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Thread: Does anyone from Ambient Design still read these?

  1. #11
    Join Date
    Jan 2014
    Location
    Australia
    Posts
    3,402
    I'm sorry if it looked like I was suggesting we give artistic advice (unless asked for) but surely we can find words to praise the effort taken to show us new works. Even if it is to acknowledge that we have viewed the post and appreciate the effort the artist has put into it could be enough to encourage further participation in the forum.
    June.

    Oh God of homeless things, look down
    And try to ease the way
    Of all the little weary paws
    That walk the world
    today.
    -
    Unknown.

    http://enug66.deviantart.com/gallery/

    [My setup: hp 15in laptop,11th Gen Intel Core i7-1165G7 @ 2.80GHz 2.70 GHz, 8.00 GB RAM, 24in Acer 2nd monitor, Huion Kamvas 20 Pro display tablet, Windows 11, ArtRage Vitae.
    My painting real-estate is extended across three monitors.]

  2. #12
    Join Date
    Jun 2019
    Posts
    176
    I can only judge this topic from my point of view. And in my opinion, if I watch the inventions of ArtRage during the last years, it falls back behind its competitors (like Rebelle 5, Adobe Fresco, and even Krita is gaining more and more) and looses attractivity. I want to use Artrage as a serious productive app, not as a toy. So it would have been more important for me that the old annoying bugs would have been fixed than to be able to paint together with others or so. That is nothing that's worth to pay for. At least for me. E.g. Rebelle 5 introduced Micropixels. Haven't tested it yet, but it sounds like a really interesting technical breakthrough. Expensive but probably worth its money. But where are the relevant and valuable inventions in ArtRage?

    This is also the main reason why I almost turned my back to this forum.

  3. #13
    Join Date
    Apr 2012
    Posts
    671
    Somerset

    The writing on the wall **seems** to be that this thing is no longer a passion for the owners.

    That's natural, real people have real lives and real interests/goals/aspirations in life... its very possible this is at the "been there done that" stage and perhaps mixed in with "I'm not ready to let it go".


    The final stage of software in such a state is usually complete sale and unfortunately the buyers tend to be completely hands off (coming in and understanding the program and making meaningful changes is very difficult and costly for a new team) and just package it with other software without any sort of integration... or just keep selling with cosmetic and minor changes, leaving all the core functionality as it is.

    Also, it is close to impossible to "merge" software packages which generally have completely different internals and mechanics...


    This is all just speculation but it is clear that things feel different... like it is sailing into the sunset.

  4. #14
    Join Date
    Apr 2006
    Location
    Rochester, New York
    Posts
    523
    You might be on to something here.

    My personal opinion (and by no means am I an expert on the subject) is the rise of smart-cell phones that have replaced desktop and laptop computers may be the reason for changes in the direction you have highlighted here on this thread.
    I have a personally designed artwork gallery website at: www.stephenlopiano.com
    There is one section full of pages there under the Digital Artwork category that is devoted entirely to paintings I have created with Art Rage.

  5. #15
    Join Date
    Oct 2016
    Posts
    296
    Quote Originally Posted by Somerset View Post
    I can only judge this topic from my point of view. And in my opinion, if I watch the inventions of ArtRage during the last years, it falls back behind its competitors (like Rebelle 5, Adobe Fresco, and even Krita is gaining more and more) and looses attractivity. I want to use Artrage as a serious productive app, not as a toy. So it would have been more important for me that the old annoying bugs would have been fixed than to be able to paint together with others or so. That is nothing that's worth to pay for. At least for me. E.g. Rebelle 5 introduced Micropixels. Haven't tested it yet, but it sounds like a really interesting technical breakthrough. Expensive but probably worth its money. But where are the relevant and valuable inventions in ArtRage?

    This is also the main reason why I almost turned my back to this forum.
    haven't noticed artrage falling back behind fresco at all, maybe I haven't looked hard enough?

    rebelle has certain things done really well about it, but it comes with € 10—€189,99 paper bundle purchases, adding quite a bit on top of the price tag, and performance-wise, artrage is a preferred choice for many, particularly with desktop systems going up in price over the recent years.

    krita is free, and it is more or less understood that with artrage you get a natural media simulation package; for higher end CG art, you'll pick up a second or third application, and there's no shortage of options at the moment.

    they don't compete, they co-exist with artrage.

  6. #16
    Join Date
    Jun 2019
    Posts
    176
    I just wanted to share my opinion, concerning the topic why this forums become more and more deserted, in a democratic way. In my opinion it might have to do with that there is too less relevant progress in the development of ArtRage. Respectively the progress I see doesn't point into a direction that is attractive and worth to pay for - for me. But if you have a different opinion, it is of course absolutely okay. If ArtRage shall become a sort of fancy toy in the future, rather than a serious professional painting app, I will not need it and of course not buy it. Why should I?

    And as I already said, the other point is, that, while the developers developed this - for me - useless features, they neglected bugs that were well known for years (the last update for AR6 was in Oct 2019, as far as I remember). E.g. the crashing Docking Mode and the Outlines that can't be exported. Both reported years ago. That means, that users paid for faulty software and the manufacturers didn't do anything to fix it. To the contrary, they bequested it to the following version. That's not really inspiring confidence, I think. However, I'm not lucky with that, so I'm still working with ArtRage 6 until I find something better.

    And at the moment it seems that Rebelle 5 might be my next choice. Those expensive canvas bundles are of course an argument. But I think it will be possible to create own canvases, as I also create the most of my additional stuff for all of the graphic apps I work with on my own. And "competition or coexistence"... - it doesn't matter, because you can also paint very nice paintings with Krita, Fresco, Affinity Photo... or even a simple app like MyPaint. I know a female artist who creates marvelous Fantasy-Art with GIMP - much better than many artists do with ArtRage.

    The long and short of it: I really loved ArtRage right from the moment I first saw it. But as it seems, it is now going into a direction I can't use it. Possibly this is also the reason why other people turn their backs to it. I don't really know.

  7. #17
    Join Date
    Oct 2016
    Posts
    296
    Quote Originally Posted by Somerset View Post
    And as I already said, the other point is, that, while the developers developed this - for me - useless features, they neglected bugs that were well known for years (the last update for AR6 was in Oct 2019, as far as I remember). E.g. the crashing Docking Mode and the Outlines that can't be exported. Both reported years ago. That means, that users paid for faulty software and the manufacturers didn't do anything to fix it. To the contrary, they bequested it to the following version. That's not really inspiring confidence, I think. However, I'm not lucky with that, so I'm still working with ArtRage 6 until I find something better.
    I personally don't have the issues with docking mode.

    artrage does have a certain amount of crashing to it, but it's minuscule compared to many other packages. *every* package out there I have used to date has issues that take their developers more than a single release cycle to fix. some issues just don't have the same urgency to them, or aren't easy to tackle directly.

    in case with artrage, I personally come from ten years of using cor*l painter that always (literally always) provides inferior solutions to user feature requests, and inferior fixes to weird, hard to figure out new issues, created by the development team throughout application development. fresco has adobe's marketing team trying to hype it up (which they do with a degree of success), but are the tools over there actually worth wasting time with it?

    artrage, in comparison, is reliable, stable, and humble. the oil brush and custom brush tools they have working there suit my needs much better than rebelle, or any other app out there - I've used them all, if they had a port for mac.


    Quote Originally Posted by Somerset View Post
    And at the moment it seems that Rebelle 5 might be my next choice. Those expensive canvas bundles are of course an argument. But I think it will be possible to create own canvases, as I also create the most of my additional stuff for all of the graphic apps I work with on my own. And "competition or coexistence"... - it doesn't matter, because you can also paint very nice paintings with Krita, Fresco, Affinity Photo... or even a simple app like MyPaint. I know a female artist who creates marvelous Fantasy-Art with GIMP - much better than many artists do with ArtRage.

    The long and short of it: I really loved ArtRage right from the moment I first saw it. But as it seems, it is now going into a direction I can't use it. Possibly this is also the reason why other people turn their backs to it. I don't really know.
    good luck with your rebelle adventures, and I hope you're happier over there compared to what you have with artrage?.. by all means, pick the tools that make you productive and creative, it's your right as a creator shopping for art supplies in a painting application market.

    I hate all of the packages you have listed because they feel clumsy, and getting art produced in them (gimp in particular) to look non-digital is a chore and a matter of faking and faking and faking the right canvas and paint treatment - something that artrage allows pretty much out of box. I use other apps on the side with artrage, but the core of what I'm creating depends on it. there's just nothing out there that would compare to the same paint mixing realism that artrage has going on, even if the development pace no longer excites you.

    by the way, artrage twitter and facebook community are both quite lively places, I'm not sure why you consider the decline of forum image sharing format as some sort of omen for the artrage future.

    people are just generally too lazy to register on a forum if whatever they'll share here isn't immediately available to be shared on the social media.
    Last edited by nekomata; 05-28-2022 at 08:00 PM.

  8. #18
    Join Date
    Mar 2006
    Location
    USA
    Posts
    211

    Unhappy


  9. #19
    Join Date
    Jun 2019
    Posts
    176
    @nekomata
    I absolutely accept your standpoint. But I have a different one. I'm working with ArtRage for many years and always was very satisfied. But if I look at Vitae, there is not much worth to pay for for me. ArtRage is a tool for me, not a fetish. And not a toy. If it fits my needs, I will buy it. If not, I don't. And if ArtRage suddenly only is available via the Microsoft and Apple Stores, it is a significant disadvantage for me. Especially if the Upgrade-Discount for owners of former versions suddenly is time limited at the same time. This of course doesn't make the app more attractive for me.

    The issue with the crashing Docking Mode has been reported here by several users several times since 2019. I reported it directly to the support early 2020, as far as I remember. It is a very annoying thing if suddenly all Docks disappear while you are painting, and you have to reconfigure the whole GUI. markw offered a workaround to save the GUI-layout, long time ago. But it is annoying anyway. Even you may possibly not be affected (possibly only a Windows issue?). And as I read here on the forums, this issue still exists, also on Vitae. If the issue with the Outlines that can't be exported, is solved in the meantime... I don't know. On ArtRage 6, it isn't fixed.

    As I said, I always really loved ArtRage. That's why I'm so disappointed now. I'm still glad to have ArtRage 6 and will still have an eye on the further development of ArtRage. Maybe I will purchase some future version again. But Vitae is not interesting for me.

  10. #20
    Join Date
    Oct 2016
    Posts
    296
    Quote Originally Posted by Somerset View Post
    The issue with the crashing Docking Mode has been reported here by several users several times since 2019. I reported it directly to the support early 2020, as far as I remember. It is a very annoying thing if suddenly all Docks disappear while you are painting, and you have to reconfigure the whole GUI. markw offered a workaround to save the GUI-layout, long time ago. But it is annoying anyway.
    I've had something similar happen in a different application, but if your bug report has been not answered to day with no resolution or workaround in sight, I would assume that the program issue is rooted on the OS-level (no such issue on mac across several mac os versions), and is hard to figure out.

    in my experience with past ArtRage versions, reported bugs or odd tool behaviors were fixed very fast, and the team rolled out an update to address things very promptly.

    As I said, I always really loved ArtRage. That's why I'm so disappointed now. I'm still glad to have ArtRage 6 and will still have an eye on the further development of ArtRage. Maybe I will purchase some future version again. But Vitae is not interesting for me.
    we have roughly a year until the next release.

    in the meantime, you can explore the alternatives, or you can focus on making the best out of artrage version you have.

    if I remember this correctly, artrage team promised to keep artrage 6 supported for as long as it's offered for sale, so there might be a patch coming out to address your issue. I don't know. you can contact the technical support again, or message them on social media to get some clarification. they aren't very active on these boards anymore since Hannah left.

    I understand the frustration, but the grass is really not always greener on the other side; artrage is still a great application with stellar paint simulation.

    I'm sorry that your interface issues break your workflow so much.

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