Isometric Grid Photo Mosaic 2

 

Isometric Grid Photo Mosaic

 

I used the new isometric grid vectorizer options to build a vectorizer embed isometric grid photo mosaic image in the paint synthesizer.

Block Coloring Experiment

 

I'm color palette mapping the individual brush load blocks using the preV6 Ip Op Brush Load feature.  Fixed color palette above, adaptive color palette synthesis for each block below.

The adaptive color palette for each path start feature has actually been around for awhile in Paint Color Source control panel.  I added some additional adaptive synthesis options to it.  Pretty obscure feature most people probably don't know about, but actually pretty useful when you approach using it this way.

Resynthesis Bansky Photo Mosaic

 

The banksy resynthesis output used as an image folder brush for a photo mosaic with brush load recoloring.  Simple experiment, but it gave me an idea for a new brush load coloring option that would be cool to add to the paint synthesizer.

After thinking about it for a minute i realized you can already use some of the new and old pre_V6 features to get part what to what i was thinking about for a new colorization option.

Even closer (still using existing features).  The paint synthesizer is very versatile if you take the time to configure it to your whims.

Movie Mosaic Experiment 4

 

As promised, i added a new feature to pre_V6 so that you can work with free running movies by just dropping them in a folder and using them in an image folder brush.  Constructing a sub-nested stack of movies in a single movie brush is pretty tedious, so if you don't need 2D index modulation for some specific purpose this new approach is way easier to work with.

Quick second test with free running movies via image folder brush in a simple time particle paint preset.

Movie Mosaic Experiment 3

 

I reworked a few ass-backwards bug issues in the 2D index modulation for movie brushes that apparently fell through the cracks in V5.5 testing.  So this run is using AnimFrame Cycle Fwd for 2D Mod A and RGB Mapping for 2D Mod B.  Which is how you would really want to specify it if you want the back to back movie sections in the single movie brush to RGB map into a specific sub movie for coloring (the B axis modulation) and the frame advance within that specific sub movie (the A axis modulation).

It would be ideal to speed up how this whole things works, and add a few more feature options to make it more flexible, so that will happen today.

Now that things are working properly again with 2D modulation, you can run some wacky experiments like the one shown above, with 2D Mod A =  RGB Mapping, 2D Mod B = Lum, and the Attribute Index remapped using the Luminance option.  The attribute index remapping trashes the sub ordering of the 44 sub movies stacked end to end across the movie brush, since all of the movie frames in the entire movie brush are luminance indexed now.  The B modulation luminance indexes into a specific 100 frame sub segment of the luminance mapped frames, and the A RGB modulation runs through those 100 remapped frame images and picks the best one for the local coloring.

If you swap the A-B modulation indexing for the first photo mosaic setup shown at the top of this post, this is the correct behavior you now get.  We're using A = RGB Mapping and B = AnimFrame Cycle Fwd.  The B indexing is moving through the sub movies one by one, and the A indexing selects the best frame in the sub movie to represent the coloring of a local area.  I just ran a few frames in the movie below to get across what i'm talking about.

Movie Mosaic Experiment 2

 

Normal movie brush running with the animation frame indexing in a paint synthesizer mosaic preset.  The movie brush is used as a source brush to apply solid paint to the canvas as opposed to the previous example where the movie frames were the paint nibs.  

Below is the same movie brush used in a time particle preset.

Movie Mosaic Experiment

 

Experiment using 2D index modulation with an interleaved movie brush setup so that the individual movie frame advance in the photo mosaic.  The old ArtMapper program let you do this kind of thing as one of its more advanced features, and a question came up on the Studio Artist User Forum about emulating it in V5.5.  44 different movies of 100 frames each  back to back in a 4400 frame movie brush.  I'm going to add a new feature to pre_V6 to make this kind of thing trivial to construct and experiment with, since this old 2D index modulation approach is pretty tedious to put together.

Image Folder Background Texture -EBM tiling experiment 3

 

Sometimes i find the more abstract renditions with this effect to be more artistically appealing than the ones that are truer to the source.

Image Folder Background Texture -EBM tiling experiment 2

 

Image Folder Background Texture -EBM tiling experiment

 

Image Brush Region Fill -internal rotation modulation option

 

Someone on the Studio Artist user forum asked for the ability to rotate the images in an image brush 'region fill as bruh' fill, where the images would rotate and also completely fill the complete original region shapes.  It's in the pre_V6 code base now.

Turned on the EBM source error minimizer and let it run a few passes with random brush indexing and random brush orientation modulation using a watershed path start regionizer.

Image Folder Background Texture workout 3

 

Configured the PASeq preset to make it more of a progressive scaling regular tiling kind of thing.  The PASeq has 11 paint action steps using the same background texture, which is a great example of how the new QuickEdit command to retarget the image folder background texture opens up a lot of new experimentation.  One QuickEdit as opposed to 11 manual action step edits.

Tried out movie processing with it for laughs below.

Image Folder Background Texture workout 2

 

Besties

 

Tightening up a photo mosaic geometry

 

Debugging a users photo mosaic issue in Studio Artist V5.5.  So the trick for this kind of thing if you care about having an absolutely rigid geometry is to use the Selection Override option for the region as Brush Mode Generator as seen below.

And of course you need to make sure you are using the Each Region as Mask option for the Region Mask Opt in the Path Shape control panel as seen below.

When you set it up this way, then each painted region is directly generated from the set of Path Start Regionize (as defined in the Path Start control panel) regions.

The normal paint synth pathways will take the individual regions, try to fit some kind of path to or in them based on the Path Shape control panel settings, then convert that path back to a raster region again for the actual Region Fill as Brush pen mode paint fill.  Remember, Region Fill as Brush pen mode subverts the normal 'paint a series of paint nibs along the path' approach to painting and paints the entire path as one temporary virtual brush nib.

And the paths generated by the Path Shape control panel settings might try to match the outline of the region, or fill it with hatching or other fill patterns, and of course could be modulated or inhibited by a million different possible settings in the paint synthesizer.  This can introduce some subtle (or not so subtle) changes to the rigid geometry of this particular sub-nested tiling setup.

Using the Selection Override option for the generating the virtual brush nib for the painting region avoids any issues with the 'region to path back to region' process.  So you absolutely maintain the original rigid geometry for the virtual brush nib fill.

Boom time for gun retailers

Reports show an unprecedented surge in gun sales over the past few weeks. Yes, i do like my AM and PM respective slogs. Thanks to The Stranger for continuing their reporting after massive staff cuts.

The Process of DeEvolution

Or is it transmutation. 

Or transformation. 

Or just a process of degradation.

Someone Tweeted

Added some new features to make this kind of thing ridiculously easy to generate. Like it literally could not be any easier to do now. But you can still go in under the hood of the paint synthesizer to tweak away to your hearts content if you want to. But if you don't want to get under the hood at all, you can just do it extremely easily.

Hand Tool

Simple approach to using a movie brush. Max Path Length set to 1 so each paint stroke lays down a single nib of paint. Movie brush for the Brush Source. RGB Color mapping for the movie brush indexing. Then let it rip with auto paint.