A pixel-by-pixel choice of import threshold level please

[William]

In the Tools Import Image... facility, the threshold level used is a number, used across the whole image.

I wonder if you could please consider altering it as follows.

The method of selecting the threshold level would become chosen as an option. The default choice of method is that the threshold is a number used across the whole image. Thus the method used at present would become the default method.

There would be an option choice of using a file as the method of selecting the threshold value. The idea would be to use a grey-scale bmp file with a value in the range of 0 to 255 in each pixel. The file would be the same size in pixels as the file with the image. There would need to be a selection box so as to select the file.

This would allow a person seeking to make a font from an image to have part of the image used with a higher threshold than another part.

I do not know whether programming FontCreator to use a specific threshold value for each pixel of the imported image would be fairly straightforward to achieve or disproportionately time-consuming to achieve, yet such a facility could be useful sometimes when trying to produce a font from photographs of initial letters and ornaments from old books.

William Overington

18 June 2008

[Erwin Denissen]

Hi william,

This request is out of scope of FontCreator. You should prepare the image you want to import through your image editing software. Apply filters, or whatever is needed to clean it up. That way you have endless ways to improve your image.

[Dick Pape]

One trick I use is to import an image into several glyphs using several settings and then copying/pasting together (cobble) the final image from the usable parts. In this way I insure I have a fully defined result.

Very nicely the cut and paste often places the result into the exact same position on the final image so there is no adjusting or nudging needed.

ps Erwin -- Font Creator is our image editing software!!

[William]

Thank you for a good idea.

The image which I was trying to import which shows the problem which I was trying to solve was obtained as follows.

If one goes to http://special-1.bl.uk/treasures/festiv ... kList.aspx and then clicks forward to page 4 of 11, there is a link to images from a book published in London in 1641.

http://special-1.bl.uk/treasures/festiv ... rFest=0247

Page 002 has an illustration at the top of the page. I enlarged it using the + button which is on the screen.

Using a screen display of 800 pixels wide by 600 pixels high (which is the screen resolution at which I normally use the computer, no special reason related to this image), I used the Print Screen button on the keyboard and then pasted the image into Microsoft Paint and saved as a 24-bit bmp.

I trimmed the image so that there was only the illustration and some paper around it. The result was 770 pixels wide by 270 pixels high.

The problem that I was having was that the outside right-side quarter needs a different threshold value to the outside left-side quarter.

Your suggestion provides an opportunity to have another try.

I find the design of the illustration interesting. The two halves have the same general shape, yet the details are different. For example, the flowers in each of the upper outside corners are different, though there is a flower in each corner.

William Overington

19 June 2008

[Dick Pape]

I tried your illustration to see how it looks.

In this picture, A is the original imported image in FontCreator. B is the darkened right side.
C is the combination of the original left and the darkened right. The vertical cut is in the left side of the right apple on the bottom



If I had to do it all over I'd lighten up the "original" to make the left side "perfect" and then combine it with the right side.

Of course I got rid of the British Museum red hand stamp, some extraneous noise and rotated it backwards a little.

[William]

Excellent.

Thank you.

William

[Dick Pape]

Off Topic. Thanks for the reference to the British Museum, William. I got to perusing the documents and found this picture of some strange beasts from Sept-Oct 1550. Wonder what they are?

Elephantz-bottom.jpg (188.79 KiB) Viewed 2884 times

1. Elephants with human shaped ears.
2. Elephants with rhinoceros bodies and feet.
3. Rhinoceros with elephant heads.
4. Less than 5 feet tall.

Not to mention the length of the trunks and the "thing" at the end.

"Artist Conceptions" from never having seen one I am sure ...

[William]

.... I got to perusing the documents and found this picture of some strange beasts from the years 1590-1610. ....

The top page is as follows.

http://www.bl.uk/treasures/treasuresinfull.html

I tried to find the picture of the elephants in the festival books section.

http://www.bl.uk/treasures/festivalbooks/homepage.html

Clicking on the Texts link leads to the following page.

http://special-1.bl.uk/treasures/festiv ... earch.aspx

Well, I searched for elephant and I searched for triumph and I searched for Henry yet I have not found it.

So, could you possibly post a link to the book please?

William Overington

21 June 2008

[Dick Pape]

Entry of Henri II, Catherine de' Medici, the Dauphin (the future Francis II) and Mary Queen of Scots into Rouen.

http://special-1.bl.uk/treasures/festiv ... strPage=40

[William]

Thank you.

I found the following detailed record page, which shows details of other woodcuts in the same book as well.

http://special-1.bl.uk/treasures/festiv ... rFest=0020

William

[Dick Pape]

If you really want drawings see the book "Tournament with running at the ring and at the head, held in Paris by Louis XIV" (1662)

Groups from France, India, Persian, Turkish and America (really early but they were walking upright and riding horses!) were there for the really big event. Double page spreads and all. Great woodcuts (if you like that sort of thing).

Described in "Courses de testes et de bague faittes par le roy et par les princes et seigneurs de sa cour en l'année 1662." (Paris, 1670)

http://special-1.bl.uk/treasures/festivalbooks/BookDetails.aspx?strFest=0061

[Dick Pape]

These British Museum Festival Books Archives provided numerous examples of printing initials, borders and ornaments which were transcribed into the following three fonts.

http://rapidshare.com/files/127496183/British_Museum_Archives.zip