The Crash

I started by using the ReInitialize paint synth macro edit command to generate a generic smooth tube paint. I then used the Default Dynamic Paint Regionize Edit macro paint synth edit command to convert that generic soft paint into a rather sophisticated dynamic brush paint effect.

I then went to Path Start control panel and tweaked the settings associated with the path start regionizer. I boosted the Max Stroke setting to generate more regions, turned on Smart Start to use the facial feature detection, and messed with a few other paint synthesizer settings to dial in what i wanted for the particular source image i was using.

I also used the Make Paint Wet 1 macro paint synth edit command to make the dynamic paint have wet mixing properties.

Then ran that multiple times without erasing the previous paint cycle to build up a nice smeary paint image. Then started working with enhancement effects like smooth, sharpen, lighting gradients at multiple resolutions and very small Mix settings. Then worked with some Rank Edge ip op effects again with small Mix settings and different Composite algorithms to add some more structure into the dark areas of the painting.

So i'm compositing directly into a single layer throughout all of this, as opposed to building up 100 layers of different stacked effects and never making a final decision like in some other image processing programs.