Custom adjustment layers

[ZoltanE]

Is it possible to add custom adjustment layers somehow?

[Hoogo]

Is it possible to add custom adjustment layers somehow?

What would be custom about them? You mean plugins?

[ZoltanE]

An adjustment layer where the logic deciding how to adjust the incoming data is custom. For example custom pattern dithering or distance field calculation. Plugin filters can do the job (I'm using Filter Forge for everything) but they are not live and can work only on merged copies of groups which slows down certain tasks. Custom adjustment layers would provide instant feedback and thus decrease iteration time, remove guesswork. There are many situations when writing code for a custom adjustment layer would be cheaper on the long run.

[photoken]

Have you tried Effects...Effect Filters...Custom?

[ZoltanE]

Yeah well that's a convolution logic, useful sometimes but I'd need much more freedom and in a non-destructive manner.

[photoken]

... and in a non-destructive manner.

You can apply your custom filter as an adjustment layer -- use the icon with the little red arrow.

[ZoltanE]

Oh I see, good to know.

Anyway, I'm not sure how difficult it would be to open up this part of the system. Using a scripting language like Python would be more user friendly when it comes to adjustment logic authoring but performance would suffer. C++ would be faster but less approachable. I'd be happy with either of them. I hope the developers give the idea some consideration.

[Herbert123]

I agree that it would be an excellent addition if a "scripting" adjustment layer would be available in Photoline. It may slow down processing too much, though. In that case the embedded placeholder layer option may prove to be useful. That is how the Photoshop developers solved the processing issue.

What I would love to see is a node-based "scripting" extension. Not sure about its implementation, though. What I do know is that Photoline lacks scripting, and it is the one main thing holding back its true potential. The devs are aware of this, but at some point have confessed that they do not have a practical idea yet to implement such a feature.

[photoken]

What I do know is that Photoline lacks scripting, and it is the one main thing holding back its true potential.

I don't think so. When I first moved to PL from PaintShopPro, I wondered about that lack of scripting, too. But as I learned the features of PL, I realized that it really doesn't need scripting. At least in the case of PSP, its scripting is used to attempt to compensate for its very limited feature set....

The devs are aware of this, but at some point have confessed that they do not have a practical idea yet to implement such a feature.

At least on Windows, the solution is to use Microsoft's Visual Studio Tools for Applications (VSTA). Corel uses that for CorelDraw and PhotoPaint, and it's an outstanding solution: VSTA provides the excellent Visual Studio editor for writing code, and of course you can use your .Net language of choice -- C# in my case (and a few years ago I wrote a nice add-in for CorelDraw using C#). I'm not sure how much work is involved in exposing the application's object model as .Net assemblies, however....

[ZoltanE]

Oh scripting would be a great addition, especially when it comes to speeding up workflow. Right now I have to do many things manually which should be automated. For example:

Code: Alles auswählen

- Go through top level layers and layer groups.
- If item name doesn't start with _ then..
   - Hide everything else.
   - Scale document to closest power of two.
   - Export image to %DocumentName _%LayerName.PNG
   - Undo document scale.
   - Unhide other layers.

Each production and workflow has its own needs and conventions which can only be facilitated by a flexible tool like scripting.

And then there is the whole other realm of scripting the use of inbuilt tools which would allow procedural drawing (L-Systems and the like).

The biggest effort would be required at the beginning, after that interfacing more and more parts of PL could be done gradually over the years.