Later used that image as a backdrop for further filter experimentation.
Ended up being a rather complicated svg -using the image filter primitive to pull in the background image and using displacements by that fragmented heart object.
Made the heart prism available in a much siplified image.
Went back and recreated a "mountain filter" from scratch.
Previously each layer was generated by the same filter chain but with different parametres -like different flood fills and different turbulence scale values-,
which was a huge burden for tweaking.
So this time, simplified it so that the overall shape of all the mountains is defined by only one turbulance filter primitive,
and all the mountains are using are two flood fills.
This way it's much easier to handle the scenery.
Downside is that it looks too duotone-like -which I tried to tweak with component transferring
and that the shape, "jaggedness" of the mountain contours don't scale with the distance.
Anyway, 12 mountains are composited atop eachother.
In reality, there is only 1 shape generated that is 13 times wider than the rendered area,
and it is split into 12 pieces, each offset so there is no repeating.
Went with the about screen page layout, maybe it can be useful in the future.
Exporting to a png took about a minute, which is quite a pleasant surprise from the previous one.
Attaching a variant with a "striped layer" -and also an svg asrequested on the live chat. It renders much better with inkscape, can possibly hang your browser so try right click/save as instead just opening it in a new tab.
In the previous approaches the "mountain skyline' was smoothed out with blurring and simplified with component transferring the alpha channel,
and an additional displacement was added to generate the small details.
That approach doesn't work because this time the displacement map not only generates the overall shape, but the fill pattern too.
Other problem is adding in some variance and depth to different layers of mountains.
Huge part why the previous version was so resource heavy is because the gradient was generated from top to bottom within a layer of a mountain.
Better avoid that. Then it'll be the only way to use the object's fill attribute as an input too.
Which I always had bad luck with -how to blend a black to white gradient onto a vivid image without making it look flat.
Experimented with a combination with multiplying the dark tones and screen blending the light ones -didn't work.
Would be so much easier if there was some interface for luminosity curves and not just the colormatrix filter primitive or component transfers on each level.
Then there is the issue with the hard-wired limitation of the displacement filter primitive taking 256 values only.
For this filter, to generate the shapes, 4 displacement filter primitives are chained one after another,
to have a 325 px maximum displacement.
In total, that means 256 values control a 650 px displacement range -which clearly shows with the jaggednells.
Specifically, using the alpha values as an input from a fractal noise. Which has a 0-255 value range.
There is no interpolation between the values, regardless it was never meant to render colours with alpha "fractions".
Still, theyboth use the same computation model, so that is that.
Work in Progress frosty mountains
Inkscape.org
Current challenge of the forum is to draw a frosty scene.
https://inkscape.org/forums/competitions/inkscape-challenge-1-december-2022-31-december-2022/
Had an idea a long time ago, which would fit the challenge.
Came across this image at openclipart:
https://openclipart.org/detail/262126/surreal-foggy-valley
Which used an automated method to trace an existing photograph of a mountain.
The method used also provided a distinct look which I wasn't fond of, so gave it a go to do the job manually.
In February of 2017 came up with this solution:
The image used some filtering to generate the mist and used vector paths to clip each "layer" of a mountain.
The svg is available here:
https://openclipart.org/detail/272304/heart-of-winter
Later used that image as a backdrop for further filter experimentation.
Ended up being a rather complicated svg -using the image filter primitive to pull in the background image and using displacements by that fragmented heart object.
Made the heart prism available in a much siplified image.
You can check out the svg here:
https://openclipart.org/detail/273146/heart-prism-2
Although, as again, those were "finished" works for their times they always let me somewhat unsatisfied and this time revisiting the concept.
Drawing a mountain panorama has close connection to the previous month's animation challenge,
where was using such layering for a 2,5D perspective in combination with animateMotion animations, to achieve a parallax effect.
https://inkscape.org/forums/competitions/inkscape-challenge-1-november-2022-30-november-2022/#c49695
Most probably this would be a time to follow such a route, but heading a different direction.
This time, I'm experimenting with filtering only:
how can filtering be used to generate such a panorama?
Conceptually it's very straightforward to do so, yet the tweaking is like climbing the K2.
So that's where it really is getting into the work in progress topic.
Been flooding the live chat with screen captures some days ago and thought
it'd be a good idea to document my climb.
And who knows? Maybe I'll turn this topic into a filtering extravaganza.
Since filters are really freezing the "inkmountain", so to speak.
Here are those screen captures taken between 3th and 10th of December.
Initial idea, to generate every mountain in a single filter chain.
A problem arose where the displacement map filter primitive is limited to 100 px displacement in the gui.
Had to use notepad++ to make it larger for the mountains at the front.
Not sure if I messed something up, but couldn't get the rendering right with the large displacement settings.
Those mountains in the front are using displacements in both x and y directions which is unintentional.
You can guess how that looks in the filter editor.
Instead of troubleshooting the situation, considered it as a proofof concept and focused on rendering a "single layer" of a mountain right.
If it's successful it will be a better position for further explorations.
Inspired by chinese ink drawings started with a toned down colour scheme.
This latter one looks quite an ink drawing in my opinion with that smudged contour.
However that isn't working well if more layers are added atop eachother.
At this point the "inkblob" was creating a gradient from opaque to transparent in both directions.
For a solid filled mountain a "backdrop" colour needs to be added below the blob.
And then, a distinctive skyline to be used cutting it to the overall shape.
So much for an ink drawing, time to explore beyond.
It will be beneficial despite the visible set backs.
Ok, it looks promising.
Needs a more convincing colour scheme and mist. A lot.
This is where I'm currently at.
These 3 mountains use 3 different filters. With different blurring values a bitof depth of field is added in too.
Anyway, to make it really striking, need to dive into a convincing colour scheme.
Honestly a good linear gradient can define the whole scenery. The rest is just applying it to the generated scene.
Was exploring deviantart for photographs, will see what kind of palette will be the result.
Here is the result of my rather limited research into mountain images.
Deviantart sure has alot of inspirational images. I claim no credit on those photographs nor are they showcased at their full glory.
Didn't put down their original sources so that is that. The focus is on the palettes created.
Which is available as an svg here:
https://openclipart.org/detail/340080/mountain-palette
They seem to be very close to a monochrome arrangement.
Nevertheless those are the starting point to choose the fitting "frosty" palette for this filter.
Another attempt.
Out of curiosity exported it in 1920/1200 px. Took about 30-40 minutes?
Used 1.1.2 this time. Recolouring the filter with that version is harder because the dropper tool was removed.
Will change to current master version. Tested it before, but it crashed once editing a simple gradient.
Another plus in the developer version is that there are scale handles for the filters?
Should work wonders if (or because of probably) can't manage every mountain into a single filter chain.
Another variant, after more and more tweaking.
Balancing all the flood fills throughout 11 similar filter chains, and adjusting a seed parameter for a turbulance filter primitive.
Supposedly it can generate random shaped mountains
-however there are 1000 possible variations each for the primitive has the seed setting from 1 to 1000.
Still not so satisfied with the look and even less how the image is structured.
But hitting the limit of my patience soon so will have to wrap this up as soon as posible.
Maybe more blurring for the depth of field effect or a grungy overlay can improve the outcome.
After about a 4 hour export for an 1920/1200 px image:
Used an 1.3 master version but it's all a mess.
Can't edit a filter conveniently. Filter editor is more confusing than before, Layers/object's panel are harder to use than ever.
A conclusion of the filter editingis to use separate smaller filter chain and apply those one by one in a nested manner
-apply filter on onbject, then group it and apply filter on group etc.
However that doesn't really work with the object dialog?
Wondering what can the gui be improved with new features to make it manageable.
More attempts. Better restart from square one after this.
As wich was the case with the #3 post.
Could export 3 images today only with minor tweaking forthat "grunge overlay".
Tweaked one filter from this pack: https://openclipart.org/detail/273118/overlay-pack
Turned out the texture of the grunge being ugly on the lighter shades.
Then, created a new filter based on a flood fill and a noise primitive - blending didn't come out right.
There was grunge everywhere except at the areas which had the same luminosity as the flood fill colour.
Had enough and made a composite of those with gimp.
With a bit of unsharp mask filter effect, a tad bit using the clone tool too.
So much for any improvement since 2017. Feeling it as lost efforts.
My expectations might have grown, even have ideas how to improve but seems it's always doomed to fail.
Inkscape doesn't cut it.
Attaching the tweaked image with the retouches in gimp and will share the svg without the grunge on openclipart soon.
For anyone wondering what that mess looks in inkscape.
The svg is available here at openclipart:
https://openclipart.org/detail/340151/frosty-mountains
Tried uploading it to the inkscape gallery but it freezes the page.
Handle with care.
Just for some reference, how fast you can create a mountain landscape in blender:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLHo6cE8eiE
Third time's charm?
Went back and recreated a "mountain filter" from scratch.
Previously each layer was generated by the same filter chain but with different parametres -like different flood fills and different turbulence scale values-,
which was a huge burden for tweaking.
So this time, simplified it so that the overall shape of all the mountains is defined by only one turbulance filter primitive,
and all the mountains are using are two flood fills.
This way it's much easier to handle the scenery.
Downside is that it looks too duotone-like -which I tried to tweak with component transferring
and that the shape, "jaggedness" of the mountain contours don't scale with the distance.
Anyway, 12 mountains are composited atop eachother.
In reality, there is only 1 shape generated that is 13 times wider than the rendered area,
and it is split into 12 pieces, each offset so there is no repeating.
Went with the about screen page layout, maybe it can be useful in the future.
Exporting to a png took about a minute, which is quite a pleasant surprise from the previous one.
Some other varian, with different flood fills and seed values for the turbulence.
Attaching a variant with a "striped layer"
-and also an svg asrequested on the live chat.
It renders much better with inkscape, can possibly hang your browser so try right click/save as instead just opening it in a new tab.
Made a few exports at 300 dpi resolution.
Turns out that the banding issue scales too well.
Needs some more dithering and what not.
Then played with gimp for adding that kind of noise and some colour correction/modification.
Attaching variants which may work with the frosty theme.
More variants - this time, merely focusing on editing the image in gimp.
Using the "gimpressionist" filter.
@imv2
Uploaded the basic svg version of the file with the "work in progress" filters included here:
https://inkscape.org/~Lazur/%E2%98%85abc-03+1
Cannot emphasize not to click on the image but right click/save as.
This freezes the browsers apparently.
Update.
For the current mothly challenge, took this to an abstract direction.
https://inkscape.org/forums/competitions/inkscape-challenge-1-january-2023-31-january-2023/#c51602
The idea is still the same to generate the shape by a displacement map filter primitive.
This time a gradient-like pattern is distorted.
For a short while the svg is available here:
https://inkscape.org/~Lazur/%E2%98%85ink-test
Notes woth to mention:
In the previous approaches the "mountain skyline' was smoothed out with blurring and simplified with component transferring the alpha channel,
and an additional displacement was added to generate the small details.
That approach doesn't work because this time the displacement map not only generates the overall shape, but the fill pattern too.
Other problem is adding in some variance and depth to different layers of mountains.
Huge part why the previous version was so resource heavy is because the gradient was generated from top to bottom within a layer of a mountain.
Better avoid that. Then it'll be the only way to use the object's fill attribute as an input too.
Which I always had bad luck with -how to blend a black to white gradient onto a vivid image without making it look flat.
Experimented with a combination with multiplying the dark tones and screen blending the light ones -didn't work.
Would be so much easier if there was some interface for luminosity curves and not just the colormatrix filter primitive or component transfers on each level.
Then there is the issue with the hard-wired limitation of the displacement filter primitive taking 256 values only.
For this filter, to generate the shapes, 4 displacement filter primitives are chained one after another,
to have a 325 px maximum displacement.
In total, that means 256 values control a 650 px displacement range -which clearly shows with the jaggednells.
Specifically, using the alpha values as an input from a fractal noise. Which has a 0-255 value range.
There is no interpolation between the values, regardless it was never meant to render colours with alpha "fractions".
Still, theyboth use the same computation model, so that is that.
Attaching an example, where it really shows.
Tried to submit something similar to the about screen contest 2023 (1.3)
-and didn't got into the voting because the svg was deemed to load sloooow. 16 s was the mentioned time for opening and using 14 GB RAM.
That's rather an inkscape rendering problem in my humble opinion. Well never thought it'd win, but here goes my 2 cents.
Exports from the svg at 200%:
The svg files are available in the gallery for the brave ones.
https://inkscape.org/~Lazur/%E2%98%85inkscape-ink-landscape
https://inkscape.org/~Lazur/%E2%98%85inkscape-ink-landscape-ii