Blade Pro Lesson Five

Texture slider (slider #14) -

This slider controls the height or depth of the texture that you picked for button #3 , (remember, button #2 offers you a choice of built in textures, none, or custom bitmaps of your choice?)   The slider on button #29 controls the SIZE of the texture pattern you apply, if you choose a medium size pattern and move slider #29 to the left, the pattern will be smaller and repeated on the image.  If you move slider #29 to the right, the pattern will be larger and may not completely show on the image, depending on the original size of the texture pattern.

Texture slider #14, on the other hand, controls how that texture bitmap is applied in relation to it's height off the image.  Push the slider all the way to the left and the texture will be indented into the image, push it all the way to the right and the texture will raise off the image.  Set the slider at 0 and you will probably see no texture at all, because you are telling Blade Pro to make the texture the same height as the image.  Get it?

 

 basic gold preset with texture 1 from drop down list applied, slider #29 set at 62, slider #14 set at -100.   The texture is indented.

  same preset, same texture, same setting on slider #29, slider #14 set at 100.  The texture is raised.

  same preset, texture, slider #29 setting, but slider #14 set at 0.   No texture visible.

 

Gloss slider (slider #15) -

 

To be honest, this slider doesn't have a lot of effect most of the time.  (Either that, or I haven't figure out how to apply it effectively!)   The Blade Pro documentation says that lower values produce a chalky effect, and higher values produce a glossy effect.   I tried every conceivable configuration on our basic gold button, had no effect whatsoever.

 disco ice preset, the default gloss setting is 29.

  same preset, gloss setting at 0, lost a few highlights around the edge of the bevel.

  same preset, gloss setting at 100, many more highlights on the interior surface of the bevel, and the edges.

Glare slider (slider #16) -

The glare slider seems to work in conjunction with the gloss slider.  Whereas the gloss slider controls the number of highlights, the glare slider controls the size of the highlights.

  disco ice preset, gloss setting at 100, glare setting at 0.

  same preset, same gloss setting, glare setting at 100.   The glossy highlights have increased in size.

 Reflection slider (slider #17) -

 

This slider controls the amount that the environment bitmap (button #4 ) is reflected on to your image. Pushing the slider all the way to the right will result in no reflection from that graphic.  All the way to the left can result in the environment bitmap reflecting on and coloring the image, but not always.  (Too many variables to make an "always" statement!)

 This is one of my favorite presets, called buckled mirror.  It makes a great framed border, the wider the better. 

 buckled mirror preset.  The default reflection setting for this is 100.  This image was a white background.

  same image, same preset, reflection setting at 50.   Sorta looks like that milky glass stuff my grandma had!

  black background, buckled mirror preset, reflection setting at 50.

  black background, same preset, reflection setting at 100 (very similiar to first image, on white background, but colors slightly darker on top of button.)

 Okay, enough sliders for now, go play some more, make a milk glass vase or something!