Basics of Using the Materials palette

The Materials palette offers a variety of ways to choose colors, styles, and materials for the raster and vector tools. When using the Art Media tools, however, you'll notice some functionality of the Materials palette is disabled.

To display or hide the Materials palette:

To display the Materials palette, choose View > Palettes > Materials, or press F6. To close the palette you can click the Close button located in the palette's title bar, or choose View > Palettes > Materials again.

To choose a solid foreground or background color:

On the Materials palette, make sure the Foreground or Background style is set to Color (not Gradient or Pattern), and the either the Frame or Rainbow tab is active, then do one of the following:
To choose a foreground color, click the Foreground/Stroke properties box. This will display the Material Properties dialog.
To choose a background color, click the Background/Fill properties box. This will display the Material Properties dialog.

From the Material Properties dialog's Color tab, select the desired color, and then click OK. For more details, see Choosing Colors.

To choose a foreground or background material (color, gradient, pattern, or texture):

On the Materials palette, do one of the following:
To choose a foreground material, click the Foreground Material box.
To choose a background material, click the Background Material box.

The Material Properties dialog opens. On this dialog, you can choose from all of Paint Shop Pro's colors, gradients, patterns, and textures.

To choose the style, click the Color, Gradient, or Pattern tab and select the appropriate settings. For more information, see Choosing Colors, Choosing Gradients, or Choosing Patterns.
To choose a texture, mark the Texture check box and select a texture. For more information, see Choosing Textures.
Click OK.

To choose from recently used materials:

On the Materials palette, right-click a Color or Material box to display the Recent Materials dialog, and then choose a material.

On the Recent Materials dialog you can click the Other button to display the Material dialog and choose or create a material from all of Paint Shop Pro's colors, gradients, patterns, and textures.

To choose a color from the Frame tab:

On the Materials palette, click the Frame tab . It displays an outer Hue rectangle and an inner Saturation rectangle, as well as a strip containing white, three shades of grey, and black.
On the outer Hue rectangle, click on the desired hue/color (you can fine-tune the color in steps 3 and 4):
Left-click to set the Foreground/Stroke color (hold down the mouse button to display a tool tip with the cursor position's RGB value)
Right-click to set the Background/Fill color (hold down the mouse button to display a tool tip with the cursor position's RGB value)

Fine-tune the Foreground/Stroke's saturation by dragging the horizontal slider.
Fine-tune the Foreground/Stroke's lightness by dragging the vertical slider.

To choose a color from the Rainbow tab's Available Colors panel:

On the Materials palette, click the Rainbow tab .
Move the cursor over the Available Colors panel; its shape changes to a dropper. As you move the dropper around the panel, a ToolTip displays the color value beneath the dropper tip.
Do one of the following:
To choose the foreground color, left-click in the Available Colors panel.
To choose the background color, right-click in the Available Colors panel.

The Foreground or Background Color box displays the selected color. If the Style button is set to Gradient or Pattern , change it to Color so that the material is updated with the color.

To apply the current materials to all tools:

On the Materials palette, mark the All tools check box.

If you clear this check box, the current materials are applied to the active tool only.

To reverse the foreground and background colors:

Click the Swap Colors icon .

To reverse the foreground and background materials:

Click the Swap Materials icon .

Basics of Using the Materials palette

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