Possible plugins

[davidf]

Just wondering if anything like the following plugins already exist (or are in development) ...

1) Watercolor fill

Shading that is kind of "splodgy", like watercolor painting.

2) Object fill

Given a set of objects (surrounded by transparency) -- either from a file or the clipboard -- fill the current selection with non-overlapping (or overlapping if a box is checked) copies of randomly selected objects, possibly with random scaling or rotation.

Not the same thing as "pattern fill"!

(Couldn't find a perfect image to fit this -- close enough!)

3) Crystal growth

(Diffusion limited aggregation).

Grow a fractal-looking structure outwards from a point (or adjacent to a particular color).

4) Skeleton

Find the skeleton (medial axes) of a shape:

http://www.voronoi.c...st_and_Skeleton

(Which could lead to other interesting effects, like shading the different regions in particular ways, or even warping based on adjustments to the skeleton -- just dreaming! I have no idea how to do that).

5) Texture synthesis

Photoshop CS6 has a "content aware fill" ... the following does something like it, but might take too long to run:

http://graphics.cs.c...EfrosLeung.html

6) Stippling

Edit: Done now ... http://forums.getpaint.net/index.php?/topic/25637-stipple-plugin-21st-nov-2012

Weighted Voronoi stippling, described here:

http://mrl.nyu.edu/~...ples-node1.html

7) Search and replace

I know it might sound weird, but it could be handy to be able to erase or modify repeating patterns in an image -- for example, artifacts in a scanned image, or an unwanted background pattern.

Coming up with an interface could be tricky. I am imagining a small grid (16x16?) where each pixel in the target pattern can either be "this color" (with a tolerance?), "anything but this color" or "ignore". It would also be handy to be able to fill the pattern from the clipboard or a file. There would also be an operation for each pixel: "change to this other color", "leave unchanged" and maybe some other unary operation (invert, brighten / darken ...)

Not sure what to do about overlapping matches in the image. Maybe the top / left has priority, and pixels involved in a previous match cannot be involved in second one.

Edit: Maybe not such a weird idea after all - Andrew Glassner designed a (very!) advanced "image search and replace" in 2003 that could change the first image below into the second one:

Edited November 21, 2012 by davidf

[DrewDale]

Looks interesting, not seen anything like this on my journey through here, would love to see what you have on this theme

[yellowman]

The Object Fill reminds of this:

But to me is not user friendly, I like something simpler

And a closer to Stippling is the Halftone?

The Crystal growth and the skeleton are great ideas, especially the Skeleton for text effect, I don't remember we have something similar to both.

Edited November 17, 2012 by yellowman

[davidf]

The Object Fill reminds of this:

http://forums.getpai...e-paint-plugin/

But to me is not user friendly, I like something simpler

Yeah, that's a slightly different idea.

This is the kind of interface I was thinking of:

The input file (or clipboard contents) is assumed to contain one or more objects surrounded by fully transparent pixels.

"Tiled" means that objects can be partially drawn on one edge and continued on the opposite edge.

(Maybe there should also be a checkbox called "avoid edges" to forbid partially drawn objects when it isn't tiled).

A spacing of zero means "touching", negative means overlapping, positive means far apart (1.0 = the width of the object).

The Crystal growth and the skeleton are great ideas, especially the Skeleton for text effect, I don't remember we have something similar to both.

Looking through the list of existing plugins, the only one I can see that does text effects (other than drawing along a spiral etc.) is this one:

Text Pro - http://forums.getpai...showtopic=17056

Have I missed any other plugins that change the appearance of text?

By the way, these are all just ideas -- I'm not "reserving" any of them, so feel free to implement if they inspire anyone.

Edited November 18, 2012 by davidf

[BoltBait]

If you can read a bitmap off the clipboard with transparent pixels, I'd be impressed.

I can't seem to figure out how to do it.

When you figure this out, I'd love it if you could correct the code listed on this page:

http://boltbait.com/pdn/CodeLab/help/tutorial4.php

...under the "Clipboard" heading.

[davidf]

If you can read a bitmap off the clipboard with transparent pixels, I'd be impressed.

I can't seem to figure out how to do it.

Eek. Thanks for the warning!

The following page looks potentially useful, but I haven't tried anything out from it yet:

http://stackoverflow...lpha-channel-in

It does get me wondering how Paint.net itself handles the alpha channel when you copy and paste a selection ...

Edited November 18, 2012 by davidf

[BoltBait]

If you search around the web, I'm sure you can find the source code to Paint.NET... an older version, but it should still have all the clipboard stuff in it.

6) Stippling

Weighted voronoi stippling, described here:

http://mrl.nyu.edu/~...ples-node1.html

I would love to see this.

[Ego Eram Reputo]

I think we have something very similar...

[davidf]

I think we have something very similar... http://forums.getpai...-17th-oct-2012/

Well, that's a plugin I made too, but I like the idea of variable size circles instead of just pixel sized dots.

Here's another example (before & after stipplig):

[BoltBait]

I believe stippling uses fixed sized dots.

[davidf]

I believe stippling uses fixed sized dots.

Good point (and the original image I showed had fixed size dots) -- though I like the look of the variable sized dots too.

[BoltBait]

Variable sized dots is for halftoning. Which we already have a nice plugin for in Ed Harvey's pack.

[null54]

It does get me wondering how Paint.net itself handles the alpha channel when you copy and paste a selection ...

It uses an internal format (MaskedSurface), the remaining formats on the clipboard do not have transparency.

[midora]

There are DIB formats which allow transparency but they are not really supported by applications.

As I understood, Rick may add the PNG clipboard format in the future. Means good packing rate and support for transparency.

Regarding possible plugins. I did once a plugin which calculates and marks the balance point of a shape. I'm not sure if the method to do this kind of calculation is simular to Skeleton.

[davidf]

OK, I've implemented Stipple now (using fixed sized dots, to make boltbait happy!) ...

http://forums.getpai...n-21st-nov-2012

It doesn't use quite the same algorithm as in the document mentioned in this thread, though (Weighted Voronoi Stippling) -- instead, it uses something like the COFI (Circle of Influence) algorithm, starting with the darkest areas & excluding an increasingly large circle around it as it continues to the lighter pixels.

Edited November 21, 2012 by davidf

[davidf]

Added another idea to the first post in this thread - 7) Search and replace.

[doughty]

If you can create a plug-in that can add text to an image something like this:

That would be nice.

Online Mac app: http://textify.it/

********************************************

This was done with a Java applet downloaded from here: http://lapin-bleu.ne...textorizer-old/

Source code available.

Please forgive if this isn't posted in the right place.

Edited November 24, 2012 by doughty