COMPANY: Artlandia | URL: www.artlandia.com | TYPE: Plug-in | PLATFORM: Mac, Windows | PRICE: Varies by package
Above: Source image. Below: resulting patterns
Artlandia SymmetryShop 3 is all you need to create professional pattern designs in Adobe Photoshop. Now in its third release, this plug-in makes the design process quick, easy, and fully automatic. Select a part of an image and the plug-in does the rest. SymmetryShop patterns stay editable forever: refine your source image and rebuild the pattern at any time.

SymmetryShop Features

These powerful features let you do pattern design as never before. With SymmetryShop, you are more productive and creative. And the once painstaking job is fun.

All standard symmetry types
Generate a ready stream of design solutions by simply clicking the colorful symmetry buttons. There are exactly seventeen types of symmetry that can be used to create a pattern, all available to you in the SymmetryShop palette.

One-click creation of popular repeats
Create many popular repeats with just one click. Simply choose drop, brick, diamond, gradation, scale, spot, grid, and other repeat types from the Layout list. Then quickly customize the built-in layouts. Even create a variety of special effects, such as optical effects.

Interlocking design elements
Select a part of the image as a "seed" (motif) and easily build organic, interlocking patterns by letting your design elements overlap. Or clip repeating units and create kaleidoscopic patterns.

Smoothed-away boundaries
Easily control the amount of overlap of the neighboring units and smooth the boundaries away by applying the feather effect.

Surface patterns and borders
Create just one tile, a border, or a surface pattern. You have full control over exactly how many repeating units the plug-in makes for you.

Support for smart objects
With smart objects (available in Photoshop CS2 and later versions), you can use any combination of layers as a motif, even complex vector images, such as SymmetryWorks patterns created in Adobe Illustrator. Possibilities are indeed unlimited.

All-over and tossed repeats
Also use smart objects to quickly create pattern designs from elements that are arbitrarily scattered over the repeat area. Keep similar elements linked to each other. Make as many copies as you wish. Freely rotate, flip, and scale copies to achieve a more organic look. Edit one element and instantly apply the changes to all linked copies. Reposition elements in your seed layer at any time, add or remove copies, or apply other non-destructive transformations. Rebuild the pattern with a click when you are ready.

Composite repeats
Freely use one SymmetryShop pattern as a motif for another. By enclosing a pattern in a smart object, you can nest patterns and create virtually any type of repeat, while keeping all components separately editable.

Multiple source layers
Combine as many image layers as you like in a smart object and use the object as the seed layer of your SymmetryShop patterns. The source layers will remain completely independent and you will be able to replace, edit, transform, or otherwise rearrange the elements of your motif. Then rebuild the pattern with a click.

Support for text, fill, and shape layers
Create patterns from text or other vector shapes and fill layers (filled with a solid color, gradient, or pattern). Edit the text at any time, change the font or formatting, warp, or apply any other Photoshop editing technique. Edit vectors with Photoshop's vector tools. And, again, rebuild with a click.

Layer and vector masks
SymmetryShop lets you select a part of a layer to use in your pattern. But you can also apply Photoshop's layer and vector masks to isolate (mask) parts of the seed layer that you do not want to use. Edit your masks with the familiar Photoshop tools at any time and rebuild your pattern.

Interactive editing
The plug-in fully automates your work. Edit your motif or change the repeat size of your pattern with the usual Photoshop tools and quickly rebuild the pattern by running a Photoshop action.

Quick export as Photoshop pattern fills (presets)
Instantly export your finished design—or any number of intermediate snapshots—as Photoshop pattern fills. The plug-in adds your pattern to Photoshop presets and makes it available to the paint bucket, pattern stamp, healing brush, and other tools, as well as to the Layer Style dialog.

Unlimited iterations and refinement in multiple Photoshop sessions
Easily change parameters and tweak the design when your customer requests a modification. Because the plug-in automatically saves everything it needs to rebuild your pattern, you simply open your old SymmetryShop file and pick up right where you finished!

New features in SymmetryShop 3

Working with plug-in has become easier and more efficient in SymmetryShop 3 and Photoshop CS4. Take advantage of the greatly improved pattern design workflow.

Floating SymmetryShop panel
Access the plug-in at any time as a regular Photoshop free-floating panel. Move the panel to a convenient place on your screen or dock it with other Photoshop panels.

Dynamically adjusted image size
Dramatically increase speed and improve performance by reducing the image size of your pattern on the fly. SymmetryShop preserves the quality of your original motif in a smart object and lets you rebuild the pattern at full size as soon as it is ready.

One-click pattern/motif toggling
It is easy to go back to editing your motif in SymmetryShop 3. The new Target Seed/Pattern Layer button lets you quickly toggle between the pattern layer and the seed layer with a single click.

Easy selection of the control path
Instantly select the control path to visualize or transform it as needed. Deselect with a click, too. The new Select/Deselect Control Path button in the SymmetryShop panel lets you quickly switch between editing pattern elements and changing the repeat size.

Interactive editing of the control path
Use the Photoshop Transform Path command to change the repeat size of your pattern. SymmetryShop will automatically rebuild the pattern as soon as you apply the transformation. Or easily edit the control path with your other favorite Photoshop vector tools. Then update the pattern with a click.

Enhanced pattern preview
Fill the entire SymmetryShop Layer with a pattern or preview the pattern in another layer. Fill the whole layer or a selected region. The new Preview Pattern button lets you instantly see the exact result that will be produced when you export your SymmetryShop pattern as a Photoshop preset.

Support for large images
Use images of any size that are supported in your version of Photoshop. SymmetryShop no longer limits document sizes to less than 30,000 pixels.

Other productivity enhancements
Work faster and more efficiently by taking advantage of multiple technical improvements in many SymmetryShop operations, such as the canvas extension management, autorun, and others.