FotoSketcher 2.30 beta available

Hi,

A beta version of FotoSketcher 2.30 is now available. You can download it here: http://www.fotosketcher.com/FotoSketcher_beta_230d.exe

Apart from some minor modifications and optimizations, the main new feature is the Pencil Sketch 4 effect.

Here is an example:

And here are the parameters I used:

Have fun :-)

Best regards,

David

Testing a new Pencil Sketch effect

Hi all,

Just a quick update to let you know that I'm currently experimenting with a new pencil sketch effect.

Here are a couple of examples (the first one is just the new filter, the second is a blend with Painting 7):

Best regards,

David

FotoSketcher 2.25 officially released

Hi all,

FotoSketcher Version 2.25 is now officially released!
As usual you can download it from the official web page here: http://www.fotosketcher.com/download-fotosketcher/

The main changes in this release are:
- new "Emergence" stylized effect (looks like a mosaic or shattered glass)
- 2 new languages (Hungarian and Turkish, thanks Zoltán and Ufuk)
- some interface improvements (larger menu fonts, prettier trackbars and new background pattern)
- many bug fixes (I guarantee that there are plenty left!)

I hope you'll enjoy creating art with this new version ;-)

All the best,

David

FotoSketcher 2.25 Release Candidate

Hi all!

I have just uploaded a close to final version 2.25 here: http://www.fotosketcher.com/FotoSketcher_2.25_RC1.exe

If no showstopping bug is found, I will officially release version 2.25 in the next few days. The main changes are the new Emergence effect, two new languages (Hungarian - thanks Zityisoft and Turkish - thanks U. UĞUR), a few cosmetic improvements and some behind the scenes changes.

Here is an example of the new Emergence stylized effect (click on image for full view):

And here are the parameters I used:

Best regards,

David

Bug hunting - Thanks for your help!

Hi all,

Since making FotoSketcher version 2.25 beta available, some users were reporting crashes when trying to launch the program.
Despite testing on 6 different PCs, I had been unable to reproduce the problem.

Therefore, I added some code to do exception handling and thanks to the help of many users (and especially Peter from British Columbia!) I finally tracked down the problem to some corrupt components. For once, my code was not the culprit! After replacing these components, the bug finally disappeared. The current beta version can be downloaded here: http://www.fotosketcher.com/FotoSketcher_beta.exe

I still have a few changes to make, but I should soon be able to upload a release candidate of version 2.25. Stay tuned!


Thank you very much again for your help,

David

FotoSketcher 2.25 beta available

Hi all,

I have just uploaded a beta version of FotoSketcher 2.25.
You can get it here: http://www.fotosketcher.com/FotoSketcher_beta.exe

Apart from a few bug fixes, the main new feature is the 'Emergence' effect (an evolution of the 'shattered glass' filter).

As usual, I welcome your feedback and would be glad to hear from you if you find any bugs!

All the best,

David

New shattered glass effect

Hi all,

Just a quick word to let you know that I am also experimenting with a simple effect that I will probably call "shattered glass" or something similar.

Here is an early example (click on image to view in full size):

Best regards,

David

Season's greetings!

Hi all,

I was hoping to release a new version of FotoSketcher in time for Christmas, but unfortunately I am running behind. My experiments with a new algorithm did not produce good enough results for me to include a new filter in FotoSketcher. I might even have to abandon the ideas I've been working on lately and start on new ones (no worries, I have lots of new ideas, one of them might even produce something nice, lol).

In the meantime, here is the result of one of my latest experiments (based on a picture of young Sean Connery):

I wish you all happy holidays!

All the best,

David

Working on some new ideas

Hi all,

I'm currently exploring some new ideas based on the brushstrokes algorithm. I've changed the way the brushstrokes are placed and added a new 'overlap' concept in the code. That way I can choose how much the various brushstrokes are allowed to overlap each other.

It's still early days and the results are not yet completely convincing, but I think I am on an interesting track. Here is an example:

I'll keep you posted as I make progress, so stay tuned!

All the best,

David

FotoSketcher for Mac - proof of concept

Hi all,

It's been a rather long time since I last updated this blog and I apologize to all my faithful followers. I know that you can't wait to know what's coming in the next release of FotoSketcher ;-)

First of all, I've busy rewriting the official website (http://www.fotosketcher.com/) which was in serious need of an overhaul. To cut a rather long story short, I installed and learned Wordpress, chose a nice, clean looking theme and voila!

Then, after some severe lobbying from Mac users ;-), I decided that I would start looking into Mac development. Fortunately, my programming environment Delphi had just been updated to support Mac OS. So I decided to invest in the latest version (Embarcadero Delphi XE2), purchased a (not so) cheap old Mac Mini with 512MB of RAM and tried to start programming for the Mac. Alas, I soon discovered that I needed to upgrade to Snow Leopard (the minimum for Delphi XE2) and that requires 2GB of RAM!

So, following this great tutorial http://www.methodshop.com/gadgets/tutorials/macmini-ram/index.shtml and miraculously not screwing things up, I finally installed Mac OS X Snow Leopard.

And tonight I set up everything to try compiling a test program on my Mac. It actually worked the first time (I nearly fell off my chair)!! Here is proof of my first program running on a Mac:

The snag is that in order to make FotoSketcher multi-platform, I will need to rewrite the user interface and probably quite a lot of the "under the hood"code. So I'll probably continue updating the current Windows only version in parallel for a while.

Best regards,

David