Krita Workspace Proposal + Mock-ups

Valerie valerie_vk at yahoo.com
Sat Dec 22 14:00:31 CET 2007


Haha, sorry. I've been busy lately so I've been rather slow. 
Then again, this isn't going to make it into the next release 
anyway. No hurry!

Thanks to the person who pointed out that Krita Does have a bug 
submission area! But I really suggest for Krita to get its own 
as it grows. ;) Also, I'd like to have opinions on the following 
first.

Anyway, I'll try to keep things short and visual. In my opinion, 
workspaces in Krita should follow the following principles:
- Task-centric: Included presets include painting modes, image 
editing and more. For each, the interface and starting tool take 
on presets suited to the task.
- Visual: New users like big icons... I hear that Inkspace has 
too many icon artists. Maybe Krita can borrow a few?
- English: More intuitive descriptions, less technical mumbo jumbo. 
Please?
- Fully configurable: All workspaces can be edited and saved, users
can also start new workspaces from scratch. Reverting to a default 
setting can be easy via a "Revert to default" command, so you won't
be afraid of messing up.
- Sharable: Workspaces can be exported and shared, so that people
can immediately pick up the workspace their favorite artist or 
friends are using. Imagine the implications for Tutorials! Also, 
ideally a few very good artists will accept to manage some of the 
default workspaces.
- Fully documented: Each included default workspace is fully
documented, to make the experience as seamless as possible.

Additional note: I believe Everything should be editable in
Krita. One of my pet peeves in Gimp are non-editable round brushes
and non-editable gradients. No really, seriously? The other one
is its rather cluttered interface...

Back to workspaces, here's how things would be from a user point-
of-view (obviously, the art concepts will need a lot of work. I'm 
obviously not an icon artist, for example):

1. Start-up screen, chose workspace:

http://img341.imageshack.us/img341/9949/workspacestartupdz2.png

Note: alternatively, all possible workspaces appear in just one screen. In
both cases, the use can configure which workspaces show up and which are
hidden, so that's not a problem and could avoid some clutter.

2. Chose template:

http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/8991/workspacetemplatessg2.png

Note: if all possible workspaces appear in just one screen, it 
could be possible to squeeze templates into the same screen to 
save users a step.

3. Very rough interface examples:

Paint workspace (Watercolor): 
http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/5329/workspacepaintwh8.png

Photo editing workspace: 
http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/2874/workspacephotomz1.png

4. Workspace manager:

Main:
http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/8237/workspacemanagermainyf5.png

Resource main: 
http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/4246/workspacemanagermainresak2.png

Resource explanation: 
http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/3564/workspaceresexplainay1.png

Ex., Brushes:
http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/5404/workspacemanagerbrushesmz4.png

Ex., Templates:
http://img167.imageshack.us/img167/5736/workspacemanagertemplatsh0.png

Settings main:
http://img205.imageshack.us/img205/7272/workspacemanagermainsetdr2.png

Ex., Toolbar:
http://img341.imageshack.us/img341/9930/workspacemanagertoolbarjx0.png

Note: the workspace manager just manages collections. It is not 
the brush editor, the gradient editor, or anything of the likes. 
Those get their own editors. 

For examples of resource shortcuts, see the Paint workspace
example. They may sound frivolous right now, but wait until the 
user has to manage over a hundred brushes of all types.

Final note: This workspace concept goes in line with some of the
other proposals I'm working on, we'll see.

Questions?


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