Digital Art/Paini System Survey ROBERT RIVW he most fundamental question to be three-dimensional letters, or complex addressed in this survey is, What computerized "mapping" designs, then is a digital art/paint system? output the results a Secondly, frame at a time, T the survey provides a basis for usually onto film, taking up to six minutes comparison among the different systems, to assemble each frame of e complex designed to show where they are similar, sequence. where they vary, and prompt you to The systems outlined here are designed directly contact those manufacturers to perform "down and dirty" whose systems you wish to evaluate artwork-artwork which is, in the words seriously . of Peter Black It pf Xiphias, "short turn- is clear, now that the dust from last around/short burst." In typical newsroom year's NAB show is beginning to settle, applications, the that images will be created we have seen, in the course of just the within minutes, then displayed, usually past year alone, the birth of a brand new compressed into a box wipe, for seconds . type of image creation product-the Though some digital of the systems possess the art/paint system. Its predecessors ability to perform 'limited animation"- pre-date it by several years, including the by having a finished NEC picture build up from Action Track/Digital Strobe Action scratch, for instance, or by having colors unit that uses extensive digital processing flash on and off and a simulating motion, these digital framestore to generate often systems are not designed to produce abstract images out of existing video animation effects pictures, . The images are, for all and the Interand Telestrator intents and purposes, digital stills. which, for several years, has been being used to draw images directly onto a TV monitor using a unique blend of analog System types and digital processing. In a narrow definition, only certain of But there is nothing quite like the digital the systems included art/paint in this survey would systems which appeared in such be considered digital art/paint systems, numbers at the NAB show, and the having been unlimited developed strictly for the graphics possibilities they open purposes outlined above. They are the up. By way of definition the systems Ampex AVA, Aurora Digital outlined in this survey are all products Videographics, Digital Effects Video available for purchase and installation in Palette, Logica Flair, MCI/Quantel broadcast plants and teleproduction Digital Fine Arts, N.Y.I.T. /Computer facilities. We're not talking about pro- Graphics Lab IMAGES and Xiphias prietary computer animation systems Videograph. For the sake of comparison (opposite page) used by production companies which and A gallery of Images created on digital art/ because they can often accomplish the specialize in creating computer graphics same purpose, however, we have paint systems (clockwise, from upper left): for others (for included Aurora Imaging Digital Videographics these companies, see the several other types of systems. From System; Ampex AVA; Digital Effects Video stories on East and West Coast special Adwar and Video Associates Labs are Palette (Andrea D'Amico, artist) ; IMAGES effects houses elsewhere in this issue). Nor modifications that allow the low-cost from Computer Graphics Lab created on are we talking about the kind of computer Apple II computers graphics package to the system; MCI/Quantel DFA-7000 Digital graphics systems which use large and be used in an NTSC video system. From Fine Arts system; Logica Flair. small computers to simulate motion, or For-A is a "video writer" allowing a light MILLIMETER/SEPTEMBER 1981 DIGITAL ART/ PAINT pen to create images directly on a video screen. The Interand Telestrator uses a proprietary stylus to achieve much the same effect, but far more complex. The Thomson-CSF Vidifont Graphics V is an extremely advanced character generator/ graphics system with a drawing tablet and other art system features. And, from McInnis/Skinner, Spectra Computer Systems (formerly Weathercaster) and Weathermation are art systems which evolved from programs to add graphics and movement to weather radar and map displays. Hardware Almost all the systems are based on microprocessors or mini-computers which have graphics programs to translate the digital data and its manipulation into graphics images; this data is generally written into a digital framestore which is The menu display on the Aurora system the active "canvas area" for creating (above) uses a full-color graphical menu to images and displaying the illustration indicate modes. being worked on. Logica's Flair system graphics tablet (left) The basic computer graphics programs has pre-selected menu areas; transparent, are generally accessed through a computer It can be used to trace artwork. console keyboard, though the amount of keyboard interaction varies consider- ably from system to system. On units with the most advanced software, the interaction is limited to virtually turning the computer on with the keyboard; in others, the computer-prompted, key- board-entered commands do much of the work. Again, almost all the systems have a graphics tablet on which the artist "draws" and "paints" with a stylus, providing magnetically-encoded in- structions to the computer through the graphics tablet . In some of the systems, the size of the active drawing area is Below, the Ampex AVA system's interac. tive graphics variable so that the artist can select the tablet. size of the area he or she wants to draw in, with the scale between the drawing area and the picture monitor scaled according- ly. In some systems, the drawing area is completely separate from the menu selection process, though the same stylus (or the keyboard) can be used to choose operating modes. On the other hand, some of the systems-like Aurora and Digital Effects-have the menu display and the illustration in the same monitor. Paint/Draw/Rubber Stamp The "painting" process is perhaps the ultimate refinement of these systems, for it allows the artist to first define the stylus as a "brush," then define its shape, then dip it in the "paint pots" palette, and paint on the screen with whatever shape and color have been selected . In some systems, the sizes and shapes of the brushes have to be pre-determined. In others, the artist first defines the size and shape of the brush, then "captures" it as a 68 MILLIMETER/SEPTEMBER 1981 DIGITALARTI associated with the color programs . "Fill" pencil charcoal, etc. An "airbrushing" PAINT means that, once the stylus is touched technique is also available, allowing the down within an area on the tablet, the shape so that painting with rather artist to smooth out the hard edges of an strange program will begin to fill all non-contig- shapes can take place. image (the program actually takes the Artist-defined uous boundaries-either inside shapes can often be used the pixels at the boundaries of the image and as "rubber polygons or outside to form stamps," with the form being the selectively mixes them with the duplicated background . "Color Match" allows wherever the stylus is the surrounding background color). A "drop touched down on artist to duplicate a color that has the screen . Brush and already shadow" function, as in a character rubber stamp been used in the drawing without shapes can be stored generator, allows forms to be provided for later use as returning to the color palette; the stylus defined by the . is witha hard, contrastingedge. artist merely touched to the illustration The computing in the power of the system is appropriate place, and the system instruc- also often used to Magnification /Compression create geometrical ted to match the color. This can be shapes, a line being par- To aid in composition, the image can defined by the artist as ticularly effective when working two points with with an often be magnified to allow detailed, the computer plotting the image that has been scanned straightest path into the pixel-by-pixel work to change colors, between them; similarly, system from an external video a circle or forms or textures. The image is then can be created br indicating a reflective artwork source . As point MCI/Quan- shrunk back down to normal size for as the circle's center with a certain tel and others demonstrate, if radius . one doesn't display, or it can be retained and like the skyline in an image, the color of displayed in its magnified state. the clouds in the background can Colors be matched and the offending building simply Scan-In, Outputs Since the paints in these systems are painted out. In addition to being able electronic, most can use a system of red, to call up pre- Similarly, most systems enable the stored patterns and shapes, green and blue/hue, saturation . and and drawing artist to "clear" or "erase" selective and painting with intensity values to create more the stylus, some than 16 portions of the image without affecting systems enable the million colors. On a practical basis, user to digitize both not the whole. already-created that many colors can possibly be used videotapes and/or in a "Color blending" indicates software reflective artwork single illustration, so a "palette" for further processing . is formed that allows an artist to actually mix elec- Though not with a certain number of colors specifically covered in the likely to tronic paints like the real thing, taking survey, almost be needed, with the all systems have possibility of two different colors and moving them input/output returning to the basic (I/O) ports enabling them to RGB/HSI table if toget; .cr, then picking the exact area of be connected necessary.