RIP, Microsoft Paint. MS Paint, the first app you used for editing images, will probably be killed off in future updates of Windows 1. Paint 3. D. Microsoft lists the 3. ![]() Lineage Eternal Twilight Resistance Install Adobe FlashWindows 1. 0’s next autumn update, a little X marking the end of an era. The app is certainly a relic, from a time when the casual computer user couldn’t crack open Photoshop or Skitch or Pixelmator or thousands of web apps. MS Paint can’t save image components as layers or vectors; it’s for making flat static images only. It doesn’t smooth lines or guess at your best intentions. It does what you tell it and nothing more, faithfully representing the herky- jerky motion of drawing freehand with a computer mouse. It’s from a time before touch, a time before trackpads. As more sophisticated options appeared, Paint’s janky aesthetic became a conscious choice. Paint” became the metonym for that aesthetic, even if an image was actually created in another app. TV Tropes lists major limitations that came to define a certain look: the wobbly freehand lines, awkward color handling, and inappropriate export settings that give Paint its distinctive look. In 2. 01. 4, Gawker’s Sam Biddle noted Paint’s influence on conspiracy theory images, calling the form “Chart Brut.” In amateur detectives’ attempts at identifying the Boston Marathon bombers, the simplicity and jaggedness of Paint evokes the “crazy wall” aesthetic of red string and scribbled notes, apparently without irony. The same year, internet historian Patrick Davison explored Paint’s influence on the last decade of meme culture, particularly Rage Comics. The outsider- art aesthetic feels appropriate to the relatable everyday content, and makes the art form unthreatening. Of course, Paint offered a few features to smooth things out, like the circle and line tools and the “fill” tool, all used in the stoner comics of the early 1. Crucially, those circles still had jagged curves. The bright colors of stoner comics are flat, as MS Paint didn’t support gradients (without an elaborate hack). Contrast those pixellated lines with the slick, stylish face from this art tutorial: This slickness is built into Paint’s successor, Paint 3. If you’ve ever considered sharing your every move with a significant other, you probably have an opinion about location-sharing apps. “This is great! I’ll. MS Paint, the first app you used for editing images, will probably be killed off in future updates of Windows 10, replaced by the new app Paint 3D. Microsoft lists. This is a list of Windows 7 services that are safe to disable. If you don't know which services you can turn off/disable, read this guide! D. From the moment you start sketching, Paint 3. D smooths out your art. It also supports automatic selection tools and content- aware fill to rival Photoshop’s.)By automatically improving art, Paint 3. D hides the process behind the image. Paint’s sloppiness is probably why rage comics got so popular. Looking at a rage comic, you can tell exactly how it was drawn, and how you might draw one yourself. By delivering exactly what the artist draws, MS Paint forms an image that the viewer can mentally reverse- engineer and imitate. Unless you go absolutely nuts with it. Reddit user Toweringhorizon painstakingly assembled the drawing “To a Little Radio” using MS Paint tools like the oil brush, stretching the medium while maintaining a pixelated look. It’s one of the top submissions to MS Paint subreddit, a beautiful collaborative art gallery. Scrolling through this art feels like flipping through the sketchbook of the most artistic kid in high school. There’s an accepted roughness, a desired minimalism. For example, the exquisite raindrops in the work above are reflected in a flat, featureless tabletop. Like a transistor radio, Paint might be showing its age, but this tenacious little gadget should not be underestimated.“To a Little Radio” doesn’t even come close to testing Paint’s limits. As we say goodbye to the app that shaped an era, let us watch this bizarrely soundtracked time lapse of drawing Santa Claus in MS Paint on Windows 7 over the course of 5. We can only believe this is real because faking it would be even harder. Logitech Finally Made a Keyboard Worthy of Its Best Mouse. For years, Logitech’s productivity mice have been among the best, with devices like the MX Master 2. S helping to bring PC and Mac users together thanks to a cool software solution called, Flow which allows users to use the same mice with multiple computers at once. But for a long time, the company never had a keyboard that could deliver the same sort of style and quality its pointers delivered. So despite a pretentious sounding name like Craft (the only thing worse would be to call this thing an artisanal keyboard) and not having mechanical keys that are all the rage among the youths of today, Logitech’s new wireless keyboard is a delightful piece of tech. I’ve only used it for a few days, but its cushioned scissor switches are damn near whisper silent, which is a big plus for people who works next to inconsiderate assholes using keyboards with clackety Cherry Blue switches.(I’m kidding, kind of.) The keys also have a comforting indent and chiclet style layout which makes switching between laptop and desktop keyboards a cinch, even if you’re a Mac. Book user. And the backlighting has a special party trick thanks to its proximity sensor, which makes the keyboard light up whenever you get close. But the absolute best thing about Craft is that when teamed up with another Flow- enabled device like Logitech’s MX Master 2. S mouse, it completely eliminates the need for archaic tech like KVM switches. Controlling multiple computers with the same input devices has never been easier. Logitech Flow even lets you copy and paste things across up to three different machines, and because Flow works over Bluetooth or Logitech’s own wireless dongle, there’s no cords to worry about either. Another nice feature on the Craft is the big dial on the top left. It can do normal stuff like adjust the volume of your computer, but it also works with Microsoft and Adobe software. Now you can use the dial to adjust settings in apps like Photoshop and Powerpoint. It’s the same idea behind the Surface Dial, and it gives you precise, granular control when you want to adjust things like contrast or opacity. The main drawback is that only seven apps are fully supported right now (four from Adobe and three in MS Office), though Logitech says more are on their way. And while important apps like Chrome don’t have any pre- installed controls either, you can create your own dial shortcuts on a somewhat limited basis. But before the fawning goes too far, I must mention that the Craft isn’t perfect. It doesn’t have adjustable legs in back, so people who like a little angle to their keyboard dangle are out of luck. And if you choose to keep the backlighting on, in wireless mode, Logitech says the Craft will only last about a week, which is far less than some of its past wireless keyboard like the Di. Novo Edge. (Turning the backlighting off extends longevity to about a month, but who is going to do that?) However, I do have to give Logitech props for fitting the Craft with a USB- C port for recharging instead of micro USB. It’s helpful nod to the future that a lot of other accessory makers seem to be ignoring. Lastly, there’s the Craft’s price: $2. That ain’t cheap by anyone’s standards, but it’s not that different than a high- quality mechanical keyboard, and the Craft has way more features. The Craft is due out sometime in October.
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October 2017
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