Who here has tried Krita?

[Konna-ni]

I have seen Krita floating around on Tumblr lately, but have been putting it off for quite some time due to my love for SAI. But seeing some of the features today (I had never given it a hard look) has caught my attention, and so I am going to give it a shot. I was wondering if anyone else had, either.

For the curious, Krita is free, but still appears to be a very powerful and quality little piece of software. It can be downloaded here: https://krita.org/

I am going to play around with it sometime today and post my results. If anyone else has tried it, what was your experience with it compared to other programs, specifically Photoshop and SAI? I have been using a mixture of PS and SAI for a while, but I'm hoping for an all-in-one experience with this one.

UPDATE: So after spending some time in the program, I am about to uninstall Krita. Not that is does not have its uses... but I cannot deal with how the brushes behave with my pen. It just feels too unnatural no matter what settings I choose, and I could not even come up with a rough sketch that I was satisfied with after all this time. At most, I would use Krita for flashy effects after finishing my picture in SAI, but I already have Photoshop for that.

It really is a shame since I had hope for the program, but freehanding in Krita is just terrible for me. I've seen great things done with mice and paths, but on my own I've had to fight the program to put lines where I want them freely. It had a lot of fancy brushes and effects that look very interesting, though, which is what attracted me. Maybe after a few updates, I will try it again.

 

[Abbi Normal]

I couldn't get it past a blank page on my crappy 2008 lenovo thinkpad. But all the layout management stuff regarding graphic novel layouts looked really great. I actually draw in GIMP of all things, partially because of familiarity (I've been using it for various purposes since I was a little kid), and partially because it does what I want without taking up as much system resource as the equivalent version of Photoshop. There's some GIMP-hate out there so virulent that I sometimes wonder if the difference might be greater than I understand it to be, and if I'm unnecessarily hobbling myself, and if I'd see any improvement just by switching like some people seem to imply.

 

[DragonFU]

After reading the first paragraphs I started downloading then I come back and read your update then cancel the install.

I love everything about SAI and how it works except for this one brush sketching technique that people use Photoshop for and I have Photoshop but I can't make the brush work like how I want or how I imagine. I deleted my presets options so everything should be basic but it's still meh, so I'm forever stuck with SAI. I would like to use Photoshop but it has nothing like the watercolour brush in SAI which is an integral part of my work, Photoshop surely has unlimited possibilities but I just don't have the patience to sit and fiddle with crap for an entire week. (Whenever I try to solve that one brush issue I spend ~4 hours on it and get nowhere)

Sorry that's it for my irrelevant rant.

 

[Eo Fenstalker]

(Wee, first post since joining the forum!) I use Krita almost exclusively for my artwork. It's replaced Photoshop for me after using it since 1997. I really love how the brushes feel but I can't compare them to SAI as I haven't used it. Krita is still in beta, so it has its bugs, but they're working hard on improving every aspect. If you're using the Windows version, you need to make sure OpenGL is enabled or it will behave like a hobbled yak: Settings -> Configure Krita -> Display -> Enable OpenGL. You can do a lot with the brush engine if it's not behaving as you'd like - the standard brushes have weighted smoothing options that affect the feel, and there's also a dynamic brush that is great for inking.