Fisherman's Friend

I really don't want a plugin folder full of phoning home Dlls. The idea of auto-update-plugins may be interesting, especially for the developer, but as a user I reject it. Besides the fact that it annoys me, it opens a new realm for bugs, freezes and crashes. I suggest to drop the update-idea and -system, and I also request other plugin authors to not adapt the idea. And as a side note, some pictures to show the effects in the first post would be nice and of use.

Would it be possible to change the plugin so that it doesn't discard all the metadata? The point here is: The best use for HD Photo is saving edited Digital Camera pictures. Paint.NET includes a lot of effects for improving the quality of your photos, especially via plugins. Now, if I edit my photos I don't want to loose any quality when saving them. With JPEG, I usually save it in a way that the filesize becomes larger than the original, and still I'm not sure wether I loose quality. With HD Photo, I think, you can keep the quaility and even reduce the filesize. Also, It has a lossless mode. But when I use the plugin, all metadata is lost. :? As Windows 7 supports HDP even more than Vista (for example in Media Center) I ask for an update and also encourage you to include it in Paint.NET. In 7 (and in Vista) it's supported in Windows Explorer, Windows (Live) Photo Gallery, Windows Photo Viewer, Media Center (7) and all WIC applications.

I use this plugin a lot, usually with PNGs. Sadly, there seems to be a bug. Sometimes, directly after the file is saved, the entire apllication freezes. You can't do anything, even the "X" to close Paint.NET doesn't work. Clicking the Paint.NET window results in error sounds. I always have to close Paint.NET via the Task Manager. It happens frequently, but unforseen. There is no crash log, and I also failed to see a pattern in the behaviour. I really have no clue. My system is Vista SP2, x86 Intel. I use the most recent version of Paint.NET. I don't know wether the proplem is limited to me, but I suggest all other users to save all open files in a default format (PNG for single layer, PDN for multi layer files) before you use this filetype plugin. Otherwise you may face data loss. I want to say that I'm very fond of this plugin and will continue to use it in spite of the bug. Thanks.

I assume you accidently deleted Tanel's plugin, which goes by that name. Link

May I suggest moving Polygonal Transparency to the "Object" submenu? I honestly see no use for a new submenu if it includes only one entry. The meaning of submenus should be to produce a clean user interface and to avoid an overcrowded one. We do not know if this submenu is "accepted" like Object, Tools and Color. Considering that general transparency effects rather go in "Adjustments" I see the possibility that half a year in the future this submenu will still feature only one single entry. Now that I mentioned this, I also think a "Transpareny" submenu may confuse the users. By compiling all effects into a single DLL you sadly force me at the moment to either take all of your effects or none, if I don't want the Transparency submenu - both bitter options. Major plugin contributors like Pyrochild, BoltBait, Madjik... therefore provide single DLLs for each effect. In my opinion, you should consider this choice as the best of both worlds.

It is my pleasure to confirm that the plugin seems to work properly now. At least I failed in reproducing the error shown above. Thanks for the quick fix. Just out of interest, did the old version of the plugin use the luminace or RGB based method?

Seconded. But the plugin has a major rendering issue. It happens apparently when you enlarge the image till it is shown larger than the Paint.NET window. As a consequence, the result does not replace the original, it is rendered inside the picture. Original: Plugin used in "window" picture size: Plugin used (same settings) with the picture larger than the window (in my example, I enlarged it to 100% - 1024x768 - with the window around 890x630, the following image shows the result zoomed out to display the effect): Users of Windows Vista and Windows 7 may restore the old plugin version via shadow copies ("previous versions") until a fix is provided. Note that this works only in certain editions. Interested users can use "Help and Support" for further information. Despite any problems I want to say thanks that this plugin is still maintained and updated. Sadly, I do not understand the local maximum/minimum option. The image just turns black or white..?

Eerm... Not meant as any kind of flaming, but isn't this already "built" into Paint.NET? Just save the image with high JPEG compression... :shock:

I suggest that you provide some sample images for mosaic painting in your first post - like those flowers. That will help the users, as they can play around with your plugin and get an impression how it fits their needs. And indeed, this plugin looks amazing. Thanks!

I for one do. HD Photo is at the moment the best choice when saving your file in Paint.NET - as long as you are on Vista or Seven. Combining - and improving - all the advantages of JPEG and PNG, including rich metadata, alpha and lossless mode, HD Photo does the job. One of the few things I looked forward to when I got Vista. JPEG is fail. Without options like GIMP, it produces crappy results even on "100", it has been discussed and shown on this forum. I really don't get why I should spend hours and days on artwork and then save it as ruined file in a format which is actually out of date. OK, I could save as PNG - but can I tag the file? Can I rate it? Do I even see the author? Nope, at least not outside of Photo Gallery. Now I have an OS praised for all the indexing and search stuff, but the PNGs will not show up in my "4 and 5 stars" search folder. With HD Photo, it works. For real, there is no reason why I should save in the worse file format when I have HDP. HDPs need less space while featuring better quality and more possibilities than JPEG. It's just as saving in DOC when you have access to and make use of DOCX (Word 2007). The only thing which matters is the compatibility issue, but I can convert them in seconds. And when Seven launches, many people who didn't want to upgrade from XP to Vista will move on Seven, then being able to view HDPs. Considering it is becoming JPEG XR, I guess all the rest is just a matter of years. Nice job on HD Photo, Microsoft. As a side note: You do not need SP3 in XP for HD Photo. You only need WIC, which is just ONE MB (see yourself) and is installed when you get Windows Live Photo Gallery with all it's features including panorama stitching and people tags. WL Gallery itself opens HDP, being WIC based.

~2500X1900 px, 150dpi.

I recently edited a bunch of digicam photos and encountered one memory error after another using this plugin. I have an x86 PC with 3 GB RAM and my pagefile can expand to at least 6 (?) GB. No other plugin caused problems, it was only this one, and it did it frequently and rather randomly. So I guess there's a mistake in the code. This is one of the exception logs Paint.NET showed when the plugin crashed: Datei: C:\Program Files\Paint.NET\Effects\IncreaseLocalContrast.dll Effektname: MeeSoft.Paint.Net.Plugins.IncreaseLocalContrast.EffectPlugin Vollständige Fehlermeldung: PaintDotNet.WorkerThreadException: Worker thread threw an exception ---> System.OutOfMemoryException: Eine Ausnahme vom Typ "System.OutOfMemoryException" wurde ausgelöst. bei MeeSoft.Mathematics.LinearAlgebra.MatrixFloat32.New(Int32 nRows, Int32 nCols) bei MeeSoft.ImageProcessing.PlanarBitmap.New(Int32 width, Int32 height, Int32 planeCount, Double gamma) bei MeeSoft.ImageProcessing.PlanarBitmap.Assign(Bitmap source) bei MeeSoft.Paint.Net.Plugins.IncreaseLocalContrast.EffectOperation.CheckParams(EffectPluginConfigToken param, Bitmap srcBitmap) bei MeeSoft.Paint.Net.Plugins.IncreaseLocalContrast.EffectPlugin.Render(EffectConfigToken parameters, RenderArgs dstArgs, RenderArgs srcArgs, Rectangle[] rois, Int32 startIndex, Int32 length) bei PaintDotNet.Effects.Effect.Render(EffectConfigToken parameters, RenderArgs dstArgs, RenderArgs srcArgs, Rectangle[] rois) bei PaintDotNet.Effects.BackgroundEffectRenderer.ThreadFunction() --- Ende der internen Ausnahmestapelüberwachung --- bei PaintDotNet.Effects.BackgroundEffectRenderer.Join() bei PaintDotNet.Effects.BackgroundEffectRenderer.Abort() bei PaintDotNet.Menus.EffectMenuBase.DoEffect(Effect effect, EffectConfigToken token, PdnRegion selectedRegion, PdnRegion regionToRender, Surface originalSurface, Exception& exception) In most of the cases the crash occured when pressing the OK button, during the preview it was OK. Also, it was only a "little" error, only the plugin "died", Paint.NET continued to run. It works fine with smaller pics.

Thanks. I'd also ask you to add the publishing date of the current version to your first post, like 2009/03/23, instead of just a version number like 1.0.1.1. It's pretty hard to say if something has changed if it's like 1.0.1.0 to 1.0.1.1. Especially imagine someone has holidays, comes back and cannot tell wether something has changed or not. If you see that the current version was published on, say 09/03/30, you won't have to guess.

I'm afraid there's a rendering bug. I used it on a 1280x8xx image and aftwerwards it looked like it was splited in parts and put together in a wrong way. Apparently it happens when your zoom is set to 100%. The bug was reproduceable, but sometimes you need to look closely.

Could anyone please write the correct string for the Photo submenu? I mean the localizeable version.