Results 1 to 3 of 3

Thread: Please help a newcomer

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Oct 2022
    Posts
    1

    Please help a newcomer

    Hi everyone. I dabbled with art rage a while ago but now it seems my
    Mac needs upgrading.How
    Much RAM is recommended and also CPU please? I’m hoping to create paintings that I would like to have printed on 1-2 metre canvases. Also I’m looking for recommendations for a graphic display tablet. I’m looking for
    One that will offer fingertip control as well as pen. Like An I phone screen so I can pinch to zoom out and reverse pinch to zoom in. Also move the image. I guess everyone on here is an art rage fan. Is it good enough for commercial use or has anyone found limitations
    Nice to be here. Thanks. Jack

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Posts
    2,223
    Hello Jack and welcome to the ArtRage forums
    With regards to hardware and running ArtRage, ArtRage is CPU based rather than relying on the GPU*.
    So the faster and more cores the CPU has, and that you can afford, the better! You can never have too much CPU power!

    And like the CPU you can never have too much RAM!
    So get as much as you can when buying your new Mac as it may not be possible to add more yourself later with some Macs.
    RAM is where AR will be keeping most of a paintings data as you work. Especially with large canvases, if it can’t store all it needs in RAM then it will start compressing data and/or writing it to disk, which may impact AR’s performance.

    Lastly for hardware, having a large Flash or Solid State Drive instead of a traditional rotary drive will speed up load and save times of files. Here I personally would be looking at 1TB drives as a minimum internal drive size.

    *Coming back to the GPU again, you would need to look at what other graphics devises you will have connected to the Mac.
    If you have multiple screens and/or display based graphics tablets connected then your Mac will need sufficient GPU bandwidth to be able to run them smoothly.
    This maybe something you will need to investigate further…
    I’m very much old school still, and using a non display Wacom Intuos 4 with ArtRage!

    Getting any digital work printed for commercial work can be a bit daunting and complicated if you have never done it before.
    As it is a raster, pixel based app, you will generally need to setup your canvas to the correct print size before starting. Over enlarging it later can lead to a loss of image quality.
    One other thing regarding AR that I would also mention, is that ArtRage dose not offer the user the ability to set a specific colour space for working in. But in practical terms, AR is working in RGB.

    Is AR good enough for commercial use?
    Yes, if it dose what you need it to do and No if it doesn’t! Though only you will be able to truly answer that question!
    But lots of professionals do use it.
    Maker Of Replica Macoys

    Techie Stuff:
    ArtRage Vitae 7.1.4 ~ 15" Macbook Pro
    ~ macOS 10.15.7 ~ 4 Core i7 3.1GHz CPU ~ 16GB RAM ~ Wacom Intuos4 M
    My Animal Paintings In The Forum Gallery
    On Instagram

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jun 2019
    Posts
    176
    One additional hint. If you want to create such big posters, you don't necessarily need to paint your paintings in the size and resolution they are intended for. Usually pixel images, that are intended to be printed in e.G. magazines, will be printed in nearly their original size (Inch or Millimeters) with a relative resolution of 300 Pixels per Inch (ppi). But if the images are intended to be published as big format posters, often lower resolutions are good enough, because big posters usually will be watched from a higher distance than images in magazines. The point is that the points of the printing raster (the Dots) should always be small enough, so that the viewers don't see them as points. Higher resolutions mean smaller dots. In case of big posters sometimes resolutions of down to 140 or even 100 ppi are usual. That saves RAM-power and even money for printing. Only if it really has to be a high quality art printing, you should print posters in high resolution. But that will of course be expensive. You should better talk to your print shop of trust about this topic, to be save.

    And there is also another thing I want to point out shortly: ArtRage has no color management. For printing, digital images always need to be converted from light colors to body colors (RGB to CMYK). Often the print shop can do this for you, but it is a thing you should be aware of and talk about with them, because colors can change during this conversions, if you don't care about it. Depending on your demands and how much money you can or want to spent for printing, you will possibly also need special colors or spot colors for more brillant colors (print colors are never as brillant as light colors) or e.G. metallic colors (gold, silver...).

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •