ANR Contour Strokes

Overview

Contour Strokes covers the image with brush marks taken from its own colours. Each mark curves along the image's contours, the lines of equal brightness, so strokes wrap around faces, folds and objects the way a painter's would. Marks on strong edges can be darkened, which outlines the forms like a sketch.

Underpainting keeps some of the original image under the strokes. Use the node for painterly stills and animatics, stylised flashbacks and dream sequences, music videos and title backgrounds.

Inputs

1. Sourcerequired

   The image to repaint. Strokes take their colour from it and only start where it has alpha.

2. Maskoptional

   Limits the effect: where its alpha is black, Source shows unchanged.

Output. The repainted image, covering the project format. Between strokes the image shows at the Underpainting amount, so below 1 those gaps are partly transparent.

Quick start

1. Add ANR Contour Strokes after your image.
2. Set Stroke Spacing, Stroke Length and Stroke Width for the density and size of the brush marks.
3. Raise Contour Radius so the strokes follow the big shapes; lower it to follow fine detail.
4. Set Contour Contrast for how dark the marks get on strong edges; 0 keeps the image's colours.
5. Set Underpainting: 1 keeps the full image behind the strokes, 0 leaves strokes only.
6. If Underpainting is below 1, merge the result over a background, such as a paper colour or the original image.

The panel

The node's panel as Nuke shows it, with the values of a new node. Click any control to see what it does; tabs and sections work as in Nuke.

All controls

Tips

• The strokes keep the same layout on every frame, so on moving footage the picture slides under them. For a hand-painted boil, key Seed to change every frame or two, for example 1 on the first frame and 50 a hundred frames later, with linear keys.
• On grainy or busy footage, raise Contour Radius so the strokes follow the forms rather than the grain.
• Use Mix to bring back some of the original detail.

Good to know

• In perfectly flat areas, with no contour to follow, strokes run straight up and down.
• Smaller spacing and longer strokes mean many more marks and longer renders, especially on large formats.
• The output covers the project format; Reformat the image to it first if it differs.

Works with

ANR Paint DabsRepaints footage or stills as short, overlapping brush strokes in the image's own colours, for painterly looks and stylised sequences.ANR Ink PosterTurns footage into a flat-toned, ink-outlined poster or comic look: it smooths detail, reduces each colour to a few tones and inks the edges.