STEP option for various tools or brushes

[david-b]

I’ve been using various versions of PSP for several decades and I’ve always wondered about one of the tool functions but never really got serious about looking into it. Now I am.

Many of the tools (it may be limited to brushes) have the standard options of Size, Hardness, Opacity, etc., and Step. Can anyone tell me what Step does? What effect does it have on a tool such as the Sharpen brush or the Lighten/Darken brush?

I looked at the online PDF manual but it didn’t have a search function and I browsed a few sections but it too big to manually search through it. Also tried search on this forum but that just came up hundreds of matches to the word step or tool used in their generic sense.

I’m currently using PSP 2018 and will be upgrading to PSP 2019 in next few days

Thanks,
David

[hartpaul]

Someone can go through alll the terms and try to explain what it does , but I fine the best way to understand what it does is to test it.
1. Set up a new image white, 1000 pixels by 1000 pixels, use a square brush 100 pixels in size with hardness set to 100 and step 10 , Opacity 100 and Soreground color set to a color contrasting with the white.
2. File > General Program Preferences > Units > set Display Units to Pixels

Now place the brush in the top left corner and start to drag it towards the right and observe that the new iteration of the brush occurs after it is dragged 10 pixels.

01Step10.jpg (22.38 KiB) Viewed 972 times

Now set the brush step to 50 and continue dragging and observe that the new brush image occurs when you have dragged it 50 pixels

02Step50.jpg (22.81 KiB) Viewed 972 times

Do it at 90 pixels then 100 pixels and 110 pixels . By now you should be getting an understanding of what the Step setting does.

[JoeB]

I'm not the OP but if I understand your example images correctly then if drawing a straight line you can use a step that's the size of the brush to get a smooth line. But if drawing a curved for example then you would need a very small step setting for it to look smooth. Is that correct?

[hartpaul]

Why not try it out for yourself. One of the best ways of learning.

[david-b]

Thank you very much for getting back to me on this so quickly. Between your reply and JoeB's comments I think I have an idea of what is going on with the Step option. Now, like you suggested, I'm going to experiment with a couple of brushes on a photo to see if the option works in the manner I'm thinking it does.

Thanks again for the help.
David