The user interface allows multiple documents to be opened at the same
time. The drawing canvas can be both zoomed and rotated using the
sliders on the navigator or the hotkeys configured on the keyboard. The
toolbar on the top part of the screen also includes a button to mirror
the drawing view without mirroring the actual drawing. It is also
possible to open multiple viewports to the same document. An
application-wide scratchpad (which can be used as a color mixing panel)
is provided, which is saved between sessions. Colors can be stored in
the swatches panel.
Various raster drawing tools are implemented, such as the Airbrush,
Watercolor, Pen, and Marker, which can all be easily customized, and
stored in slots in the user interface of the application. There is also a
set of vector drawing tools intended for inking, which, like the raster
tools, can be configured to be pen pressure sensitive. However, the
vector tools are not affected by selections, and therefore need to be
adjusted by other vector tools.
Work can be done on separate layers, which can be grouped and have
opacity masks. In addition to this, layers can be masked by clipping
them to a lower layer. This allows one to add shading and highlights to
an area without creating new masks for the additional layers.
There is also a pen movement and pressure smoothing feature which can be manually configured as to how much effect it has.
Selection tools include the simple square selection, the lasso, and magic wand, which can be configured for anti-aliasing. There is also a selection brush tool, which can be customized like the drawing brush.
Some common features that exist in similar software, such as text
layers, gradients, and shape tools, are not implemented, as SAI focuses
on drawing and painting, while the final composition is often done using
another application. SAI displays white and transparency in the same
way, which may cause significant display differences when exporting to
another program, such as Adobe Photoshop. There is also no printing
functionality, but documents can be exported in a range of popular
formats, such as .PSD or .BMP files, in addition to the native .SAI format.
Because the program does not focus on image editing, the only adjustments present are Brightness/Contrast and Hue/Saturation,
and therefore no support of level editing, channel extraction, etc.
Users may use another program for more complex editing, but when the
image is brought back to SAI, its properties may be changed.
Программа Небольшая по размеру программа, стартующая за считанные секунды; Полная поддержка графического планшета; Большая скорость работы; Почти все горячие клавиши взяты из Adobe Photoshop плюс свои сочетания; Сглаживание пера и высокая интерполяция штриха; Поворот холста; Высокое качество рендеринга картинки; Поддерживаемые типы файлов .psd (стандартный тип файлов Adobe Photoshop) .sai (свой собственный тип) .jpg .bmp .png
