It was originally written by William Snider, published bySilicon Beach Software (which was acquired byAldus Corporation in 1990), and released in 1986 for theApple Macintosh. William Snider wrote and designed the program from his house on anApple Lisa inPascal. It was the only program that outsold Silicon Beach'sDark Castle games, but SuperPaint was much more lucrative for the company,[3] representing about 70% of the revenue.[4] The program and packaging was also localized into Japanese.[5]
Version 1.0, released in 1986, has a fixed-position user interface with palettes arranged on the left and bottom edges of the screen. IncludesLaserBits 300dpi editing mode[7] and the ability to print in color despite only being able to display inblack & white.[8]
1.1, released in 1988, included theSuperConvert app to convert to/fromLaserBits;[9] was bundled withMicrosoft Word 4.0 for Macintosh in 1990.[10]
2.0, released in 1989, introduced many new features including: AutoTrace,SuperBits (formerlyLaserBits), freehand Bézier tool, multi-page documents, rich text in text blocks, rotation and transformations,plug-ins, a multi-palette user interface, custom tools in the paint palette.[11][12][13]
3.0, released in 1991, was a major revision that added many extra features, most notably color support, but also image enhancement functions and texture fills; hotkeys were revamped to simplify the interface;[14][15] tear-off palettes.[16]
3.5, released in 1993, brought support forSystem 7, copy brush tool, several other new drawing tools including some that are pressure sensitive,[17] expanded importing capability including still frames from QuickTime.[18] This was the final version of the app.
Later versions were published by Aldus after their 1990 acquisition ofSilicon Beach Software. The application continued to be sold byAdobe after their 1994 takeover of Aldus.[19]
In 1988, alongside version 1.1, anSDK (software development kit) was released that allowed the creation of software plug-ins to add features and capabilities to SuperPaint.[20][21]
Many plugins were created and shared, including some that added support for pressure-sensitive pens such as those made byWacom.[22]
Artist Richard Bolam used images drawn using Aldus SuperPaint in the 1990s as part of his "Bolam at 50" exhibition in 2014.[23]Naoki Yamamoto is seen using SuperPaint in the DocumentaryUrasawa Naoki no Manben in season 4, episode 3 (broadcast in 2017).[24][25]
