VECTOR & RASTER
The main difference between Photoshop and Illustrator, is that Illustrator is predominately a vector-based program. Photoshop is predominately a raster-based program.
I say predominately, as both programmes can have raster or vector elements as part of an image, but they are primarily one or the other.
You may have noticed how small an illustrator file is. Illustrator is made up of mathematical paths. You can increase the size of a vector as much as you want and it will never decrease in quality. Imagine a vector like text. You can set text to be whatever size you like and it always looks lovely and sharp.
This means that puppets built in illustrator are resolution independent. If you build a puppet in Illustrator, you can zoom in as close as you like, and the puppet will remain nice and crisp.
This makes Illustrator the better choice for puppets that are more graphically based.
Photoshop images are raster based. This means that when you zoom into a raster image, it starts to look pixelated. Photoshop puppets are better at subtle changes in light and color. This means that Photoshop is better at photographic based images.
So if you wish to build a puppet that uses photographic elements as its source material, you are better off in Photoshop.
If you are building a puppet in Photoshop, you really need to plan your framing. By framing I mean how close we may see the puppet. If you build a Photoshop puppet that is too small, your puppet will look pixelated when you scale for a close-up. So understanding this is especially important for Photoshop puppets.
Here at ElectroPuppet, we lean toward Illustrator for our drawn puppets. They are resolution independent and we find it much easier to control when we are constructing them. Getting a nice smooth line or changing the color of something is much easier in Illustrator. We can reshape without having to completely delete an element.
That said – if you are building a puppet that requires photorealistic elements, then photoshop is definitely what you require. Some people just aren’t familiar with Illustrator and want to stay with what is familiar. Others prefer the greater control it offers over texture and lighting. So both applications have advantages and disadvantages. Hopefully this article has helped make all that a little clearer, or as I like to say, a little vector!!
Here at ElectroPuppet we recently built some clay based, stop-motion style puppets in Photoshop called ‘The Clay Mates’. We chose Photoshop because we wanted that lovely clay and fabric texture and lighting to come through. You can have a look at the behind the scenes for that [here].