Graphic art softwareBob Gordon, Maggie Gordon ''The Complete Guide to Digital Graphic Design '', 15 March 2002 pp:44 is a subclass of

application software Application may refer to: Mathematics and computing * Application software, computer software designed to help the user to perform specific tasks ** Application layer, an abstraction layer that specifies protocols and interface methods used in a ...

used for graphic design,

multimedia Multimedia is a form of communication that uses a combination of different content forms such as text, audio, images, animations, or video into a single interactive presentation, in contrast to tradi ...

development, stylized image development, technical illustration, general image editing, or simply to access graphic files. Art software uses either raster or vector graphic reading and editing methods to create, edit, and view art. Many artists and other creative professionals today use personal computers rather than traditional media. Using graphic art software may be more efficient than rendering using traditional media by requiring less hand–eye coordination, requiring less mental imaging skill, and utilizing the computer's quicker (sometimes more accurate) automated rendering functions to create images. However, advanced level computer styles, effects and editing methods may require a steeper learning curve of computer technical skills than what was required to learn traditional hand rendering and mental imaging skills. The potential of the software to enhance or hinder creativity may depend on the intuitiveness of the interface.

Specialized software

Most art software includes common functions, creation tools, editing tools, filters, and automated rendering modes. Many, however, are designed to enhance a specialized skill or technique. Specialized software packages may be discontinued for various reasons such as lack of appreciation for the result, lack of expertise and training for the product, or simply not worth the time and money investment, but most likely due to obsolescence compared to newer methods or integration as a feature of newer more complete software packages.

Graphic design software

Graphic design professionals favor general image editing software and page layout software commonly referred to as

desktop publishing Desktop publishing (DTP) is the creation of documents using page layout software on a personal ("desktop") computer. It was first used almost exclusively for print publications, but now it also assists in the creation of various forms of online ...

software. Graphic designers that are also image developers or multimedia developers may use a combination of page layout software with the following:

Multimedia development software

Multimedia development professionals favor software with audio,

motion In physics, motion is the phenomenon in which an object changes its position with respect to time. Motion is mathematically described in terms of displacement, distance, velocity, acceleration, speed and frame of reference to an observer and mea ...

and interactivity such as software for creating and editing

hypermedia Hypermedia, an extension of the term hypertext, is a nonlinear medium of information that includes graphics, audio, video, plain text and hyperlinks. This designation contrasts with the broader term ''multimedia'', which may include non-interact ...

, electronic presentations (more specifically slide presentations),

computer simulation Computer simulation is the process of mathematical modelling, performed on a computer, which is designed to predict the behaviour of, or the outcome of, a real-world or physical system. The reliability of some mathematical models can be dete ...

s and

games A game is a structured form of play, usually undertaken for entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator sports or games) or art (su ...

Stylized image development software

Image development professionals may use general graphic editors or may prefer more specialized software for rending or capturing images with style. Although images can be created from scratch with most art software, specialized software applications or advanced features of generalized applications are used for more accurate visual effects. These visual effects include:

Traditional medium effects

Vector editors are ideal for solid crisp lines seen in

line art Line art or line drawing is any image that consists of distinct straight lines or curves placed against a background (usually plain), without gradations in shade (darkness) or hue (color) to represent two-dimensional or three-dimensional obje ...

poster A poster is a large sheet that is placed either on a public space to promote something or on a wall as decoration. Typically, posters include both textual and graphic elements, although a poster may be either wholly graphical or wholly text. ...

woodcut Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking Printmaking is the process of creating artworks by printing, normally on paper, but also on fabric, wood, metal, and other surfaces. "Traditional printmaking" normally covers only t ...

ink effects, and

mosaic A mosaic is a pattern or image made of small regular or irregular pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic, held in place by plaster/mortar, and covering a surface. Mosaics are often used as floor and wall decoration, and were particularly pop ...

effects. Some generalized image editors, such as Adobe Photoshop are used for

digital painting Digital painting is an established art medium that typically combines a computer, a graphics tablet, and software of choice. The artist uses painting and drawing with the stylus that comes with the graphics tablet to create 2D paintings within ...

(representing real brush and canvas textures such as

watercolor Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (British English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin ''aqua'' "water"), is a painting method”Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to ...

or burlap canvas) or

handicraft A handicraft, sometimes more precisely expressed as artisanal handicraft or handmade, is any of a wide variety of types of work where useful and decorative objects are made completely by one’s hand or by using only simple, non-automated re ...

textures such as

or stained glass. However, unlike Adobe Photoshop, which was originally designed for photo editing, software such as Corel Painter and

Photo-Paint Corel Photo-Paint is a raster graphics editor developed and marketed by Corel since 1992. Corel markets the software for Windows and Mac OS operating systems, previously having marketed versions for Linux (Version 9, requiring Wine). Its primary m ...

were originally designed for rendering with digital painting effects and continue to evolve with more emphasis on hand-rendering styles that don't appear computer generated.

Photorealistic effects

Unlike traditional medium effects, photorealistic effects create the illusion of a photographed image. Specialized software may contain

3D modeling In 3D computer graphics, 3D modeling is the process of developing a mathematical coordinate-based representation of any surface of an object (inanimate or living) in three dimensions via specialized software by manipulating edges, vertices, ...

and ray tracing features to make images appear photographed. Some 3D software is for general 3D object modeling, whereas other 3D software is more specialized, such as Poser for characters or Bryce for scenery. Software such as Adobe Photoshop may be used to create 3D effects from 2D (flat) images instead of 3D models. AddDepth is a discontinued software for extruding 2D shapes into 3D images with the option of

bevel A bevelled edge (UK) or beveled edge (US) is an edge of a structure that is not perpendicular to the faces of the piece. The words bevel and chamfer overlap in usage; in general usage they are often interchanged, while in technical usage they ...

ed effects. MetaCreations Detailer and Painter 3D are discontinued software applications specifically for painting texture maps on 3D Models.

Hyperrealistic effects

Specialized software may be used to combine traditional medium effects and photorealistic effects. 3-D modeling software may be exclusively for, include features for, or include the option of 3rd party plugins for rendering 3-D models with 2-D effects (e.g. cartoons, illustrations) for

hyperrealistic Jean Baudrillard ( , , ; 27 July 1929 – 6 March 2007) was a French sociologist, philosopher and poet with interest in cultural studies. He is best known for his analyses of media, contemporary culture, and technological communication, as wel ...

effects. Other 2-D image editing software may be used to trace photographs or

rotoscope Rotoscoping is an animation technique that animators use to trace over motion picture footage, frame by frame, to produce realistic action. Originally, animators projected photographed live-action movie images onto a glass panel and traced ov ...

animations from film. This allows artists to rapidly apply unique styles to what would be purely photorealistic images from computer generated imagery from 3-D models or photographs. Some styles of hyperrealism may require motion visual effects (e.g. geometrically accurate rotation, accurate kinetics, simulated organic growth, lifelike motion constraints) to notice the realism of the imagery. Software may be used to bridge the gap between the imagination and the laws of physics.

Technical graphic software

Technical professionals and technical illustrators may use technical graphic software that might allow for stylized effects with more emphasis on clarity and accuracy and little or no emphasis on creative expression and aesthetics. For this reason, the results are seldom referred to as "art." For designing or technical illustration of synthetic physical objects, the software is usually referred to as CAD or CADD, Computer-Aided Design and Drafting. This software allows for more precise handling of measurements and mathematical calculations, some of which simulate

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which rel ...

to conduct virtual testing of the models. Aside from physical objects, technical graphic software may include software for visualizing

concept Concepts are defined as abstract ideas. They are understood to be the fundamental building blocks of the concept behind principles, thoughts and beliefs. They play an important role in all aspects of cognition. As such, concepts are studied by s ...

s, manually representing scientific data, visualizing algorithms, visual instructions, and navigational aids in the form of information graphics. Specialized software for

concept map A concept map or conceptual diagram is a diagram that depicts suggested relationships between concepts. Concept maps may be used by instructional designers, engineers, technical writers, and others to organize and structure knowledge. A conc ...

s may be used for both technical purposes and non-technical conceptualizing, which may or may not be considered technical illustration.

Specialized graphic format handling

This may include software for handling specialized graphic

file formats A file format is a standard way that information is encoded for storage in a computer file. It specifies how bits are used to encode information in a digital storage medium. File formats may be either proprietary or free. Some file forma ...

such as Fontographer software, which is dedicated to creating and editing

computer font A computer font is implemented as a digital data file containing a set of graphically related glyphs. A computer font is designed and created using a font editor. A computer font specifically designed for the computer screen, and not for pri ...

s. Some general image editing software has unique image file handling features as well. Vector graphic editors handle vector graphic files and are able to load

PostScript PostScript (PS) is a page description language in the electronic publishing and desktop publishing realm. It is a dynamically typed, concatenative programming language. It was created at Adobe Systems by John Warnock, Charles Geschke, ...

files natively. Some tools enable professional photographers to use nondestructive image processing for editing

digital photography Digital photography uses cameras containing arrays of electronic photodetectors interfaced to an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) to produce images focused by a lens, as opposed to an exposure on photographic film. The digitized image i ...

without permanently changing or duplicating the original, using the

Raw image format A camera raw image file contains unprocessed or minimally processed data from the image sensor of either a digital camera, a motion picture film scanner, or other image scanner. Raw files are named so because they are not yet processed and the ...

. Other special handling software includes software for capturing images such as 2D scanning software, 3D scanning software and screen-capturing, or software for specialized graphic format processing such as

raster image processing A raster image processor (RIP) is a component used in a printing system which produces a raster image also known as a bitmap. Such a bitmap is used by a later stage of the printing system to produce the printed output. The input may be a page d ...

and file format conversion. Some tools may reduce the file size of graphics for

web performance optimization Web performance refers to the speed in which web pages are downloaded and displayed on the user's web browser. Web performance optimization (WPO), or website optimization is the field of knowledge about increasing web performance. Faster website ...

while maintaining the image quality as best as possible.

Lists of Software

* List of raster graphics editors * List of vector graphics editors * List of computer-aided design editors * List of information graphics software * List of concept- and mind-mapping software (description and list) *

3D computer graphics software 3D computer graphics, or “3D graphics,” sometimes called CGI, 3D-CGI or three-dimensional computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data (often Cartesian) that is stored in the computer for t ...

(description and list) * Presentation software (description and list) *

Desktop publishing Desktop publishing (DTP) is the creation of documents using page layout software on a personal ("desktop") computer. It was first used almost exclusively for print publications, but now it also assists in the creation of various forms of online ...

(description and list) *

List of media players Comparisons of media players are lists of digital media player hardware and software products that compare their features. The lists are organized by medium and other characteristics. Hardware *Comparison of portable media players, for portable h ...

(viewing access only) * Comparison of media players

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Graphic Art Software Computer art Graphics software