scripting,powerful graphic processing free tools,plugins ...

[shekofte]

some months ago i found these very interesting freeware projects
i used them for some of my graphic purposes and i believe they contain unique features (also in some cases they are better than commercial softwares )
the most important feature of these tools is their extendability

command line
http://www.imagemagick.org/script/index.php
API
http://www.imagemagick.org/script/api.php

ImageJ
http://rsbweb.nih.gov/ij/index.html
plugins
http://rsbweb.nih.gov/ij/plugins/index.html

i think if we can use these tools instead of developing a graphic related software from zero for each game ... there is a lots of advantages

for example :

1. writing plugins is so much easier than full development
2. the other developers can read the scripts you writhing and contribute for updating or using in other similar problems
3. if the support provided for importing various game graphic formats like dds,textures ... colors pallets ... then we can use the commands are available in these interfaces for modifying,analyzing,converting ...
4. lake of game related works is obvious in these type of free projects as an example http://rsbweb.nih.gov/ij/plugins/index.html the list of plugins don't contain something that game developers invented ...

please share your idea and comment/critic on this subject ?

check this one too :
http://www.graphicsmagick.org/index.html
also if you know other similar projects please notify us

[Dinoguy1000]

Wikimedia uses Imagemagick for some of the image processing Wikimedia wikis do, for what it's worth. =)

[invisghost]

Those are mostly used in servers. They aren't known for having the "best" features or anything. Theres a few hidden gems in there but unless you're doing your work on a web server i don't see much point in using any of these. Most programming languages supply libraries which do at least what those do if not more so

[shekofte]

Wikimedia uses Imagemagick for some of the image processing Wikimedia wikis do, for what it's worth. =)

thanks for your tip
i didn't know that so far

Those are mostly used in servers. They aren't known for having the "best" features or anything. Theres a few hidden gems in there but unless you're doing your work on a web server i don't see much point in using any of these. Most programming languages supply libraries which do at least what those do if not more so

can you tell more about that why they are ideal for servers ?
regards

[invisghost]

can you tell more about that why they are ideal for servers ?

I'll be talking about Imagemagick in this example. It's been integrated into many programming languages that are used on servers (See Here). It has cache support to make things faster and its already very fast. It's very good for servers and that's what it's geared towards.

[shekofte]

It's been integrated into many programming languages that are used on servers (See Here)

indeed

1. by this way , may it used as a generic tool for those type of requests in Graphic file formats section viewforum.php?f=18 ?

2. how do you vote for it as a teamwork interface ?

(i am a little familiar with c++ forms languages , i am curious to know in which of those supported languages you have skill ? )

thanks invisghost

[finale00]

Any tool that allows you to quickly figure out a file's format would be suitable for research.
The better tools we have, the easier things will be.

Being able to share the plugin with full source provided allows newer users to familiarize themselves with various details of some format.

[invisghost]

may it used as a generic tool for those type of requests in Graphic file formats section viewforum.php?f=18 ?

It would but I think there are better applications to use for discovery of some common image types. Irfanview would be my suggestion. Regardless of the file extension it tries to match the file to every format it supports so its helpful for discovering a file's image format. It supports a lot of formats. (Here) is a list of formats ifranview supports and (here) is a list of the formats imagemagick supports. The lists are roughly the same but irfanview is much easier to use.

how do you vote for it as a teamwork interface ?

I don't understand what you mean when you say "teamwork interface".

I am curious to know in which of those supported languages you have skill ?

I have a understanding of few languages in that list. C++, .NET (C#), Java, and PHP.

[shekofte]

I don't understand what you mean when you say "teamwork interface".

i mean the same concept that finale00 talked about it here

Being able to share the plugin with full source provided allows newer users to familiarize themselves with various details of some format.

thanks invisghost for mentioning to Irfanview

[finale00]

Irfanview[/b] would be my suggestion. Regardless of the file extension it tries to match the file to every format it supports so its helpful for discovering a file's image format. It supports a lot of formats. (Here) is a list of formats ifranview supports and (here) is a list of the formats imagemagick supports. The lists are roughly the same but irfanview is much easier to use.

What happens if it's just missing a header here or there? Or whatever weird things developers would throw at their data to confuse us. Would these still be feasible?

[invisghost]

i mean the same concept that finale00 talked about it here

Being able to share the plugin with full source provided allows newer users to familiarize themselves with various details of some format.

It's open source so I think it should be fine

What happens if it's just missing a header here or there? Or whatever weird things developers would throw at their data to confuse us. Would these still be feasible?

There is a function to load raw images where you can define the type of pixels and everything. I was able to use it to get some textures from a ps2 game that no one was able to figure out so I think it's pretty useful in that department. It's not one of those "this does everything" programs but it does quite a lot.

[finale00]

Compared to texturefinder, would you say it is

1: easier or harder to use
2: better or worse at successfully figuring out the format

[invisghost]

Well each have different purposes.

1. Texturefinder is purely for looking at unknown texture files while irfanview views known formats and also has a way of looking at unknown (raw) formats. Texturefinder is easier to experiment with different pixel formats and stuff but thats not to say irfanview cant do the same things.

2. Irfanview is better for finding formats that it knows of. Texturefinder doesn't really say which filetype a certain file is.

Just try them both out, one is better than the other in certain situations.