditional Suminagashi tutorial (silverdragonstudio.com).

Suminagashi demonstration by Yoju.

The world of Japanese Marbling (Traditional Suminagashi and Suimonga examples and techniques).

Paper marbling (Wikipedia)