[ANN] "Imagedata Toolkit Preview 3" released

[Wilhelm Sanke]

On Fri Mar 30, 2007, Sivakatirswami katir at hindu.org wrote:

> Aloha, Wilhelm:
>
> Well this is certainly very, very impressive.   It will be interesting
> to see how this runs on my new 17 in Intel MacBook Pro...
>
> Only one problem: My photo processing needs are rather "prosaic" as
> I'm working in a production environment where I have to take
> a lot of incoming Digital camera images and do a simply chore:
>
> 1) downsize for web, bicubic (now available by setting the imageQuality
> setting
> and I've tested and it really works, quality is tops)
> 2) run auto levels
> 3) unsharp mask to a prespecified set of values.
>
> I would rarely, if ever use any of the "art" functions of your suite...
>
> Right now I usie  droplets to drive Adobe's ImageReady, but I would really
> love to be able to do this from inside revolution. But your interface
> is a bit daunting and I'm not sure how I can extract a small subset
> of functions from your tool kit to set up a lean automated work flow.
>
> I'll look into the scripts and see if there is any way to ferret out
> extraction
> of specific routines... but any advice you have before I start hacking
> this thing will not doubt be useful.
>
> It certainly is encouraging that this is now even possible (I was going to
> start cracking open the docs on Core Image , but not looking forward 
> to it)
>
> Sivakatirswami


There are currently 3 versions of "unsharp mask" filters to be found in 
the "Imagedata Toolkits":

A 5x5-matrix filter  in version 2 of the toolkit which I took from 
"photo.net" and ported to Revolution

<http://www.sanke.org/Software/ImagedataToolkit.zip>

and two 3x3-matrix filters in version 3 of the toolkit - with some 
changes as of today -

<http://www.sanke.org/Software/ImagedataToolkitPreview3.zip>.

I no longer include the group with the 5x5 matrix options in version 3 
because the execution of the filter script takes about 20 seconds (2 GHz 
Windows computer) as there is not yet a suitable dll-external. I would 
be very grateful if anybody is out there who is able to blow up the 
existing 3x3-matrix external to 5x5 according to my proposals.

The two 3x3-matrix unsharp filters (toolkit 3 - newest version of April 
3) can make use of Derek Bump's "convolve.dll", which is included in the 
zip-file. Execution time for 640x480 images is about 180 milliseconds 
and somewhat longer when applied to larger pictures.
I computed the matrix values for the 3x3 filters on the basis of the 5x5 
filter above.

The quality of all 3 unsharp-mask filters is at least as good and 
certainly better than the default setting of the unsharp mask of 
Paintshop Pro, but with Paintshop you can set certain parameters whereas 
with my toolkit you must experiment with the matrix values (this is 
possible) to find other configurations (which you can then save as a 
user-defined filter).

If you want to extract the necessary scripts from the "Imagedata 
Toolkit" you need the following parts:

- convolve.dll
- button "apply Windows DLL (DB)" to launch the DLL or
- button "apply scripted version" not using the dll (execution time 
about 7 seconds) needed for MacOS and other platforms
- button "remove borders 5" to remove the black borders produced by the 
DLL (the script of this correcting button must be slightly changed as it 
is meant for a fixed image size of 640X480, but it is relatively easy to 
adapt  to "any" size).
- then of cause the scripts of buttons "unsharp mask" and "unsharp mask 
2" (hidden) that put the values into the matrix field.

For batch processing it would be advisable to combine these scripts into 
a single or two buttons and especially to remove the intermediate matrix 
field - you could place the matrix values directly into the "apply" buttons.

If you think exploring these unsharp filters is worthwhile and you would 
need any support I would be happy to provide it.

Best regards,

Wilhelm Sanke
<http://www.sanke.org/MetaMedia>