Picture Tubes

A picture tube file - *.PspTube - consists of one or more images arranged on a grid. In use the individual images are painted one after another as the mouse is clicked for one, clicked and randomly dragged for a series of images or clicked,move the cursor to another position, hold shift down and then clicked again to give a straight line of impressions.

If frequent new layers are used it is easy to edit, reposition and resize the images and so build up a graphic.

Many tubes are supplied with the program and many are available for download on just about any subject. Quality varies from cartoonish to good,   It is also easy to make your own tubes

In general, you can add objects to raster layers: eg garden tools and plants or create and adorn a graphic eg make a grass lawn and put a fence across it.

This screen grab shows a typical PspTube file. This tube of autumn leaves shows 9 different leaves arranged in a 3 x 3 grid on a transparent background. The Placement options decide how the images are put down on the canvas. The toolbar shows that the tube is selected and the settings show all the details (because it is the current tube). Dragging the cursor over a white background and multiple clicking creates an image

.Using a grass tube and the Fence-Wood tube with appropriate settings, the impressions align to produce a continuous fence

Making a Picture Tube of Australian Coins

Coins were spread over the scanner and a scan made.

Then the individual coins were selected and saved as files with transparent backgrounds

New image 400 x 200 pixels .    Set Grid to 100 pixel squares and display grid.

In this example I wanted to keep the relative sizes of the coins correct. The biggest is the 50 cent coin so I reduced the size of this image by % rather than measurement and reduced all the coin images the same way

Open each coin image and drag and position it anywhere on the grid.

Tube files must be 24 bit and have only one raster layer with transparency,so merge all the coin image layers and delete any coloured background layer. To create a tube you must have only one layer and it must contain transparency, Then select

File / Export / Picture Tube

Fill in the number of cells and the tube name and make any placement options now or later when using the tube.

To use this tube, create a new image with a “table cloth” background.

Activate the Tube tool

select the tube just made

and scatter impressions about!