Effects

The Marks and motion ring

Effects are marks, not brushes of one medium: the Marks and motion ring puts an effect on the brush in hand, in its medium and your colour.

1. Tap a motion gauge on the wheel: Amount, Speed or Pattern. Or tap the medium in hand on the wheel's rim, so its brushes unfold, after the chips Add brushes 1 and Marks and motion 2, and tap Marks and motion. Both open the same ring.
2. Its second ring holds every group side by side: the motion families, then Line, Shapes, Hatching, Liquid marks and the effect categories. They don't all fit at once, so the ring turns: drag along it to reach the last categories. Beyond it are the chosen group's marks, each a moving sample.
3. Tap a category, then a look. The rings stay open so you can try another; painting folds them.

Line takes the effect off, back to the brush's own mark. The motion families on the same ring set the path motion under the effect, and the inner ring chooses which part the gauges move. An effect's parts, and the stroke nearer or farther, open with a second tap on the brush in hand: see Variations for layering. Effects are offered with any paint brush; tools that edit paint already on the page, such as the Water Brush, have none, and with one in hand the ring holds only the motion groups.

A look changes the marks and their local movement, preserving your colour, paint and whole-stroke motion. Each stroke is one colour, the one in hand, so effects build up like paint: for a fire, paint a red flame, then an orange one over it, then a small yellow core, turning Strength down for the fainter layers. Only effects whose colours are the point, Confetti, Aurora and the vine's flowers, bring colours of their own.

With an effect in hand, tap a gauge for the brush's settings: under Paint, Build it up offers three colours for its category, deepest first (for Fire: deep red, orange, yellow). Tap one, paint a stroke, then the next.

Categories and looks

Draw in the direction the effect should go: flames rise from where you start, rain falls toward where you finish. For Ocean waves draw the waterline, for a River its course, and for a Waterfall the lip the water falls from; the water always falls down the page.

The effect gauges

When you take up an effect, by any route, the wheel's three gauges 1 2 3 control the effect: Effect movement is chosen on the inner ring of Marks and motion. Choose Whole stroke there for the stroke's own motion; it stays chosen while you turn the gauges, until you take up other marks. They always do the same three jobs, under names that suit the effect:

The other three gauges work on effects too, on every medium: Size scales the whole effect, Strength is its opacity, and Water is how wet its marks are: wetter marks have softer edges and run together more. Together they are what you change between layers: a big, faint, wet red flame, then a smaller, stronger yellow one.

The first two effect gauges run from a quarter to four times the brush as it comes (or as you saved it), which sits in the middle and reads 1.0×; an effect chosen from the Marks and motion ring measures against its look. An effect keeps its pace whatever the length of the stroke: its marks move as many of their own sizes a second on a long stroke as on a short one, so a stroke moves as the wheel's preview does, and a long stroke's marks still reach its end. On the Water brushes, Flow is how fast the colour moves inside the marks. The third changes its local character. Whole-stroke Wind lives in Whole stroke. Tap a gauge for the Motion panel.

Select effect strokes already painted (with no whole-stroke motion of their own) and the same three gauges are theirs, outlined in orange: turn one and, when you let go, every selected effect stroke takes the value on its own gauge, as one undo step.

The Pencil

Every effect says what the Apple Pencil does to it: under its description in the brush's settings, and in Brush Studio on the Marks page, under Pencil, where each link has its own amount. Drawing speed counts for a finger or mouse too; with a finger, pressure and tilt change nothing.

A light touch gives the smallest or faintest marks and a firm press the fullest; tilt counts once the Pencil leans further than a usual hold. Flocks, lightning, vines and frost take the Pencil over the whole stroke rather than point by point. Effects painted before this was added keep their look, and paintings that use it need this version of the app.

The Marks collection

In the brush library (Add brushes), the Marks collection 1 shows the same looks, by category. Tap one to put it on the brush in hand. Brushes you save with an effect appear at the end of their category, so a look you tuned is one tap away.

Your own looks

Tune a look with the gauges, or every setting in Brush Studio, then save the brush (Save current brush in the library, or Save copy in Brush Studio). It joins its category in the Marks and motion ring and the library's Marks, and shares as a brush file like any other.

All settings

All settings opens Brush Studio; its Motion page has the settings under the gauges:

Flocks, lightning, vines and frost place their own marks, so they have no Grow and fade or Inside the stroke; lightning, vines and frost have no Liveliness either, and take their character from their gauges.

Separate effect parts

Falling drops, Splash droplets, Puddle rings and Foam trail are ready-made parts in Water. Paint them on different strokes or layers to choose their colour, size, timing and position separately. A puddle ring appears at the end of the gesture; draw toward the impact point.

You can split any effect that has secondary marks in Brush Studio → Marks → Shape → Effect parts. Choose Main marks only, Main + secondary, or the secondary shape alone. Motion → Shape over lifetime sets the secondary delay, lifetime and size. Hiding a part retains its settings. For rings, Ring perspective runs from a low, flat ellipse to a circle seen from above. Ring angle rotates the ellipse relative to your gesture; both are in Marks → Shape.

Plus: Free includes Flame, Embers, Smoke, Steam, Clouds, Mist, Rain, Snow, Bubbles, Current, Ripples, Leaves, Blossoms, Flock, Fireflies, Twinkle, Magic trail, Burst and Confetti. Plus unlocks all 156 looks, including the separated Water parts; on Free they carry a Plus badge, and choosing one opens Free and Plus. Effects already painted keep their look on Free, and the effects a book's pages paint with always play.

Watercolor interiors

Water Current, Water Ripples, Water Eddies, Wet / Dry Loop and Edge Bloom keep a joined wash outline still while colour moves inside it: pigment drifting down the stroke, rings spreading from drops, swirling eddies, patches that wet and dry with dark blooms at their edges, or pigment creeping out to pool at the edge. As they come, the movement is clearly visible, a cycle every four or five seconds; turn Swirl down for a quieter wash. In Motion → Inside the marks, Keep outline still also stops any whole-stroke or individual-mark movement you added. See Motion inside a wash. These use compatible liquid marks; they do not add interior motion to an ordinary Line brush.