CorelDRAW Help | Applying special effects in bitmaps

Quick links to procedures on this page:

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To apply a special effect

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To inflate a bitmap manually

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To add a plug-in filter

Applying special effects in bitmaps

You can apply a wide range of special effects to bitmaps, such as three-dimensional (3D) and artistic effects.

Left to right: Add noise effect, Zoom blur effect, Solarize color transform effect, Edge detect contour effect, Sharpen effect

Left to right: Original image, Emboss effect, Cubist artistic effect, Mosaic creative effect, Distort pixelate effect

The special effects are organized into the following categories.

Special effect category	Description
3D Effects	Lets you create the illusion of depth. Effects include 3-D rotate, Bevel effect (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Cylinder, Emboss, Glass (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Page curl, Pinch/punch, Sphere, The Boss (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), and Zig zag (Corel PHOTO-PAINT).
Art Strokes	Lets you apply hand-painted techniques. Effects include Charcoal, Conte crayon, Crayon, Cubist, Dabble (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Impressionist, Palette knife, Pastels, Pen and ink, Pointillist, Scraperboard, Sketch pad, Watercolor, Water marker, and Wave paper.
Blur	Lets you blur an image to simulate movement, speckling, or gradual change. Effects include Tune blur (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Directional smooth, Gaussian blur, Jaggy despeckle, Low pass, Motion blur, Radial blur, Bokeh blur (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Smooth, Soften, Zoom, and Smart blur (Corel PHOTO-PAINT).
Camera	Lets you simulate effects produced by various camera lenses. Effects include Colorize, Diffuse, Lens flare (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Lighting effects (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Photo filter, Sepia toning, Spot filter (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), and Time machine, which lets you walk your image back through history to recreate some popular photographic styles from the past.
Color Transform	Lets you create photographic illusions by using color reduction and replacements. Effects include Bit planes, Halftone, Psychedelic, and Solarize.
Contour	Lets you highlight and enhance the edges of an image. Effects include Edge detect, Find edges, and Trace contour.
Creative	Lets you apply various textures and shapes to an image. Effects include Crystalize, Fabric, Frame, Glass block, Mosaic, Scatter, Smoked glass, Stained glass, Vignette, and Vortex.
Custom	Lets you apply a wide range of effects to your image. For example, you can add texture and patterns to an image (Bump-map effect). Effects include Band pass (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Bump map, and User defined (Corel PHOTO-PAINT).
Distort	Lets you distort image surfaces. Effects include Blocks, Displace, Offset, Pixelate, Ripple, Shear (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Swirl, Tile, Wet paint, Whirlpool, and Wind.
Noise	Lets you modify the graininess of an image. Effects include Tune noise (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Add noise, 3-D stereo noise (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Maximum, Median, Minimum, Remove Moire, andRemove Noise.
Sharpen	Lets you add a sharpening effect to focus and enhance edges. Effects include Adaptive unsharp, Directional sharpen, High pass, Sharpen, and Unsharp mask.
Texture	Lets you add texture to an image by simulating a variety of surfaces, such as cobblestone, elephant skin, plastic, and relief sculpture. Effects include Brick wall (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Bubbles (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Canvas (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Cobblestone, Elephant skin, Etching, Plastic, Plaster wall (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Relief sculpture, Screen door (Corel PHOTO-PAINT), Stone, and Underpainting (Corel PHOTO-PAINT).
Plug-ins	Lets you use a third-party filter to apply effects to bitmaps in CorelDRAW.An installed plug-in appears at the bottom of the Bitmaps menu.

To browse the special effects that are available in the application, see Special effects categories.

When you apply an effect to a bitmap, CorelDRAW automatically adds a border around the bitmap so that the effect covers the entire image. Disabling the automatic inflate option cuts off the effect at the edges of the image. For example, if you apply the Gaussian Blur effect to a rectangle, the corners are cut off.

Gaussian Blur with Auto Inflate (left); Gaussian Blur without Auto Inflate (right)

If you want to use a custom border size, disable automatic inflation, and manually specify the dimensions of the inflated bitmap.

Adding plug-in filters to CorelDRAW provides additional features and effects that you can use to edit images. You can add plug-in filters, and you can remove them when you no longer need them.

To apply a special effect

1 .

Select a bitmap.

2 .

Click Bitmaps, choose a special effect category, and click an effect.

3 .

Adjust any special effect settings.

To browse the special effects that are available in the application, see Special effects categories.

To inflate a bitmap manually

1 .

Select a bitmap.

2 .

Click Bitmaps

Inflate bitmap

Manually inflate bitmap.

3 .

In the Width and Height areas, do one of the following:

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In the Inflate to boxes, type the number of pixels that should make up the dimensions of the inflated bitmap.

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In the Inflate by boxes, type the percentages by which to inflate the original bitmap.

To inflate the bitmap proportionally, enable the Maintain aspect ratio check box.

To automatically inflate the bitmap to cover the entire image, click Bitmaps Inflate bitmap Auto inflate bitmap.

To add a plug-in filter

1 .

Click Tools

Options.

2 .

In the list of categories, double-click Workspace, and click Plug-ins.

3 .

Click Add.

4 .

Choose a folder containing a plug-in.

5 .

Restart the application.

The plug-in appears in the Bitmaps

Plug-ins menu.

To remove a plug-in filter, click a plug-in folder from the Plug-in folders list, and click Remove.

Not all suite components documented in this Help are available in our Trial, Academic, and OEM versions. Unavailable components may include Corel applications, product features, third-party utilities, and extra content files.

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