I Spent Over A Decade To Make This Dream Paint Program

I created this program called Expresii for doing digital Eastern ink painting because all the existing paint apps just can’t cut it.

I first saw the painting app Painter in early 90’s, but quickly realized that it couldn’t do what a Chinese brush can, no matter it called its brush ‘sumi-e’ or not. I waited and waited but the situation didn’t change. In 2001, Painter updated to version 7 with a new watercolor engine. If you’re old enough you might remember it was marketed with the URL youwontbelievewhatitcando.com. ＼⊙０⊙ノ But to our disappointment, the simulation was still less than satisfactory.

In 1999, I started designing my own paint program with 3D brush simulation. We published the result in a CG conference in 2002. I started working on realistic ink simulation the next year. Our brush+ink prototype dubbed MoXi was later presented at SIGGRAPH 2005 getting much attention from CG professionals. Adobe even licensed our tech in 2006 and I also went to their office to do technology transfer. Adobe folks kept telling me they loved my work but eventually rejected me joining them in 2007.

Later in 2008 Microsoft approached me for GPU-based paint tech development and I accepted their offer. I developed oil and pastel simulator from scratch under the name Project Gustav and the end result became the app Fresh Paint after the project was transferred to another group. (FYI, the watercolor in Fresh Paint wasn’t my work – my manager in the new group asked someone else to work on that even though they knew about my MoXi work.)

In 2011, I left Microsoft and returned to Asia. In 2012, I started working on Expresii, a new incarnation of the old MoXi. I wanted Expresii to be future-proof so I developed a new paradigm that allows a high degree of magnification – you get the best of both worlds of raster and vector. In 2016 we finally made our official release. We’re lucky to get the attention of WACOM senior management saying it’s the best tool for ink painting they’ve ever seen.

Life is short. During my career as a software developer, I was sometimes given the short end of the stick, which may have lost me precious time. I try to contribute as much as I could to the development of new paint tools. I thank all those who supported me along.

More info: expresii.com