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Free Software Alternatives to Adobe CS6

Tuesday, May 14th, 2013

Adobe CS6 Alternatives
Adobe CS6 Alternatives

In 2012 Adobe released CS6. What set this release apart from previous versions was the licensing path that Adobe has chosen. For more information about the Adobe Creative Cloud model, see Adobe’s Creative Cloud FAQ.

While I have been using Photoshop since Photoshop 5, it wasn’t until CS4 was released that I bought my first full Adobe suite. Adobe Design Premium CS4 included:

  • Acrobat 9 Professional – for PDF creation
  • Dreamweaver CS4 – for web site creation
  • Fireworks CS4 – preproduction and mockup for web page creation (combines Dreamweaver and Photoshop features)
  • Flash CS4 Professional – Flash creation
  • Illustrator CS4 – for creating vector graphics and for graphic design
  • InDesign CS4 – for desktop publishing
  • Photoshop CS4 Extended – Photoshop with 3D capabilities

Of the programs that make up the Design Premium suite, Photoshop is where I live and is the application which I am most qualified to comment on. I must say that I have become increasingly disenchanted with Adobe’s approach to the software/graphics market. This has strongly influenced my decision as to whether or not to continue to upgrade my Adobe products. From one review of CS6 we have this summation:

"No creative professional will deny the need for Adobe Creative Suite, and 2012′s version, CS6, focuses on some of the toughest demands designers face in an interactive, digital, multimedia landscape."

From a corporate perspective, that is probably true. Once upon a time you could not get criticized if you bought IBM products. With the advent of the desktop computer, Microsoft became the safe buy. With respect to visual creative software, Adobe holds the corporate safe to buy crown. But I am not a corporation. Nor do I have the deep pockets that would allow me to continue to ride the Adobe Upgrade Train.

So this article is for those who are in search of an alternative to Adobe. For this article, I am only going to look at those alternatives that are free. However, I am not going to do this for every program that is a part of the Design Premium package – just those that I use.

Acrobat 9 Professional

When it comes to creating PDFs, I have never had to make use of the advanced features provided by Acrobat. Instead I have found the capabilities of OpenOffice/LibreOffice Writer’s Export to PDF function to be sufficient for my needs. I will note that Acrobat has come in quite handy when it comes to editing PDFs that I did not create.

If all you need is to create simple PDF versions of documents you’ve created then I suggest using Writer – which is available as a tool in either OpenOffice or LibreOffice.

Dreamweaver CS4

While I have experimented with using Dreamweaver as a web site creation tool, I’ve always had a certain disdain for WYSIWYG web site creation tools. Once upon a time I used NetObjects Fusion professionally. If Microsoft FrontPage was a nightmare, then Fusion was a dream. But I never opted to use Fusion for my personal web sites. I much preferred the hand-coded approach – and still do. As the focus of this article is on graphic software, I will comment no further on Dreamweaver.

Fireworks CS4

Fireworks I’ve used a couple times just to give its web page creation tools a try. As I am not engaged in web design as a full time professional pursuit, I was unwilling to devote time to learning how to use this software, preferring to create quick graphic mockups in Photoshop.

Flash CS4 Professional

I confess that I have never even opened the Flash application. I have never had an interest in using Flash to create digital art and as a web designer have deliberately avoided using Flash for the web sites I’ve done – a strategy that in hindsight appears to have been the right one to follow. So no recommendations here.

Illustrator CS4

I’ve never been much of an Illustrator user so am not really qualified to testify on its strengths and/or weaknesses. All I can say is that it has worked for me when I’ve needed it.

As to free alternative vector software it seems that Inkscape is the most popular option. It is worth noting that Draw, which is another of the software components of both OpenOffice and LibreOffice, is also used to produce vector-based art and diagrams. Draw is the one component of OpenOffice/LibreOffice that I have never used. (Note that my chief reason for migrating from Microsoft Office to OpenOffice was that I viewed OO Impress as a superior product to MS Powerpoint at that point in time). Inkscape is available for the Linux, Mac, and Windows platforms.

Inkscape – inkscape.org

InDesign CS4

My use of InDesign has been minimal. For the most part the documents I create are simple enough in terms of layout that they can be created in OpenOffice/LibreOffice Writer. However, for people who need the capabilities of a desktop publishing (DTP) application then Scribus is worth a look. This free software is available for the Linux, Mac, and Windows platforms. Oh – it is amazingly enough also available for those running OS/2 Warp (my favorite operating system of all time!).

Scribus – http://www.scribus.net/canvas/Scribus

Photoshop CS4 Extended

Photoshop – the software I love to hate due to its frequent crashes and operational glitches. I must say that it seemed to me that each new version of Photoshop crashed more often than the previous version. I was able to eliminate many of the crashes with CS4 by turning off all OpenGL features – which has the unfortunate side effect of reducing Photoshop’s functionality – but I prefer losing features to losing work!

As to free alternatives to Photoshop, there are many. The oldest and most well known of the free alternatives is GIMP. My use of GIMP has been limited but fruitful. My main problem with GIMP is that I would have to learn the GIMP way of doing things. Having used Photoshop for so long, I just know how to do what I want to do without having to think about it. Migrating to new software is always painful in that time must be spent in learning both the GUI and the tools. GIMP is available for the Linux, Mac, and Windows platforms.
GIMP – www.gimp.org

It is not just photographers using Photoshop, but artists as well. Photoshop’s paint brush engine is quite powerful and allows artists to create many painterly effects – serving as a challenge to Corel Painter. One of the free, open source painting software alternatives is Krita. Krita started out as KImageShop, a component of KOffice, a free open source office suite, which was available for Linux, Mac, and Windows. Calligra has apparently stopped development on KOffice (2012) which does not impact Krita. The next version of Krita, 2.7, is expected to be released next month.

Krita is available for Linux and Windows with a beta version available for Mac OS/X. Windows users note that the "highly experimental MSI installer" installs the entire Calligra Suite which includes the applications Words, Stage and Sheets, Flow, Braindump, Karbon and Krita.
Krita – krita.org

Another free open source painting program for artists is MyPaint which is available for the Linux and Windows platforms. What I find appealing is this part of the site’s description of their software: "MyPaint supports pressure or tilt sensitive graphic tablets and comes with an easy-to-use brush collection. There is a complex interface for creating your own brushes, focusing on brush dynamics (changes with speed, pressure, randomly)" Creating my own brushes is one of the Photoshop features that I regularly use so this capability is a must for me.
MyPaint – mypaint.intilinux.com

Adobe Camera Raw

While not listed as a separate product, Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) played a big part in my decision to upgrade from CS to CS4. Adobe did a great job with ACR. In my opinion, it was the best modification made to what was a part of my core work flow as I do a lot of digital photography.

For photographers who are looking for a free alternative to Adobe Camera Raw, one product that is highly rated is RawTherapee which is available for the Linux, Mac, and Windows platforms.

RawTherapee – rawtherapee.com

In Summary

For me, the hardest part of migrating to new software is the loss of knowledge and experience I acquired using my current software. When I started with Photoshop there really were no good alternatives out there. For my money, I prefer to stick with my CS4 software vs upgrading to CS6 or migrating to alternative solutions. However I do anticipate the arrival of a day when I judge some free alternative to my Photoshop CS4 to be of superior quality.

In closing, for artists or photographers who are just starting out and do not have a history of using Adobe products to consider and are not seeking employment that requires a knowledge of Adobe products, this is a great time to investigate the many free software options that are available to you.

Happy Computing, Jim

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Free Software Downloads: Bryce, Daz Studio, and Hexagon

Monday, February 6th, 2012

Bryce, Hexagon, DAZ Studio Free Download
Bryce, Hexagon, DAZ Studio Free Download

Saturday I learned that DAZ (Digital Art Zone) is making available the following software as free downloads until February 29:

  • Bryce 7 Pro 3D Landscape Software (retail price $249.95)
  • Hexagon 2.5 3D Modeling Software (retail price $149.95)
  • DAZ Studio 4 Pro 3D Software (Winner of 3D World’s 2011 Software Innovation of the Year Award) (retail price $429.95)
  • 3D Photoshop Bridge (retail price $199.00)

In addition there are a number of free models and textures available as well. The total retail price of the basket of software, models, and textures that I downloaded was $1,350. The one requirement is that you subscribe to their newsletter – meaning you give them your email address.

Note that your order will show up in the Available Downloads link from your Account Dashboard and that you are allowed 4 downloads of each product you have ordered. The serial numbers for your software are retrieved separately via the Available Serial Numbers link. All downloads are in the form of executable files. The largest downloads are:

  • Bryce 7 Content – 670 meg
  • Daz Studio 4 32-bit – 441 meg
  • Daz Studio 4 64-bit – 439 meg
  • Bryce 7 Pro – 254 meg

I’ve never used Hexagon or DAZ Studio Pro but Bryce was the first 3D software I ever used – back when it was version 3. I haven’t used it in years but I still have a large collection of Bryce files and it would be nice to perhaps resurrect some of them. The name is taken from Bryce Canyon, which I had the pleasure of visiting a few years ago (there’s a photo of me at Bryce on the bottom of my home page). The first version of Bryce was released as a Mac only product in 1994. Version 3.1 of Bryce 3D was released in 1997 by MetaCreations Corporation – this was when I first purchased Bryce. Bryce was acquired by the Corel Corporation in 2000 who released version 5 of Bryce in 2001. Bryce was sold to DAZ in 2004 who has gone on to release versions 5.5 and 6.0 with Bryce 7 being released in 2010. Bryce 3D has always been looked down upon as a package for newbies with limited capabilities. While these criticisms are true, it’s important to remember that for many digital artists, Bryce was what opened the door for them to explore the world of 3D graphics software. It’s low price and easy-to-learn interface made it a perfect software solution for those digital artists looking to get their feet wet.

Hexagon is a tool for creating 3D models. According to the DAZ web site:

Hexagon delivers all the tools a graphic artist needs to create detailed 3D models ready for final render. Packed with features such as; DAZ Studio Bridge, sculpted primitives, freehand modeling brushes, micro-displacement modeling tools, comprehensive UV-mapping modules, advanced 3D paint, and instant ambient occlusion. Hexagon provides you with all the options of expensive competitor software, but at an affordable price.

I’m not sure what to make of 3D Photoshop Bridge. The DAZ web site describes it as a " DAZ Studio plug-in designed to connect the power of Photoshop with the unlimited content possibilities of DAZ Studio. It’s the next step to maximizing your creativity. It will also save you money by eliminating the need for costly photo shoots and stock imagery, save you time with quicker rendering, and save your brain by swiftly and easily integrating the best features of DAZ Studio and Photoshop…Easily pose characters and objects three-dimensionally with the 3D Photoshop Bridge while in DAZ Studio,"

Of course it would help if I knew more about Daz Studio. In this case, download first then investigate was my motto. According to DAZ:

DAZ Studio is a feature rich 3D figure customization, posing, and animation tool that enables anyone to create stunning digital illustrations and animations. DAZ Studio is the perfect tool to design unique digital art and animations using virtual people, animals, props, vehicles, accessories, environments and more. Simply select your subject and/or setting, arrange accessories, setup lighting, and begin creating beautiful artwork.

The free 3D software is available via download only from DAZ3D.com between now and February 29, 2012:

http://www.daz3d.com/i/3d/free-3d-software-overview

Product Links:

Note that there are a number of video tutorials available for Bryce, Hexagon, and DAZ Studio on YouTube.

Here’s to happy and creative computing. Jim

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Tweet A Processing Sketch

Thursday, December 9th, 2010

Processing Sketch
A Processing sketch to illustrate this post

If you check out my Twitter account (http://twitter.com/digitalart), you will note that in the past I created a limerick that fit within the 140 character limit Twitter imposes.

A while back there was a Processing Tiny Sketch Competition in which the Processing community was challenged to create a complete Processing sketch with a 200 character limit for the Processing program. That contest was hosted by Rhizome (you can visit my Rhizome account).

This got me to thinking: what about creating a Processing sketch that could be tweeted. If you haven’t heard of Processing, it is an open source programming language and environment for people who want to create images, animations, and interactions. Processing is built on Java and the Java programming language is available to Processing users. It’s a wonderful programming environment for artists and programmers alike. You can see what many folks have done with Processing at the OpenProcessing web site.

So my challenge to myself was to write an entire Processing program using less than 140 characters and I wanted the resulting image to be dynamic rather than a static. Fortunately Processing is quite flexible and there are a number of ways to shrink a program. Before explaining my methodology, here is the full unshortened version of the Processing program source code:

// declare integer variables
int x;    // x for horizontal pixel coordinate
int y;    // y for vertical pixel coordinate
int r=100;// r holds default screen size
 
// Setup() function is executed once at program start
void setup() {
  size(100,100); // Set the screen size
  background(0); // Set background color to black
}
 
// The draw() function executes continuously
void draw() {
  // Cycle through every value of x
  for(x=0;x<r;x++) {
   // For each x, cycle through every value of y
   for(y=0;y<r;y++) {
     // Set the pixel at x,y to the specified color
     set(x,y,color(frameCount*r*sin(frameCount*x),
             20*r*cos(frameCount*y),
             r*frameCount*cos(x))); 
   }
 }
}

And here is the Twitter optimized version:


int x,y,r=100,t=1;void draw(){for(x=0;x<r;x++)for(y=0;y<r;y++)set(x,y,color(t*r*sin(t*x),20*r*cos(t*y),
r*t*cos(x)));t++;}

The program is just 121 characters long. I’ve named this program Scottish Tartan as the output resembles a tartan. There’s a nice tie in as I am part-Scottish via the Campbell clan. Other than omitting the comments and crlfs (carriage return line feeds), there are functionally only two differences in the two programs.

  1. I deleted the setup() function because it is optional. It is used to initialize various parameters and options and is executed just once. By removing it:
    * the canvas will default to a size that is 100 pixels wide (the x dimension) by 100 pixels tall (the y dimension).
    * the background color will default to gray.
    * the colorMode will default to RGB with 256 possible values for each color.
  2. I replaced the system variable frameCount with my own variable t. The frameCount variable is incremented each time the draw() function is executed. Substituting my own variable t saves characters.

Other strategies to shorten the program were to:

  • Keep variable names to one character (x,y,r,t)
  • Use the increment operator t++; instead of t=t+1;
  • Eliminate unnecessary for statement brackets

See the Processing program as a Twitter tweet

If you want to see what the program actually does you will need to download and install Processing. Installation is straight forward and best of all it’s free. Why not give it a try. Visit http://processing.org/ for more information and to download Processing.

Processing Books

There are a number of books that have been written about how to use Processing to create images, animations, etc. Following are books that I recommend – based on the fact that I’ve bought and used them.

In addition to the books listed above, there is a new book out on Processing that was released in August 2010. I do not have this book so can not comment on it. You may want to investigate for yourself. The book is Processing for Visual Artists: How to Create Expressive Images and Interactive Art

Merry Christmas everyone, Jim

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New Wacom Tablet: Intuos4

Saturday, March 28th, 2009

Wacom Intuos4
Wacom Intuos4 Medium

Wacom has just released its new line of pen tablets – the Intuos4.  From the product write ups it looks like it might be time for me to upgrade. I currently use an Intuos2 tablet with my desktop for all my “real” graphics work. My Intuos2 was an upgrade from an older, smaller Graphire tablet which I still use on occasion with my laptop at home and when traveling.

I must say that once I started using a pen and tablet combination for my graphics work, any time I went back to use my mouse it seemed like a giant leap backward. For the Intuos4 it looks like the biggest advances have been made in the areas of pen sensitivity and responsiveness – the very features that attracted me to the Wacom tablet in the first place. If you have never used a pen and tablet in your graphics work, take this test. First, with a pencil and paper write in cursive your signature. Then, with the paint program of your choice, write your signature using your mouse. You will see that your mouse-created signature is no where near as smooth or as natural looking as your pencil and paper signature. Writing using a tablet and pen is very much like writing using traditional media. While not as versatile as a traditional paint brush, the Wacom pen is as close as you can come digitally.

I am not going to go into a detailed list of the Intuos4 features – there is a good summary of the features at the Amazon Wacom Intuos4 Medium Pen Tablet product page.

Once you’ve bought your Intuos4, you will be able to download several pieces of software that come bundled with the product. The software consists of the following two plugins for Photoshop:

  • Nik® Color Efex Pro™ WE6
  • Wacom Brushes 3.0 for Photoshop

and your choice of two of the three following software packages:

  • Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 Windows or Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 for Macintosh
  • Autodesk SketchBook Express® 2010
  • Corel Painter Sketch Pad

Given that I already have the full blown versions of Photoshop and Painter, I would download SketchBook. While I wasn’t able to find any information about Autodesk SketchBook Express 2010, I did find the following about SketchBook Express 2009.

Back to the Intuos4, it is available in four sizes (dimensions given are for the active area):

The size of my Intuos2 puts it somewhere between the size of the Medium and Large Intuos4. Based on that I will probably upgrade to the Wacom Intuos4 Large Pen Tablet as it is somewhat larger than my Intuos2 and is just over $300 cheaper than the Wacom Intuos4 Extra Large Pen Tablet. Also, the footprint of the Large is a manageable 18.7 x 12.6 inches whereas the Extra Large consumes a hefty 24.5 x 18.2 inches of desktop space.

Only one question remains: when I upgrade to an Intuos4, what will happen to my old but trusty Graphire since my Intuos2 will be reassigned to laptop service.

Ad Astra, Jim

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Processing: Finding Beauty in Math

Sunday, July 20th, 2008

Processing Rectangles Experiment
Processing Rectangles Experiment

Since last week I’ve been fixated on Processing. What is Processing? Processing is an open source programming environment within which one can write programs using the Processing language to create digital art and animations. Both the art and animations can be either static – using predefined parameters, or dynamic – responding to user mouse and keyboard input. Processing traces its roots back to the Aesthetics and Computation Group at the MIT Media Lab.

I say fixation because I have embarked on a crash course approach to mastering this tool by reading and fully understanding the book Processing: Creative Coding and Computational Art (book cover shown below). Written by Ira Greenberg, the book provides a solid introduction to graphic programming and animation in the Processing environment.


Processing book
Processing

Processing itself is a Java application so requires that Java be installed on your computer. The Processing programming language is similar to Java but much simpler. Artists without programming experience may find some of the object oriented programming concepts tricky to follow. Do not let this discourage you. From the book’s description:
"This book is written especially for artists, designers, and other creative professionals and students exploring code art, graphics programming, and computational aesthetics. The book provides a solid and comprehensive foundation in programming, including object-oriented principles, and introduces you to the easy-to-grasp Processing language, so no previous coding experience is necessary."

It has been some years since I have written Java programs. In fact as far as I can tell my Java applet Mars Database of Named Features was the first such tool available on the Internet. Unfortunately I have not updated the data elements since the last program update in 1999.

I have always found algorithmic art fascinating. Many years ago I wrote a Basic program to produce Lissajous curves based on user input and shared it with a few friends. The program was created and ran on an OS/2 system. Do you remember OS/2? OS/2 was the IBM operating system for the PC that was a pleasure to use. Unlike Windows, it was a real operating system and in my mind far superior to its Microsoft counterpart at the time. One objective I have is to revive this old program and port it over to the Processing environment. Perhaps even turn it into a Java applet on my web site so that others can play with it. Of course this is assuming that I can find it (see Doomed Diskettes).

I created the graphic Processing Rectangles Experiment (shown above) using a simple Processing program I wrote. The program has just 11 lines of code. The "vision" aspect consists of having a picture in your mind of what you want to create and then being able to translate that vision into lines of code.

Having only just begun to learn Processing, one concern I have is the apparent limitation to images being no larger than the physical screen size. It appears that Processing does allow large images to be opened in a memory buffer and displayed on the screen one section at a time. I don’t know the answer yet but it may be possible to draw to this buffer area; display sections of the buffer on screen; save the sections to disk one at a time; and then reassemble the image in Photoshop. I do hope so.

Processing Videos and Games

Following is an example of a video created in the Processing environment. Titled Moscow Olympics: Second Trace it was created by Vimeo user Eduardo Omine. It serves as an example of Processing’s animation abilities integrated with audio.


Moscow Olympics: Second Trace.

Another interesting example is a game created using Processing.
Benjamin Nelson’s SlingStar is more easily played than explained.

Processing Resources

For more information about Processing and examples, check out the following.

Happy Processing, Jim

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Context Free Art

Saturday, May 17th, 2008
Context Free Art
Context Free Art Example

My favorite aspect of digital art is the seemingly endless possibilities for mental and artistic exploration it provides. For example, I have only just begun to learn how to use Context Free. Context Free is a graphics program that creates an image based on a set of written instructions. These instructions are termed a grammar and consist of rules and parameters. These rules are saved in a Context Free Design Grammar (CFDG) file.

For me, this is reminiscent of the way computer graphics were created back in the early days. Unfortunately I do not recall the name of the programming package I first used to create graphics on an Apple II+ back circa 1982. Having no input device other than the keyboard meant that the only way to create graphics was programmatically.

The colorful geometric figure above was created using Context Free. The program I wrote to create this illustration is shown below.

// A sample Context Free CFDG
startshape Art
rule Art {
draw{ hue 120 sat .5 }
}

rule draw {
SQUARE{ b -1}
SQUARE{ s .995 b 1 }
draw{r 30 s .995 hue +1 }
}

In brief, the above program works as follows. To begin, the startshape directive tells Context Free the name of the rule to start drawing with. In this case the name of the rule is Art.

The rule Art consists of one statement: an instruction to execute the rule named draw. You will note that the draw statement has two parameters. The hue parameter specifies the color to draw and the value of 120 corresponds to green. The sat parameter specifies the saturation of the color, in this case 50%.

At this point control is passed to the draw rule. The first statement, SQUARE, tells Context Free to draw a square. The parameter b is used to specify brightness and the value of -1 corresponds to black. So a solid black square is drawn. The second statement, SQUARE, tells the program to draw another square. In this case there are two parameters. The s parameter is used to specify the size percentage. In this case .995 tells Context Free to draw this square at 99.5 percent the size of the last square drawn. The parameter b, used to specify brightness, is given the value of 1 which corresponds to white. So a solid green square is drawn. If this were the last statement, then the result would be a simple solid green square (from the second SQUARE statement) with a black border (from the first SQUARE statement).

The magic happens in the final statement. The draw rule is directed to execute the draw rule. When a statement or function calls itself, this is referred to as recursion. The beauty is that in this new call to the draw rule we can modify the initial drawing conditions. The r parameter tells Context Free that the first thing it should do is to rotate the drawing angle by the number of degrees specified, in this case 30. The s parameter instructs Context Free to reduce the size of whatever is to be drawn to 99.5 percent of what was drawn last. Finally, the hue parameter says to increment the value of the hue by 1.

The draw rule is then executed using these new initial conditions. And when the statement to call the draw rule again is encountered, the initial conditions are again altered by the parameters. And again and again and again. The draw rule will be called over and over until the size of what is being drawn shrinks down to nothing. When this last draw is executed, it returns control to the draw that called it and so on all the way back up the chain until control is finally returned to the Art rule.

Writing programs for Context Free can give you a nice mental workout. The program shown above is a very simple one that just scratches the surface of what is possible. You really should give this software a try. And I’ve saved the best for last: the Context Free software is free. You can download a copy for yourself from the Context Free web site.

Go ahead – give it a try. Jim

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Teaching Computers to Appreciate Art

Tuesday, April 15th, 2008
Binary Mona Lisa
A Binary Mona Lisa

I recently came across an article about teaching computers to appreciate art – at least that was the title of the news story. The story actually dealt with a software program under development that would be able to analyze a work of art and associate it with an artist in its database. The software would also be used to spot art forgeries.

The program was created by Daniel Keren, a professor from the Department of Computer Science at the University of Haifa in Israel. The software works by subdividing known paintings by an artist into discrete blocks. Each of these blocks is then mathematically reduced to a formula. The multiple formulas can then be combined and compared with one another. The underlying program logic is that these sets of formulas will uniquely describe the artist that created the associated works of art.

Models were created for five artists – Vincent van Gogh, Rembrandt van Rijn, Salvador Dali, Rene Magritte, and Wassily Kandinsky – using 15 painting per artist. The program was then tested against another 15 paintings from each artist to see if the program could correctly associate a painting with an artist. The program was able to correctly associate a painting with its artist 86 percent of the time.

Over the course of the article it becomes clear that the program has a very long way to go in order for it to be considered truly functional. I am skeptical as to the program’s chances of ever surpassing, or even equalling the judgments of the art specialist. While this program could develop to the point where it becomes a more useful tool, I can not see it ever reaching a state of reliability such that it becomes the arbiter of authenticity. I am even more skeptical of the ability to apply the program’s technique to the analysis of digitally created art since digital brushwork does not have the same characteristics of traditional brushwork.

If you would like to know more about this program, see the article Teaching a Computer to Appreciate Art

Binary Mona Lisa

Since this post is about software “appreciating” art, I decided to create an image reflective of the subject. The image used to illustrate this blog entry is a digitally manipulated rendition of that most famous of paintings, the Mona Lisa, also known as La Gioconda, painted by Leonardo da Vinci slightly more than 500 years ago. The woman in the portrait is said to be the wife of Francesco del Giocondo.

Ad Astra, Jim

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New Version of Photoshop FITS Liberator 2.2 Released

Friday, March 28th, 2008
Photoshop FITS Liberator screenshot
Photoshop FITS Liberator screen shot

A new version of the free ESA/ESO/NASA FITS Liberator plugin for Photoshop was released earlier this month. This plugin makes it possible to open FITS files with Photoshop. For you Photoshop users who are not familiar with FITS, the Flexible Image Transport System is the standard file format for astronomical data, like that of the Hubble Space Telescope for example. For more FITS information visit my Making Astronomical Art with your PC Resources page which I created for students in the astronomical art class I taught at the Adler Planetarium.

According to the release notes, the following enhancements are in this new release:

  1. Universal Binary for Mac allows native CS3 operation on Intel-based systems
  2. Flip image checkbox allows image orientation to be selected on import
  3. Stretch Root functions now operate antisymmetrically about x=0
  4. Version 1.1 of the Astronomy Visualization Metadata (AVM) standard is fully supported. For more information see http://www.virtualastronomy.org
  5. Improvements to importing coordinate metadata from the FITS header

I went to the version 2.2 download page and downloaded this new version. There is also a Photoshop action called Colour_composite.atn that can be downloaded. This action automates the production of color images from the individual RGB grayscale layers. I’ve never used their action preferring to use one I created myself. I installed the plugin without difficulty. On opening a FITS file (M27 for the curious among you) I observed that the main dialog for this new version was essentially the same with the only modifications being to the Stretch Function dialog (item 3 in the list above) and the addition of a Flip Image option (item 2 in the list above).

You can learn more about the plug-in, how to use, and even get some sample FITS files from the ESA/ESO/NASA Photoshop FITS Liberator Home Page.

Ad Astra, Jim

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CB Model Pro Beta Version

Thursday, December 13th, 2007
CB Model Pro
3D object created in CB Model Pro

This last week I learned of and downloaded a new 3D modeling program. The beta version of CB Model Pro is a free download that can be used indefinitely if you fill out the online registration.

CB Model Pro sports a very simple user interface. It operates by deforming the surface of either the supplied primitives or very simple imported objects. The supplied primitives are the sphere, cylinder, cone, cube, sheet, and torus. 3D object operations that are available are Point Pull, Flatten, Bend, Neck, Scale, and Poke. The degree of deformation applied by these tools is controlled by two simple sliders. There is also a Mirror option so that operations performed on one side of the object are mirrored on the other side.

In addtion to modeling, you can also paint your object. This is accomplished either by applying an image to the model or by using the paintbrush tool.

Once finished with your 3D model, you can export it as either an obj, stl, wrl, or 3dxml object. However, for the stl and 3dxml formats, only the 3D mesh is exported. The CB Model Pro web site has a gallery of sample textured objects to give you an idea of what can be done with the product.

If you have questions about the program, you can turn to the 12 page PDF for program documentation. There is a forum for the software advertised on the web site but stupidly they have chosen to restrict both read and write access to only those people who have previously purchased software from SolidWorks. Definitely not a bright marketing move.

The Pluses

Okay it’s free. It’s also a very simple program to learn and use. I created the object in the picture used to illustrate this article in minutes using only the Neck tool and application of a texture image.

The Minuses

It would be nice if you were able to name your saved models – rather than having the program arbitrarily assign names like file1.cb3d Precision of manipulation is really not there. It is a simple tool that performs simple tasks to create simple objects. You start with a primitive, select an operation, click somewhere on your primitive and drag. And a forum closed to everyone except owners of SolidWorks software is not at all helpful.

Summary

If want to play with creating simple 3D objects in an intuitive manner then give CB Model Pro a try.
Ad Astra, Jim

Posted in Digital Art, Graphics Software | 1 Comment »

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NASAView Limitations

Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007
NASAView JPEG vs GIF Comparison of a Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRise image
NASAView JPEG vs GIF of a Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE image

For those wanting to work with the raw data files returned by various NASA planetary missions the first order of business is to convert the data from its native PDS (Planetary Data System) IMG format into something usable by standard image processing software, like Adobe Photoshop. The NASA PDS Software Download site provides a variety of software packages for use in processing various NASA data products. For Windows users the only program available there for converting IMG files is NASAView. The most recent version of NASAView is 2.14 and was released in June 2007. Earlier versions of NASAView supported saving IMG files only as GIFs. Recent versions have included the option to save to JPEGs.

By design, GIF files are limited to 8 bits of color information per pixel. In the case of PDS IMG files, this means that each image is limited to a palette of 256 gray levels with 0 representing black and 255 representing white. Because the PDS IMG files from earlier missions contained only 8 bits of information per pixel, there was no data lost in the translation from IMG to GIF.

But what about when saving the IMG file as a JPEG. I do not know what the rationale was for adding the ability to save JPEGs. Perhaps so people could easily have an image that was more web friendly in terms of the file’s size. I strongly advise against ever saving an IMG file as a JPEG in NASAView. The reason is because of the JPEG compression. Unfortunately NASAView does not give the user any control over the level of compression. From what testing I have done, it appears that NASAView defaults to a quality setting of 75%. While this may be fine for dumping an image on the web, it fails when it comes to producing quality print images, especially if you want to enlarge the image.

To illustrate the impact of JPEG compression in NASAView take a look at the image at the top of this article. This is a 300% magnified view of a segment of a Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE image. On the left is the JPEG version and on the right is the GIF version of the same area, only mirrored. The JPEG artifacts are obvious and take the form of square blocks. Of course there is a significant difference in file size. Whereas the GIF version is just about 7 megabytes, the JPEG version is just over 1 megabyte. Another differences between the JPEG and GIF versions are that the JPEG version is brighter than the GIF version.

In closing, my advice is that if you are using NASAView to convert IMG files to a standard graphic format file, never ever use the “Save JPEG” or “Save JPEG AS” options. If you need a JPEG version, then save your file as a GIF and use another pieces of software to do the conversion to JPEG so that you can control the amount of image compression used. Hopefully in the future a more robust version of NASAView will be released which offers Window’s users greater control on output file format and quality.
Ad Astra, Jim

Posted in Astronomy, Graphics Software, Mars | 2 Comments »

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