Apply Pen Pressure

Apply Pen Pressure

When you use a Wacom stylus and tablet to create paint strokes with the Paint Stroke tool, the Apply Pen Pressure behavior controls width, opacity, spacing, angle, or jitter of the stroke based on the pressure of your stylus on the tablet.

Note: These parameters are identical to the Pen Pressure parameters in the Advanced pane of the Shape Inspector. You can choose to use the Advanced pane parameters or this shape behavior to apply the pressure data to the paint stroke. You can use a combination of Pen Pressure parameters in the Advanced pane and Apply Pen Pressure behaviors to affect more than one parameter (such as Opacity, Width, or Jitter) of the stroke using the same pressure data.

You can adjust the Apply Pen Pressure behavior using the following controls in the Behaviors Inspector:

  • Apply To: A pop-up menu that sets how your paint stroke is affected by pen pressure. There are five options:

    • Width: Pen pressure affects the width of the stroke. The harder the pressure, the wider the stroke.

    • Opacity: Pen pressure affects the opacity of the stroke. The harder the pressure, the more opaque the stroke.

    • Spacing: The harder the pressure, the greater the spacing between stroke dabs.

    • Angle: The harder the pressure, the greater the angle of the stroke dabs.

    • Jitter: The harder the pressure, the larger the amount of jitter on the stroke. Jitter randomizes the position of the paint dabs so they appear more like particles.

  • Min Pressure: A slider that adjusts the minimum threshold of pressure sensitivity. Pressure values below the minimum value are remapped to 0. For Opacity and Width, those remapped values do not appear. For Spacing, Angle, and Jitter, the values are not modified. If the Min Pressure and Max Pressure (described below) parameters are plotted on a graph, Min Pressure represents the minimum value, or 0. The area of the graph between Min Pressure and Max Pressure is remapped to the output values.

  • Max Pressure: A slider that adjusts the maximum threshold of pressure sensitivity. Pressure values above the maximum value are remapped to 1. For Opacity, Width, Spacing, Angle, and Jitter, those values will have the greatest effect. If the Min Pressure and Max Pressures parameters are plotted on a graph, Max Pressure represents the maximum value, or 1. The area of the graph between Min Pressure and Max Pressure is remapped to the output values.

  • Scale: A slider that sets the magnitude of the effect. The Scale slider defines the output range for the dabs based on the mapped values between minimum (0) and maximum (1) pressure, multiplied by the value defined in the slider (or adjacent value slider). This amount is then applied to the parameter (width, opacity, and so on) by multiplying (for width, opacity, spacing, and jitter) or adding (for angle). This control is independent of the Scale parameter in the Stroke pane of the Shape Inspector.

  • Invert: A checkbox that, when selected, inverts the attributes of the stroke created by the behavior. For example, if pen pressure is set to affect the opacity of the stroke, transparent areas of the stroke become more opaque and opaque areas become more transparent when the checkbox is selected.