Gimp Users - the MathMap Processing Application

[David]

Hi Fellow Gimpers -

A new filter system has recently been posted in the Gimp Plug-In Registry – the MathMap Image Processing Application. It is available for download from:

http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/schani/mathmap/

with a video tutorial at:

http://video.google.de/videoplay?doc...1518308861626#


Both Windows and Linux versions are available. I have loaded the Windows version successfully into the Gimp 2.6.7 (.gimp-2.6>plug-ins folder). Upon running the application is to be found under Filters>Generic>MathMap.

There are said to be about 100 filter effects arranged in sub-menus, including blurs, colours, composites, renderings and so on. Having opened an image, the preferred procedure for use is to click the last item in the menu, entitled MathMap. A dialog screen opens complete with a preview window. There are five tabs: Expression, Settings, User Values, Filters, and Composer. If you select the Filters tab you can see the full list of filters organised under sub-headings. Select, say, Colors>Lomoize (I was about to blame the Americans for this abuse of the English language, “lomoize”, but I see the author is from the University of Vienna, Austria). After a second or two you see a preview of the effect. Switching to User Values allows you to vary the parameters associated with the effect and, when satisfied you click OK to apply the effect. If you're interested you can switch to the Expression tab to see the maths and coding behind the transform.

So far – so normal. However, instead of going directly to the filters switching to the Composer tab allows access to what is probably the most important feature of the application. You can build up a series of filter effects on an image, linking them together in any manner of ways. You should look at the video tutorial listed above to understand this. I can imagine some very smart applications for this way of working.

As usual with open source software, there seem to be rough edges to the application (e.g. the preview does not always automatically update) and third-party help is clearly needed.

Here's a sample "lomoized" image from our recent snowy weather:



Cheers

David

[Donald]

David
Thank you. Off to have a look.

[David]

Donald - That was a quick reply - I hadn't even finished looking at it myself!

David