HyReZ

My CAD software is Deep Exploration by Right Hemisphere. Out of the few dozen file types that it will import, .BMX files are not one of them. I have a freeware CAD app called FreeCAD. It does not import .BMX files ether.

Ok. I thought that there may some text in those character strings that look like real language that would lead to an app or company name.

Can you open the file with an ascii text editor such as Notepad and see if there is some lead as to what app was use to create it? NOTE: I just found out that some graphics .BMX files are CAD documents .

Screen capture with layers shown

Some .BMX file information: https://filext.com/file-extension/BMX My research indicates that it is like an animated GIF and that it will open in XnView (With on site addon plugin it will read Paint.NET files) https://www.xnview.com/en/

I placed my image that I just posted above over the 7th iteration and erased the jersey so that the bottom layer image jersey was revealed. I then feathered the edges of top layer and merged it down to get this new iteration number 9.

@MJW I had it installed but was not aware of its use. I have just tried it. I does give me an additional set of options. Thanks for the information!

@welshblue After over a dozen layers and about a half dozen effects plugins; this what I came up with after 8 iterations and about 2.5 hours of experimentation and editing down to the pixel level. This is iteration 8. I liked the colors in iteration 7 but the face was not as recognizable. To get this; I used the built-in Adjustments/Hue / Saturation effect on iteration 7, and adjusted the Hue slider by tiny increments to find this final color range. (I am looking for an easier method. This project helped! 🙂)

I just got finished with this one:

I still have this plugin in my Effects folder. (Anaglyph.dll) Here is how I used it on one of mixed media art works. Dig out your anaglyph glasses. (Currently the links are broken for this thread.)

My Posterization:

Although Avedon used solarization and CMYK layering, the Beatles graphic contains a bunch of manipulation and most of it is subjective to the artist and the process and will not be easily achieved with a few settings to a plugin in. It was an artistic endeavor that took time and subjective choices, just as you are now discovering. My advice is not to do Avedon, but to do you! Don't worry about Avedon! He was working in a different mediums, photography and commercial printing technology of the late 1960's. CMYK is about preparing works to be commercially printed. Play with the image and software and make something personal and special. Your work in RGB can be converted to CYMK when it is ready to go to print.

@Hadden Using a vector graphics app for text effect generation is great, but remember once the text is imported into Paint.NET it will become rasterized (converted to pixelized images). Inkscape is the king of free vector graphics apps. (it is also great at vectorizing raster images and that is what I use it for the most.)

Here are links from the Plugin Index that relate to text manipulation. You can install the ones that interest you and apply them on your dedicated text layer. Base 64 filetype 14 Jul 2013null54 Loads and saves Base64 encoded images. Only BMP and PNG format images can be saved. The format of the text file is UTF8. FiletypeActiveUntestedN/ABase64FileType.dll BoltBait's Meme Maker 16 Aug 2016BoltBait Quickly and easily make internet memes by overlayng text with the correct styling. Separate DLL available (3.5.11) or found in BoltBait's plugin pack (4.0.6+)See also: #113220 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > PhotoMemeMaker.dll Buttons 11 Feb 2009MadJik Create beautiful colored buttons with or without text & symbols. Now with border width & text AA. Found in Magical Plugins Megapack.See also: #7186 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > RenderBoutons.dll CSV (comma separated values) Filetype 28 Mar 2015Ego Eram Reputo Saves the image as a text file containing the pixel RGBA information in numeric format. Found in EER's Plugin Pack.See also: #110145 FiletypeActive4.0+N/ACSVFiletype.dll Circle Text 28 Sep 2009dpy Writes text into a circle, or on an angle. Found in dpy's PackSee also: #16643 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > Text FormationsCircleText.dll Circular Text 07 Sep 2018xod Render text as if it was printed in a circle of constant radius. EffectActive4.1+Effects > Text FormationsCircularText.dll Dpy's Pack 26 Oct 2009dpy Effects: Black and Alpha+, Color Balance+, Multi-Threshold, Rotate_Zoom+, Perspective Effect, AA's Assistant, Metallize, Text+, Circle Text, Rotate Text, Spiral Text & Wave Text, Speech Bubble, 1px Expansion, Alpha to 0, Alpha to 255 Plugin PackActive3.5.10N/AN/A Editable Text v1.0 28 May 2008Simon Brown Note: Beta. Alternative text-tool that includes editable text. Works by using Steganography to store the details of the text in the text layer. Formerly: Re-Editable Text (BETA). Found in Simon Brown's Plugin Pack.See also: #15218 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > ToolsEditableText.dll & EditableText.pdb ImageInText 22 Oct 2017xod Creates text mask using the source layer as the text fill, alternatively creates transparent text within the source layer EffectActive4.0.19+Effects > Text FormationsImageInText.dll MyCreaLogo 16 Feb 2017roro69 NB: French language plugin. Creates wordart syle text transformations. Many options. EffectActive4.0.13+Effects > CreaTexteRogers.dll Outlined / Gradient text 21 Feb 2018xod Renders text to the active layer with options to outline and gradient fill the text. EffectActive4.0.21+Effects > Text FormationsOutlinedGradientText.dll Rotate Text 26 Oct 2009dpy Write text to the canvas at an angle. The dll named RotateTextSUI.dll is enhanced for larger displays. Found in dpy's PackSee also: #16643 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > Text FormationsRotateText.dll or RotateTextSUI.dll Spaced Text 08 Mar 2017simmetric Text rendering plugin which supports kerning & line spacing as well as a slew of basic word processing effects. Does not support OTF fonts. Jusitify option added 4 Aug 2017. EffectActive4.0.12+Effects > Text FormationsSpacedTextPlugin.dll & SpacedTextPlugin.pdb Speech Bubble 21 Mar 2010dpy Write speech bubbles and text directly to the canvas. Found in dpy's PackSee also: #16643 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > Text FormationsSpeechBubble.dll Spiral Text ver 1.2 10 Oct 2009dpy Writes text on a spiral. Found in dpy's PackSee also: #16643 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > Text FormationsSpiralText.dll TR's Monolithic (3D Text Generator) 27 Apr 2016TechnoRobbo Creates monolithic (slab-like) text using an installed font as a base. Think word-art for paint.net. Many options include a range of color options, lighting, pitch, yaw and roll, size, zoom, etc… Bug fix release for PDN 4.1.x by toe_head2001 EffectActive4.0.8+Effects > Text FormationsTRsMonolithic.dll Text Pro (free trial) 19 Nov 2009romein Impressive Word Art package for paint.net. Registration is required to remove watermark protection. EffectActive3.5.10Effects >TextPro.dll Text Steganography BETA 18 Jan 2008I Like Pi Encodes hidden text within an image. The plugin is also needed to view the text. Note: Beta status. EffectActiveUntestedEffects > SteganographyTextSteganography.dll Text Window 26 Aug 2015toe_head2001 Renders a string of text to the layer or selection. String can be repeated, offset & a specific font specified. For PDN 3.5 version see post #21 in the thread. EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > Text FormationsTextWindow.dll Text+ 21 Aug 2012dpy Render text specifying line spacing, location, direction, color and font pitch. Useful for when you need precise placement of text. EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > Text FormationsTextplus.dll Wave Text v1.0 25 Oct 2009dpy Writes a string of text along a sine curve. The dll named WaveTextSUI.dll is enhanced for larger displays. Found in dpy's PackSee also: #16643 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > Text FormationsWaveText.dll or WaveTextSUI.dll XY Coords 03 Aug 2007MadJik Creates a grid with the text giving the position of the cell in this grid with X,Y coords. Useful to understand the transformation done by other distort effects. Found in Magical Plugins Megapack.See also: #7186 EffectActive3.5.x, 4.0xEffects > RenderXYCoords.dll toe_head2001's Plugin Pack 10 Jul 2016toe_head2001 Adjustments: SubLCD. Effects: Gaussian Blur (Clamped), Screen Pixel, Blur Fill, Inset Box Shadow, Barcode, Bulletin Board Trim,Coordinate Plane Points, Gingham, Isometric Cuboid, Jigsaw Puzzle, Pie Chart, Postage Stamp, Ruler, Spoked Wheel, Tartan, Tattersall, Two-point Perspective, Radius Corners & Text Window. Available as stand-alone dll's or can be installed with custom exe installer. Plugin PackActive4.0.10+N/AN/A

To deconstruct a GIF animation: Make sure that Simon Brown's AnimGIF.dll is the in File type folder of Paint.NET https://forums.getpaint.net/topic/13454-animated-image-24-agif-apng/ Rename the .GIF extension to .AGIF Open the *.agif file in Paint.NET and it will open each GIF frame as a layer. To create a GIF animation: Here are the basics from midorashttps://forums.getpaint.net/topic/31665-make-an-animated-gif-with-midoras-plugin/

Better is so subjective. Better for what purpose? My purpose was to uncover the process and a creatively utilize it. My tutorial was the deconstruction of the original GIF. When I taught art, my goal was to teach a process, provide advice to learners on how to apply the process, and the synthesis came when the learner effectively could use the process for their own creative ends.

Above in this thread I included a link to a plugin by BoltBait that generates CYMK layers in a process similar to what MJW described Here it is again: https://forums.getpaint.net/topic/3763-rgb-to-cmyk-plugin/

Back In the 1967 Avedon was using photography and industrial printing techniques and his results were experimental. You are trying hit on producing a faithful copy of something that was subjective and serendipitous. I believe that you could achieve something very close to Avedon's Beatles poster effect in Paint.NET, but it may probably be easier to accomplish with an app that supports CMYK. Note: This may be useful when developing your plugin "In digital media Graphs describing solarisation curves typically place input range of tones on the x axis, with black at 0 and white to the right, and the output range of tones on the y axis with black at 0 and white up. A curve then defines the input to output mapping." From: http://www.historygraphicdesign.com/the-modernist-era/the-influence-of-modern-art/1016-solarisation

On that Beatle photo shoot, Avedon shot black and white and made the CMYK layers from a solarized duplicate negative. The rest was trial & error and creative license.

I think some ones wants to rant rather follow the links provided. If the Advanced User is aware of all of the nfo provide in the links, why are we here trying to help? Maybe water isn't the only thing that is all wet! Right click on *.jpg , 'Open with' whatever. Done! Now you can edit images. (No one has time to tweak the registry, but there are a few tutorials out there to help you do it.) Done here! Back to graphics.

@IHaveNoName You have it wrong. I do not use the Windows Picture Viewer and spamme desires a specific default editor. I right click on the image icon and select the 'Open with' option of the context menu. Doing this will open a list of suggested apps for opening your file. If the app that you need does not appear in the list, it can be added with an option that allows you 'Choose another app' by providing a path where the executable resides and selecting it. The next time you use the 'Open with' context menu, you preferred app will appear in the list. (Un-check the Box that will make your new selection a default; it should be added as an option!)

@spamme Open With vs Edit ( you have the open the image to edit it) I use a variety of editors because they have different features so 'Open With' is my usual choice You use one editor, so you want it to appear under Edit In either case it takes milliseconds to select from a right click Your analogy is not applicable here. You also said, "You can't change the defined application in the "edit" option within Windows." Try this to change the default editor: https://www.nextofwindows.com/how-to-easily-change-windows-10-default-photo-editor

Okay, this is my last piece for this thread! 🙂

I also consider myself an advanced user, but I have never been in such a time crunch that I could not right click on an icon, select 'open with' and scroll to the needed app to open my image. I know that you have to jump thru a small hoop in order to have your alternative app available the first time, but it is not a great inconvenience since that are only few graphics apps that I use for image editing.

This is my version: