Gertrudis Graphics has updated GMX-PhotoPainter (http://www.gertrudisgraphics.com/gmx-photopainter-information) for Mac OS X (10.5 and higher) to version 2.0. The upgrade adds custom color selection and Custom Brushes Import.

GMX-PhotoPainter is a US$59 standalone software solution that transforms an image (generally a photo) into an original artwork. With GMX-PhotoPainter, artists can start with an existing picture such as from a digital camera or scanner, a 3D rendering or painting from another program or imaging application.

GMX-PhotoPainter first performs a topological analysis of the image's content and builds a matrix of flow direction vectors. Users can then paint a few quick strokes across the desired features of their image. GMX-PhotoPainter uses this information to generate something that looks more like hand-drawn masterpieces.

While one of the main goals of GMX-PhotoPainter is enabling users to create their own styles, there are a number of standard, "ready to use" styles which successfully imitate traditional media: Watercolor, Oil painting, Crayon, and Pen & Ink. Each of these comes in different sizes, and levels of details.

GMX-PhotoPainter for Mac OS X lets the user create its own style from the ground up, with a level of customization, including the shape of the brush, texture, color sampling technique, width, length, and more features. There are over 40 different parameters, organized from the most common parameters like width, length, transparency, to more sophisticated parameters like color variation, pen & ink behavior and others. A Wacom tablet device is recommended for use with GMX-PhotoPainter.