Stencils for Paint.net

[Sparky007]

I find myself using paint.net more frequently. "donation is on the way" I have been using Visio to perform my daily task.

In Visio there are what is called Stencils. For those who don't now what stencils are, they are predefined objects in a library

that one can drag and drop then modify the object. For example if I was drawing a network solution I would be able to drag a

router and drop it on my project. then I could re-size, rotate etc. So After my long winded intro. Are stencil available if not is

this a possibility ?   Donation Sent  (273731) Thanks again guys..   

Edited December 27, 2014 by Sparky007

[Goonfella]

If by Stencils you mean brushes then yes you can get these for PDN. Simon`s plug in pack has a Custom Brushes plugin and there is a handy tutorial on how to use it as well.

Hope this is what you are after.

[Sparky007]

Nope the paint brush is not what I was looking for. But thanks for the reply.  

  

Basically stencils really helps eliminate repetition and a way faster way to get task done.

For example. Lets say you are doing house designs for a living. Start with a floor plan

and be able to pick a shower, toilet, bath etc etc from a library and place them in

the bathroom move them around and so on. The same goes for network design

as I have attached a file in my original post for you to take a peek at.

      

[Ego Eram Reputo]

Visio does truly create editable "objects". Paint.net can not because it is a raster or bitmap editor.

You can see this is the Shapes tool, and also the Text tool. Both allow for editing of the shapes/text while the tool is active. Once the shape/text is committed to the canvas (i.e. "finished") it is rendered as a series of pixels and is not able to be re-edited using the original tool. This is one of the reasons we recommend placing text (and Shapes!) onto their own transparent layer. On their own layer they are easier to resize and move independent of the rest of the image.

Pixey's workaround is probably your best bet. Find or create a series of custom brushes and use the Custom Brush plugin to place them where you want. An alternative might be to use a library of smaller images and use Layers > Import from file to add them to your project.

[Cc4FuzzyHuggles]

I often like to use custom brushes without the Custom Brushes Mini plugin. The plugin lets you draw with the brushes, but if you just want to use brushes like stamps or as resources to add to your image, then using photoshop file type plugins and brushes from brusheezy might be all you need. Check out the plugin index for photoshop file type plugins.
 
However, I think EER has a good suggestion. Use images or make your own batch of images and then save them to their own folder and simply open them onto their own layers for your project.

Or, here is another idea... basically it's the same thing as EER's idea, but instead of loading images from a folder, just have all the items already open in paint.net with each item on their own layer.  This idea might only be good if you just have a few items you want to use, or else you could end up with so many layers it might become confusing.

I'll try to explain though: Lets say your main project is a room and you want to put items into the room, such as a chair and table. Use images of items or make your own batch of images of items and place each item on it's own layer, and save it as a pdn file of all the items you want to use. Now open or start your main project and also have your items pdn file open. Every time you want an item, just go to your items and copy the item you want, then go back to your main project and paste the item onto it's own layer. You can use the "Move Selected Pixels tool" to move your items around and there are various ways to re-size items. Warning about resizing though, Paint.net does things with pixels, so resizing will effect the visual quality of an item.

 

 

Instead of brushes or making your own brushes or making mini pictures of items, you might be interested in icons and/or isometric icons, which you could use with EER's import idea or my layering copy/pasting idea. Some icons are vector, some come in normal picture formats, while some are a special icon format, but there is a file type plugin for the special icon format.

Here are some examples of icons :
Bathroom Icons
Images of Network Icons
Images of Isometric Icons

 

Edited December 28, 2014 by Cc4FuzzyHuggles

[Sparky007]

Ok.. I just updated paint.net to version 4. I see under tools the "Shapes" then I can drill down to other types of shapes. This is exactly what I was looking for. 

 

Be Nice if I could expand this down the road. maybe some sort of Shapes Plugin. Just a thought  

 

Cheers  

Martyn  

Edited December 28, 2014 by Sparky007

[TechnoRobbo]

try this

 

TR's SplineMaster