Hello everyone. This isn't really game-development-related, but I'd like your opinion on this as software developers as well as users.

Some time ago I worked for a good while on a program, "Curver" I called it, which focuses on implementing a natural workflow for working with line art. Then I put it on hold in favor of other projects and some real life circumstances. Anyway, now I'm at the stage of finding a project to start/resume. With financial interest in mind, do you think this project has potential? What to add to it without complicating it too much? Would it generate a good user base?

Basically, what are your thoughts? Thanks in advance for any input

That actually looks pretty damn sweet.

It seems really cool, but it might be easier to sell as a adobe photoshop/illustrator plugin rather than a dedicated piece of software.

...of course that would probably require a lot of extra development...

It's always a rewarding experience to build your own software.
My personal opinion is that a line-drawing-only software might be lacking in comparison with more complete packages such as Toon Boom, which offers a similar functionality:

- http://docs.toonboom.com/help/harmony/#HAR/Stage/004_Drawing/025_H2_Pencil_Tool_Options.html#Line
- http://docs.toonboom.com/help/harmony/#HAR/Stage/004_Drawing/214_H1_Smoothing_Lines_.html%3FTocPath%3DStage%20Guide|Toon%20Boom%20Harmony%2010%20Stage%20User%20Guide|Chapter%204%3A%20Drawing|Smoothing%20Lines|_____0

You could add more features to your program, such as painting brushes so that we can colour the linework, and also animation tools such as a timeline and keyframes.

At the time I started working on it, I could not find software which implemented a similar workflow. Toon Boom does seem like a much more complete package. I can't help but feel that my tool is now redundant. Also, as a solo programmer, I feel like aiming for completeness and richness rather than specificity may not be the best strategy.

I wouldn't say its redundant. Looks really nice and there is room in the world for more than one line-drawing package. Just look at all the 3D modellers out there.

I'd keep this alive personally. Good work.

It's a great piece of software don't get me wrong but I don't think there is room on the market for this.

If you put it up for free or quiet cheap some where with some ads on the download page.

Keep working on it, if it gets some attention in the next few months try to start selling it but if it doesn't put it up for free and see if it gets the attention it deserves then start charging for it.

From a commercial point of view I think that the application needs to be extended extensively, or else competition is not possible.

From the workflow point of view, however, I'm glad to see curves not manipulated by knots and control points :) Tools that work the "designer's way" are IMHO much better suited than knot manipulators.

Is it technologically based on dense polylines or piecewise curve fitting?

What about gap closing?

Does it support directly or indirectly faces or just strokes?

Does it support planar maps or something alike?

I appreciate everyone's input, although I'm still uncertain whether to go on with it or find something more promising to work on :s

haegarr

Is it technologically based on dense polylines or piecewise curve fitting?

Dense polylines, though the application simplifies and re-tesselates them on the fly. The vertices are converted on the CPU into a triangle strip and sent to the GPU, where a shader does some calculations to perform anti-aliasing, as well as some width modifications to avoid weird-looking corners.

What about gap closing?

Vertices are nodes in a linked list, so closing a curve is a matter of linking the last vertex to the first.

Does it support directly or indirectly faces or just strokes?

Closed curves (not shown in the video) can be filled. The application uses hardware stencil operations and uses the curve's vertices to draw the fill shape.

Does it support planar maps or something alike?

Shapes and curves can be shaded in many ways. There is even a material editor very similar to that in the Unreal Engine to allow users to create all sorts of shaders to use with the curves and shapes.

About extending it... I've been thinking about that, but in the end I don't want to try to compete with the myriad of painting applications out there. So I think it would be wise of me to define a manageable set of features and focus on those, instead of trying to create another painting/animation/photo-manipulation/sketching program. I think that maybe if I design it to solve a particular problem (unwieldy line-art workflows) and price it accordingly, then maybe it would be successful. But like I said before, I'm still uncertain. I don't want to spend months working on it and then failing.

I think I was too vague when asking for gap closing, faces, and planar maps. My questions were targeted at the workflow of how to handle several curves together to define a higher level topology. E.g. are overlapping curves (semi-)automatically intersected and joined, usually done by processing them as a planar map, so that the user can paint to areas without the need of explicitly marking the boundaries? (Of course, the curves should still be available as objects in a higher level.)

of
... although I'm still uncertain whether to go on with it or find something more promising to work on

Who can tell ?!

My brother is graphic designer, currently working on a graphic novel. Recently he has tested many 2D tools (PhotoShop, InkScape, Pixelmator, ToonBoom, ArtRage, SketchBook Pro, ...) with this in mind, and none of them is really satisfying his desires. Besides some being too close to the pixel art basis, the workflows are often also not revolutionary, so to say, but too technical.

However, all these tools have a head start compared to your Curver, partly of more than 15 years. They are much more complete considering the overall process of creating graphics. As an independent artist (and that is probably your market) my brother is doing all aspects from drafting to drawing, inking, painting, and texting, and switching tools in-between isn't what he wants to do, if possible.

So, there is probably a market for artist friendly workflows, but catching up on the functionality shown by competitors would be really hard. You need at least provide an easy integration into a bigger workflow.