Nested Canvases

This tutorial describes the uses of a feature of Satori FilmFX and PhotoXL which I think deserves more publicity: you can load a canvas into a layer in another canvas. The result, a nested canvas, has a number of advantages when working on complex canvases:-

1. It allows you to create objects in separate canvases and then combine them into a final scene.
2. You can easily reuse the objects you have created in other canvases.
3. It improves Satori's performance on most tasks.

This is an advanced tutorial. I shall assume that anyone reading this is already familiar with FilmFX or PhotoXL and has already used Satori to produce multi-layer canvases. 

Applications

Everything that you can do with nested canvases you can do in a single multi-layer canvas. So if you can produce your painting in one 6-layer canvas without any problems then there is no need to use nested canvases. However, even if you do not need to use this technique now, it may be useful one day to know how flexible Satori can be.

Structure

The tutorial is split into six sections of which 1 to 3 are applicable to all versions of Satori. Sections 4 to 6 have been written for  users of FilmFX version 3.x.

1. Introduction To Nested Canvases deals with the basic ideas and the performance aspects.
2. Painting By Objects illustrates a method of working which I find useful.
3. The Third Dimension shows Satori FilmFX used as a 3-D graphics tool (almost).
4. Nested Animations introduces the idea of nested file animation canvases.
5. Layers And Mappings extends the range of effects one can obtain.
6. CanvasFX Animation shows how to create animated canvasFX filters.

If you prefer you can download the nested canvas tutorials as a self-extracting 7Zip file, 683k bytes, or a gziped tar archive, 639k bytes.

Other Satori Tutorials

The main sources of Satori Tutorials are at:-

1. Spaceward Graphics own web site http://www.satoripaint.com/.
2. Michael Hirsh's web site www.animation-backgrounds.com..

The main Satori discussion forum is Satori at Ezboard http://pub47.ezboard.com/bsatori52261.