FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This invention relates to digital imagery and more particularly to reducing repetitive strokes for filling an area by providing brush stroke tools, or mark making tools, that automatically fill the area with natural looking brush strokes.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

An operation often provided by digital graphics and digital image editors is the use of a virtual “paintbrush” (also referred to herein as a “brush”, “brush tool”, or mark making tool) to modify a digital image by depositing virtual paint or virtual ink. Various prior approaches have attempted to model a real-world brush and its behavior in the context of such an operation. For example, a two-dimensional (2D) raster image may be created to represent the shape of the brush as it contacts the canvas, and the 2D image may be stamped repeatedly along the input path. In another approach, a vector representation of the brush tip has been used instead of a 2D raster image.

Some existing digital painting applications create strokes by repeatedly applying a stamp at incremental positions along a path. The stamp consists of a 2D array of pixels that represent what the “brush” looks like at an instant in time. By repeatedly applying the stamp at close spacing, the effect of the brush being dragged continuously across the canvas is created, in the form of an elongated stroke. Some existing applications provide multiple settings for users to control the appearance of the stroke, e.g. size, opacity, mark making tool, and brush style. However, such applications led to uniform marks being made by the mark making tool along the stroke as the same process as applied by the software application at each point along the stroke.

However, some areas of a painting involve repetitive strokes, which can take a lot of time for the user. Accordingly, it would be beneficial to provide the user with automated methods and systems that maintain the level of control the user seeks or needs whilst removing the repetitive nature of the area filling thereby saving the user time whilst delivering high quality results.

It would be beneficial for the area to be painted with actual, individual strokes, offering the advantages of overlapping strokes and mixing paint for an increased “natural” media look and feel.

It would be further beneficial for the user to be able to either specify parameters for the process in advance or to sculpt/tune the result as the software application paints.

Other aspects and features of the present invention will become apparent to those ordinarily skilled in the art upon review of the following description of specific embodiments of the invention in conjunction with the accompanying figures.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is an object of the present invention to address limitations within the prior art relating to digital imagery and more particularly to reducing repetitive strokes for filling an area by providing brush stroke tools, or mark making tools, that automatically fill the area with natural looking brush strokes.

In accordance with an embodiment of the invention there are provided computer executable instructions stored upon a non-volatile, non-transitory storage medium where the executable instructions when executed by one or more processors of a system configure the system to execute a process comprising:establishing in dependence upon user input a first point within a document opened upon the system;establishing in dependence upon further user input a second point within the document;establishing in dependence upon additional user input one or more stroke parameters to apply to rendering content at least one of the first point and the second point; andexecuting a stroke tapestry engine to generate a stroke tapestry for rendering upon a display associated with the system; whereinthe stroke tapestry comprises a plurality of brush strokes automatically generated by the stroke tapestry engine along a path established between the first point and the end point; andthe plurality of brush strokes transition from one or more first marks at the first point to one or more second marks at the second point in dependence upon the one or more stroke parameters.

In accordance with an embodiment of the invention there are provided computer executable instructions stored upon a non-volatile, non-transitory storage medium where the executable instructions when executed by one or more processors of a system configure the system to execute a process comprising:establishing in dependence upon user input a first point within a document opened upon the system and one or more stroke parameters to apply to rendering content at the first point;assigning the first point and one or more stroke parameters to a first brush engine;establishing in dependence upon further user input a second point within the document opened upon the system and one or more further stroke parameters to apply to rendering content at the second point;assigning the second point and one or more further stroke parameters to a second brush engine;executing a stroke tapestry engine comprising at least the first engine and second engine to generate a stroke tapestry for rendering upon a display associated with the system; whereinthe stroke tapestry comprises a plurality of brush strokes automatically generated by the stroke tapestry engine along a path established between the first point and the end point; andthe plurality of brush strokes transition from one or more first marks at the first point to one or more second marks at the second point in dependence upon the one or more stroke parameters.

Other aspects and features of the present invention will become apparent to those ordinarily skilled in the art upon review of the following description of specific embodiments of the invention in conjunction with the accompanying figures.

