| What would we need to actually simulate a crayon (and prepare our child for more advanced artistic activities)? Once you download the coloring pages above or from third party sites, you need the right software. Corel Painter Essentials and Adobe Photoshop Elements are included with many Wacom tablets, or you can use default image editing software such as Microsoft Paint or even download shareware and freeware from places like www.download.com.
However, with most image editing software, we encounter a problem. Many programs like Microsoft Paint will simply draw over the black outlines. We don't want that to happen!
Fortunately with Corel's Painter Essentials 2 (bundled with all Wacom tablets), the crayon brush actually simulates a crayon allowing a child to color in the image without coloring over the lines! For small children, we recommend that you choose the crayon brush and brush size beforehand. Choosing the colors is simply a matter of clicking the right spot on the color wheel.
In other programs like Photoshop and Photoshop Essentials, you can use the magic wand to select all the white areas so that your child does not color over and erase the black outlines of the image.
If you don't have a pen tablet yet and would like to try a great painting program that simulates actual crayons, pencils, pens and paintbrushes, download the free version of Ambient Design's Artrage:
http://www.ambientdesign.com/artrage.html. |
