First steps
RobinPad has several parts, but you do not need to learn them all to start painting. This page is a map: what is in the app, and where each thing is explained in detail.
The notebook and its formats
When you enter RobinPad you already have a notebook ready to paint. If you prefer another format, click Create New Pad in the top-left bar: a window opens where you can set the title, decide how many pages it will have and choose the format, including a custom one.
More information about notebooks and their formats: Formats and sizes
Start painting
Choose the Brush tool and you can paint on the page right away. At the top you have the size, the opacity, line smoothing and the settings for how the brush responds to pressure, plus the dirty brush and the option to keep strokes inside the page. The last one is the window where you choose which brush to use from the library.
More information about brushes: The brush
Your library
My library is a folder on your computer where RobinPad keeps what you paint with: brushes, themes, palettes, washi tapes and your pads. It also writes a copy of everything every few minutes, so you never lose work.
More information about the library: My library
Theme editor
The theme editor changes the look of the app: the paper texture, the background, the desk shadow, the washi tapes, the interface textures and even the cursor. You can export it to a theme file to share it, use it another day or sell it.
More information about the theme editor: How to create a theme.
The tools
In RobinPad you have a list of tools, some of them very much its own. Each one has its own section in the handbook, but here is a summary:
- Import image: images to use as a guide, at the back of the desk or as one more layer.
- Lofi YouTube: a music player that stays on the desk, with the default music or the video you want.
- Theme editor: where you change the visual elements of the app.
- Brush creator: where you design your own brush pack, export it and share it or sell it.
- Noise: a filter that adds grain to your painting, gives it texture.
- Gaussian Blur: the classic blur filter.
- Hue / Saturation: to correct or change the colors of your painting.
- Washi Tape: create tape patterns, place them on your painting and peel them off to leave the framing effect.
- Paper: the color, the texture and the grain of the paper. Set it once at the beginning and leave it alone, so the background stays even.
- Grayscale: shows your painting in grays, useful for reviewing values and contrasts.
- Grid: a grid over the painting, to structure the composition or place things precisely.
- Perspective: perspective guide lines, to give depth to the painting.
Other features
Besides the tools, there are a few other things you may not know about:
- Pagination: move from one page to another.
- Flip: look at your composition the other way around, in case something looks off.
- Reorder pages: see all the pages in a grid and place them however you want.
- Preview: flip through the pages as if it were a real notebook. It opens with the
Pkey. - Clear page: empty the page you are on, without touching the others.