Saving image as gradient in PSP X7

[Zantara]

Hi,

I have been experimenting with gradients in PSP X7.
Is it possible to save an open image as a gradient?
I do not see the gradient I made in the gradient palette in X7, otherwise I would know how to save it.
There doesn't seem to be a .grd option in Save as...?

[hartpaul]

Have you used the Help options ? Cassel had a video tutorial on using gradients that I think is probably still available on the Scrapbook Campus site (google it )
In it I think she had the image on the workspace then used the gradient editor to copy colors to a new gradient and then saved that.
As for selecting part of an image (eg changing tones in a sunset sky) and having that convert directly into a new gradient I don't think PSP can do that. I see from a Google search on "convert an image to a gradient" that others have asked for a quick way as well.
There seem to be some sites claiming to be able to do it, but from a quick perusal could not find a simple reliable one.

[Cassel]

Paul is referring to this class: http://scrapbookcampus.com/master-class ... gradients/
However, it is no longer available for free.

[Forriner]

Maybe this can help, two videos on one page: http://www.michelespaintshop.com/gradient-tutorial.php

[Zantara]

Thank you for your replies.
I posted yesterday to thank you and let you know I did try the Helpfile first and that a paid video is not an option for me.
For some reason the post doesn't apear.
I also found the tutorial on Michelle's site.
However, that is not what I meant.
I'm sorry if I wasn't clear enough.

It is quite easy to make a gradient out of two colours.
You pick both color with the colour picker from an image.
You make a gradient out of those two colors.
By clicking the + in the gradient palette, you can add your own gradient to the existing palette or create a new one.

However, I opened a new, transparent, pspimage.
Made a gradient and filled the layter with the gradient.
Added a new layer and filled that with a new gradient.
Then merged the layer and added an effect.
I then used Gaussian Blur to blur the effect.
The result I would like to save as a new gradient.
This would then be a gradient made out of four colours and a blurred effect.

An example of what I am referring to can be found at this link:http://www.nansons-place.com/psp/grads/grad2.html, gradient Jazz

I hope this is more clear than my original post.

[Forriner]

The gradients you see on that page are what you make in the gradient editor of PSP. You define a linear gradient, where you can use many colors. You can use the image you want to turn into a gradiënt to select the colors, as shown in the second video.

Then you click , under the edit button, on the rectasngular, sunburst or radial button to get the effect you see on Nanson's gradients. You may need to adjust "angle" and "repeats" but the basis is a (multicolor) linear gradient.

[LeviFiction]

There really isn't a way to do what you're wanting to do with stock PSP. I used to use a plugin called "Gradient Smithy" which would let me create a gradient file from an image inside of PSP. But it is a very old plugin and I can't get it to work in X7.

Have you ever looked for websites that offer to make gradients from images?

[Kathy_9]

I used to use a plugin called "Gradient Smithy" which would let me create a gradient file from an image inside of PSP. But it is a very old plugin and I can't get it to work in X7.

This one?

Click for larger view

[LeviFiction]

That's the one, don't know why it won't load in my copy.

[trueblue]

Hi,

I have been experimenting with gradients in PSP X7.
Is it possible to save an open image as a gradient?
I do not see the gradient I made in the gradient palette in X7, otherwise I would know how to save it.
There doesn't seem to be a .grd option in Save as...?

I have a step by step tutorial (not video) about X7 gradients. How to edit, create, save and import. You will find it here: Gradients and Gradient Editor

[Zantara]

@Trueblue, I haven't read all of your tutorial, but I think this is exactly what I was looking for!
Plenty of scope to experiment, thanks to your clear tutorial.
Thank you so much.

[Kathy_9]

That's the one, don't know why it won't load in my copy.

Do you have the most recent version 1.1?

Any idea how to get PSP to import the gradients you create with it? Gradient Smithy saves the gradient as a .gds file and PSP will only look for .grd files when importing.

[LeviFiction]

Yes I do. Just figured out what my problem was.

.GDS huh? Shows how good my memory is I thought it saved to GRD files. So my suggestion was even more useless xD.

Looking through the file it looks pretty straight forward. A single color stop is written in RGB format with a single full stop character between each one. Maybe even an opacity character. It could just be a bunch of individual RGBA color stops now that I think about it. The problem though is that it supports way more color stops than PSP does. As in 10,000 some odd color stops.

There is no distance or blending information.

So it would be possible to do a conversion into PSP's gradient file format but I wouldn't know where to start. You'd have to be able to develop the necessary in-between information and skip over any colors that repeat one after the other.

So Gradient Smithy gradients are only useful for Gradient Smithy itself.

[Forriner]

Have you tried just renaming it to a .grd, or in later versions of PSP, .pspgradient?

[LeviFiction]

No because it's a completely different format than what PSP supports. GRD files are photoshop format. PSP supports a more condensed version of this format. GDS files are way more simplistic and does not support the types of gradient stops that GRD and PSPGradient files do.