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Clipstudio

Clip Studio Paint is a digital painting application developed by Celsys for drawing manga, illustrations, and animation, trusted by professional creators worldwide, offering thousands of free brushes, and supporting multiple platforms including Windows, macOS, iPad, iPhone, and Android. It covers illustration, manga, Webtoon, and animation production, with built-in tools such as 3D reference models, perspective rulers, and vector layers, and offers a free trial as well as purchase options including monthly and annual subscriptions or a perpetual license.

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About this tool

Clip Studio Paint is a multi-platform application for digital painting, mainly used to create manga, illustrations, and animation, and officially stated to be used by many professional illustrators, manga artists, and animators worldwide.

In terms of purpose, it is officially positioned as a drawing and coloring application, covering illustrations (character art, concept art, etc.), comics (single-panel comics, comic strips, comic books), Manga and Webtoon, as well as animation production, while also supporting design-related work.

Main capabilities:

  • Drawing and brushes: Provides a large number of quality brushes that can simulate the textures of traditional materials such as watercolor, oil painting, crayon, and colored pencil, and supports color mixing; provides thousands of free brushes and decorative brushes to quickly draw frills, accessories, clouds, forests, and more.
  • Assistance and reference tools: Built-in reference tools help practice human body structure and draw realistic and accurate backgrounds; reference lines or patterns can be drawn directly on 3D characters; 3D models can be lit as a reference for drawing shadows; through Hand Scanner, use real-time camera video to pose a 3D hand.
  • Coloring and effects: Shading Assist provides coloring suggestions simply by placing a light source; filters can be applied with one click for blurring and extracting lines; colors can be adjusted intuitively through preview.
  • Backgrounds and props: Use dedicated rulers to draw perfect symmetry and perspective; draw lines freehand along rulers with any brush; use 3D objects as reference to sketch props and more.
  • Post adjustments: Supports Puppet Warp (adjust parts of the image like manipulating a puppet), Liquify (precise adjustment with the ability to enlarge or reduce parts), and Mesh Transformation (make patterns fit any shape), reducing redrawing.
  • Vector layers: Can preserve delicate line art on vector layers, and after drawing, lines can still be moved and scaled, lines at intersections can be erased, and they can be enlarged or reduced without loss, so illustrations will not become pixelated.
  • Layer functions: Masking and clipping can be done across multiple layers, and effects can be undone at any time; complex projects can be managed through layer colors or separate layer lists.
  • Manga tools: Provides tools needed from sketching to final artwork, such as panel frames, speech bubbles, text, effect lines, and screentones; can create comics, Manga, and Webtoon for print or web; can set the optimal paper, export, and manage multi-page projects.
  • Animation tools: From simple GIFs to full animation, officially stated to use the same tools as animation studios; provides light table and onion skin functions to view adjacent frames, allows drawing frames as desired, brings a digital feel of pencil and paper, and can be saved as vector data to scale losslessly to 4K resolution.
  • Professional output: Can be saved in industry-standard formats, making it easy toCollaborate with other creative software; supports the creation of multi-page projects, merchandise, animations, and more.

How to use:

  • Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, iPad, Android, iPhone; among these, PRO supports Windows/macOS/iPad/Android/iPhone, and EX supports iPad/Android/Windows/macOS. The mobile version uses a simplified UI, making it easy to start sketching anytime and anywhere, and you can continue the same project on a PC.
  • Versions: CLIP STUDIO PAINT PRO is for character art, concept art, and illustration; CLIP STUDIO PAINT EX is for comics, Manga, Webtoon, and animation. The official comparison table shows that EX-exclusive features include multi-page projects, Webtoon tools (some features are EX-only), PDF/e-book export, full animation tools, and more; PRO includes illustration, importing/using 3D models, extracting lines from images and 3D models, saving layer comps, single-page comic tools, simple animation/video production (up to 24 frames), and more.
  • Pricing: The official offering includes a free trial of up to 6 months; after that, you can choose a monthly or annual subscription, or purchase a one-time perpetual license for Windows and macOS. The official page shows limited-time offers: PRO 40% OFF, from US$63.00 to US$37.79; EX 30% OFF, from US$277.00 to US$192.99; there is also pricing information such as up to 50% OFF US$13.49~ and 20% OFF US$23.19~, with the promotion ending October 15, 8:00 am UTC/GMT.

Use cases: illustration and character/concept art creation, comics and Manga and Webtoon production, animation and GIF creation, design work; solutions are also offered for educational institutions and enterprises, and the official page lists many schools and companies as users.

Limitations: Multi-page projects, Webtoon tools (some features), PDF/e-book export, full animation tools, and more are EX version features; simple animation/video production in PRO is limited to up to 24 frames. The free trial lasts up to 6 months, after which a subscription or license purchase is required. Other limitations not described in the materials are not yet provided.

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