On Tue, Oct 11, 2005 at 08:22:39PM -0300, bulia byak wrote:
Another focus of Xara is on bitmap manipulation. They have a
built-in
Picture Editor, something like a primitive Photoshop. I think it's safe to bet Inkscape will never have such a thing - why do it if we can just call Gimp instead.
Well, depends what you mean by "have such a thing": calling gimp code would count as having such a thing; though currently we don't do that at all to my knowledge, and we certainly don't currently make it easy to edit embedded bitmaps, or have gimp layers implemented as separate <image/>s, or allow other vector objects to be visible when editing a bitmap.
pjrm.
This point reminds of another area we could cooperate. We do have an integrated bitmap / photo editor, because in principle I don't believe you can or should separate the two worlds. Real users want to mix photos and vector artwork, and so it's simply more convenient to be able to do this directly from within your vector editor.
(And Microsoft Expression will be majoring on this point - integrated bitmap and vector editing, indeed the only significant change MS have made to Expression they bought, is adding a fully integrated bitmap editor)
So in Xara X we added an API to call an external photo editor, so that you could double click a photo, (or a bitmap fill) edit your picture, close the window and the edited result is passed back. The theory was that we could use any external editor and were not going to make it specifically the Xara Picture Editor. So in principle this is exactly like you guys calling out to GIMP.
But our Xara <-> Picture Editor API sucks, partly because it's very COM based and partly because it's become very specific to our implementation of the photo editor. Worse, our Picture Editor component is going to be an absolute dog to port to Linux because unlike Xara X, it was never designed to be the slightest bit platform portable. GDI+ code everywhere, transparent fading, rounded dialogs, the lot. This remains a major potential stumbling block for the port down the road (it will be the last component we do). So we should also be changing our API to be more general purpose. So the user can configure their favourite photo editor to be called when they want to edit a photo.
So, if this is a feature that you guys are thinking of adding to Inkscape, lets have a common API to call external photo editors. Then we can be compatible - we can both use and call Photo editors in a compatible way. What's more this provides an added incentive for the various photo editors out there to support this API and so greatly increase the interop and choice for all users.
I might be talking b**ls here, because for all I know Linux already has an open, common API to pass photos to and from the various picture editors. But it seems another area where we could both possibly develop a feature in parallel, but both benefit equally from it.
Or is this rubbish?
On Friday 14 October 2005 21:56, Charles Moir wrote:
So, if this is a feature that you guys are thinking of adding to Inkscape, lets have a common API to call external photo editors. Then we can be compatible - we can both use and call Photo editors in a compatible way. What's more this provides an added incentive for the various photo editors out there to support this API and so greatly increase the interop and choice for all users.
I might be talking b**ls here, because for all I know Linux already has an open, common API to pass photos to and from the various picture editors. But it seems another area where we could both possibly develop a feature in parallel, but both benefit equally from it.
I don't know of anything *specifically* for that.
However, there is an API that might be relevant here, with added benefits. It's a network protocol, primarily for 3D graphics collaboration, called "Verse":
http://www.blender.org/modules/verse/
Performance could be an issue for large bitmaps, since it's a network protocol, but perhaps an optimised version could be used locally.
The added benefits would be that Inkscape/Xara would be capable of fully integrating in 3D production houses, where many people work on different parts of a scene at the same time. As I understand it, when artists update an image, 3D modellers would see those changes as they model. Likewise, different 2D/bitmap/vector artists could collaborate in a workgroup, all in realtime, building up an image between them. Of course, if you're doing it locally, you could draw in GIMP and see it update in Inkscape/Xara too.
Being 3D-oriented, there's probably some scope for sharing 2D nodes as well, perhaps allowing different artists to modify subgroups or layers of nodes in the same master drawing at once.
Blender is the major project involved as far as I know. There is already a GIMP plugin:
http://users.pandora.be/blendix/verse/
Even if this particular protocol isn't suitable (quite possible, I suppose), it might give some ideas on how to go beyond what MS are doing and produce something really special, with its own niche. Perhaps a similar API for 2D graphics could be created, with a gateway/bridge developed in future.
Also, I think there is also a similar (perhaps more popular/complete/relevant) 3D network collaboration protocol being used/developed for products like Alias's Maya and Autodesk's 3D Studio Max.
Hope this helps some :)
I don't know if this is on topic or not, but I think the single biggest thing Inkscape could do to help integration is notice changes in bitmap files. So, I link in a JPEG, and if I change that file in any other application Inkscape notices and updates instantaneously. I think this should be possible with further GNOME-VFS integration. Then, the command is to just to open GIMP on the file.
--Ted
On 10/14/05, Charles Moir <CharlesM@...1042...> wrote:
Worse, our Picture Editor component is going to be an absolute dog to port to Linux because unlike Xara X, it was never designed to be the slightest bit platform portable. GDI+ code everywhere, transparent fading, rounded dialogs, the lot. This remains a major potential stumbling block for the port down the road (it will be the last component we do).
On top of that, in my humble opinion, this is also the most awkward thing in Xara from UI viewpoint. The Xara strength has always been to edit everything on the canvas. So opening a separate window for bitmap feels extremely clumsy. That window does nothing that a dedicated "bitmap tool" with its toolbar could not do right on canvas. Such a tool would eliminate the atrociously inconvenient "zoom by slider" in the standalone picture window and would generally make the interface much more consistent. So in Inkscape, we most likely won't follow you on that; I think the best approach would be to have a Bitmap tool for simple adjustments (such as crop, unsharp, etc) plus a doubleclick to open the user's favorite bitmap editor for more complex editing.
-- bulia byak Inkscape. Draw Freely. http://www.inkscape.org
participants (4)
-
bulia byak -
Charles Moir -
Lee Braiden -
Ted Gould