Creative presets and Pointillism

Summary

Creative filters apply a preset visual style — Cartoon, Sepia, Duotone, and others — to an image or paint layer, or to the whole composition. They are non-destructive: switching back to None fully restores the original look. A dedicated Pointillism preset does not currently exist in the interface — see Warnings and limits.

Use it when

• You want to quickly restyle a photo or painted layer without manual color and contrast edits.
• You want to preview how the whole composition looks under one consistent treatment before committing to it.
• You're exploring options and want a fast, reversible way to compare looks.

Before you begin

You need an image or paint layer on the artboard — the filter list is present regardless, but the panel's own note states: Select an image or paint layer. Vector shapes and text stay editable; use Artboard to filter the complete composition. Shape, path, and text layers are not affected by Creative filters.

Steps

1. Select Filter scope: Selected layer to affect only the current image or paint layer, or Artboard to affect the whole composition at once, independent of what's selected.
2. Choose a filter from Classic: None, Faded, Cartoon, Oil Paint, Grayscale, Sepia, Vintage, High Contrast, or Duotone.
3. Select Show beta filters to reveal a second category, Studio: Ink Cartoon V2, Kuwahara Paint, Xerox, Risograph, Halftone, Linocut.
4. If the chosen filter exposes extra parameters — Duotone shows an Intensity slider — adjust them to taste.
5. Select None at any time to remove the filter and return to the original, unfiltered appearance.

What changes

• A filter is applied live and is fully reversible: selecting None after applying Cartoon restored the exact original colors in testing, with no visible residue.
• Intensity (where present) blends between the original and the fully filtered result — set to 0%, the Duotone effect disappeared entirely and the image matched its unfiltered state.
• Filter scope is independent state, not just a view toggle: switching from Selected layer to Artboard did not carry over the active filter selection — it reset to None for the new scope.
• Artboard scope applies without requiring a specific layer to remain selected, since it targets the whole composition rather than one layer's content.

Print note

Creative filters change the actual color data of the affected layer or composition and are included in exported output — they are not a preview-only effect like the grid overlay or realistic-paper view. This article does not verify color-managed export accuracy for filtered artwork; see the placeholder color-profile notes in the Output chapter.

Warnings and limits

• No "Pointillism" filter, preset, or tool exists anywhere in the current interface. This was checked directly: a full-text search of the page (document.body.innerHTML) for "Pointillism" returned no match, in both the Classic and Studio (beta) filter categories, at both Selected layer and Artboard scope, in the Pencil and Brush tools' Creative properties, and at mobile width. If you are looking for a stippled or dot-pattern effect, none of the current filters produce one — the closest available options are Halftone (a beta filter) or manual dot-based drawing.
• Filters do not apply to shape, path, or text layers at all — selecting one while such a layer is active has no target to affect. Use Fill, Stroke, and Color (see Fill, stroke, palette, and color) to restyle those instead.
• Filter scope is not remembered per layer when you switch scopes — changing from Selected layer to Artboard and back does not restore whatever filter was active on the layer before the switch in this session's testing; reapply it if needed.

Desktop and mobile

Creative filters, Filter scope, and Show beta filters are reachable the same way on desktop and mobile, per The editor at a glance and Artboard, stage, and tool rail — on mobile, they appear inside the tool-rail-triggered Creative tools sheet rather than inline in the inspector. The absence of a Pointillism option was confirmed identically at both 1280 × 720 and 390 × 844.

Troubleshooting

Related topics

• Fill, stroke, palette, and color
• Select, pencil, brush, and eraser
• Contrast, black point, white point & gamma
• RGB, CMYK & print color

Verification note

Verified against Blotter Builder on 2026-07-20.

Source notes

Primary observations — all from the live application at https://blotterbuilder.tdl.fyi, 2026-07-20:

• Observed — the Classic filter category lists None, Faded, Cartoon, Oil Paint, Grayscale, Sepia, Vintage, High Contrast, Duotone. Selecting Show beta filters revealed a Studio category: Ink Cartoon V2, Kuwahara Paint, Xerox, Risograph, Halftone, Linocut.
• Observed — applying Cartoon to a placed image visibly changed its colors and shading; selecting None afterward restored the exact original appearance.
• Observed — selecting Duotone revealed an Intensity: 100% slider not present for filters without adjustable parameters. Setting it to 0% visually restored the unfiltered image; the panel's slider and the canvas stayed in sync as it moved.
• Observed — switching Filter scope from Selected layer (with Duotone active) to Artboard reset the active filter to None rather than preserving Duotone.
• Observed — applying Sepia under Artboard scope changed the full composition's appearance without requiring the image layer to stay selected.
• Observed — searched document.body.innerHTML for the literal string "Pointillism" at: Classic filters only, Classic + Studio (beta) filters, Artboard scope, Pencil tool's Creative properties, Brush tool's Creative properties, and at 390 × 844 — no match in any case.

Verification log