Balls and Bubbles: Basics

Here is an overview of Balls and Bubbles, a PSP8 effect that you can use to make single or multiple spherical objects. You access Balls and Bubbles with Effects > Artistic Effects > Balls and Bubbles. You then see the B&B dialog box, with the Shape tab showing:

By default, the Single ball or bubble radio button is selected. In the right preview window, you see a preview of your spherical object, as in the example above. You can adjust the bounding box in the left preview window to change the position or size of the object. Or you can simply mark the Maximum possible size checkbox to make the object as large as can fit in your image canvas.

Instead of a single ball or bubble, you can choose Automatic multiple balls or bubbles, as shown below:

You then have several options:

Coverage determines how dense the distribution of objects is.
Average size determines (you guessed it) the average size of the objects.
Size variation determines the range of sizes of the objects.

Another set of options available with multiple balls or bubbles is Balls or Bubbles type. You can choose between Intersecting, Non-intersecting, and Overlapping:

Intersecting

Non-intersecting

Overlapping

The next tab on the B&B dialog box is Surface. Here you set the basic properties of the surface of your sphere(s): Material, Opacity, Shininess, and Gloss.

To change the material, click the Material color box. As with any color box in PSP8, this calls up the Material dialog box. There you can choose whatever solid color, pattern, or gradient you want for your sphere(s). Modify the material's Opacity, if you like, using a low setting for a bubble and a higher setting for a ball. Shininess and Gloss determine how light reacts to the surface.

On the Maps tab, you can choose Bump map to give your sphere(s) a texture, and/or Environment map to add further complexity to your surface.

When Bump map is selected, you can click the bump map preview to get a selection list of availble bump maps. Choose the map that you want for your texture, then adjust the Smoothness, Depth, and Size. Smoothness and Size are pretty clear, but Depth might be a bit mysterious. If you set Depth to a positive value, middle gray areas of the bump map are "ground level", with white areas defining peaks and black areas defining indentations (with intermediate gray areas being somewhere in between). Set Depth to a negative value to get the inverse effect (that is, to make white areas produce indentations and black areas produce peaks). The greater the absolute value of the Depth setting, the greater the effect of the bump map. Here are some examples using the Golf bump map supplied with PSP:


Depth: 50	Depth: -50

Depth: 10	Depth: -10

We'll look at environment maps in a later tutorial. In the meantime, try out some of B&B's presets to get a feel for environment maps.

The last tab is Illumination. Here you set the ambient light and the characteristics of any individual lights shining on your object(s). We'll look at Illumination in a later tutorial.

That should be enough to get you started with Balls and Bubbles. Try out the presets, and experiment with your own settings. You'll find that you can get a wide range of effects, including soap bubbles, snow, a gazing ball, a doorknob, eyeballs, metallic balls, and more. And you can deform what you make with B&B to create other sphere-like shapes, including eggs, oval buttons, fruits and vegetables. Try using Distortion or Geometric effects on the results of B&B, or use the Deform tools or Warp Brush to mold a sphere into another shape. You'll soon find that B&B is useful for far more than creating balls and bubbles.