Bevel LPE (and others) discussion

[Pajarico]

Hi,
I'm working on a blueprint for adding bevel to objects. I'm still
doing the mockups and need some input (I will post them shortly). So
far the mockups will show some examples of the intended result. I
haven't done the UI yet because I'm not sure on what features people
need. There are some ideas on the blueprint page:
https://blueprints.launchpad.net/inkscape/+spec/bevel-lpe

What i suggest is that the color of the bevel to be independent of
the objects color, so the bevel color should be editable on the LPE
dialog. I'm not so sure about the stroke configuration.

The above leads me to the following suggestion. I'm planning on doing
(on the long run) blueprints for LPEs for shadow, emboss and
extrusion, and a widget that let's you see and edit a color (for
general using on those LPEs and on future ones) could be useful. What
do you think? The point is that all named LPEs have a lot in common in
the way the should work:

* Bevel LPE: needs color selector for stroke/fill of the bevel and light
                     needs adjusting the position of light
* Shadow LPE: needs color selector for shadow
                         needs adjusting the position of shadow
* Emboss LPE: <none?>
                          needs adjusting thedirection of emboss
* Extrusion LPE: needs color selector for stroke/fill of the extrusion
and light
                           needs adjusting the position the extrude and light


Doubts, suggestions, ideas...:

1- Is it a good idea to set stroke&fill independently from the objects
attributes? (I find this useful but want your opinions about coding
and usability).

2- What are your thoughts about creating a color selector widget? Just
a swatch showing a color that jumps to the Fill&Stroke dialog when
clicked.
Would it be any good to have for these LPEs and future use? or is
better to use the current one? but how? The LPE settings dialog should
show this information somehow and the problem is that using the
current dialog like that won't make clear what color are you setting
exactly.

3- The selection of direction and position has similarities between
LPEs and maybe some code could be shared. Or use a widget like the
Gimp is using, but I would prefer on-canvas editing.

4- The color of the light should be added to the color of the objects,
so the final aspect of the object depends on both. CorelDRAW X3 does
this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzlaE4IJzr8 (@2:10)

5- Should rounded corners be faceted or not (with an option for the
number of facets)?

6- CorelDRAW does bevel with soft edges, but this can get things
complicated as we would need blur and a clipping path.

I think that's everything for now.

Regards. Pablo Trabajos.

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[J.B.C.Engelen]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: inkscape-devel-bounces@...
> [mailto:inkscape-devel-bounces@...] On
> Behalf Of Pajarico
> Sent: dinsdag 22 juli 2008 19:53
> To: inkscape-devel@...
> Subject: [Inkscape-devel] Bevel LPE (and others) discussion
>
>
> 1- Is it a good idea to set stroke&fill independently from
> the objects attributes? (I find this useful but want your
> opinions about coding and usability).

Just read your mail, very quick reply:

What you propose is not possible for LPEs. The style of the output is
inherited from the original path. So, although that style can be set to
anything, it means there can only be *one* style on a shape with LPE
output.
It is a huge change to make it possible for LPEs to output separate
paths with individual styles, and probably we should not call those live
path effects anymore. (Perhaps we should rename LPE to "LPM": live path
modifier, as that is what it does.)

I thought up a solution that unfortunately does not work:
- clone original path and apply LPE to the clone
- adjust the style of the clone to whatever you want.
I checked but unfortunately this does not work, because the original
path's style overrides the clones' style :(

Johan

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[Steren Giannini-2]

Can't all this be done with Filter Effects ?
LPE are for paths, what you propose is more for style. And the filter effects are here to dynamicaly modify the style.
I'm used to the LPE code, and your ideas require a total rewrite of the actual LPE system.

Did you have a look to the "Drop Shadow" pre made filter effect ? (Effects>Filter> Drop shadow  and Object > Filter Effect to see how it's made).

I would agree that the Filter Effects UI is too technical and that a UI for some pre-made filter could be great for a better control.

Steren

On Tue, Jul 22, 2008 at 10:53 AM, Pajarico <pajarico@...> wrote:

Hi,
I'm working on a blueprint for adding bevel to objects. I'm still
doing the mockups and need some input (I will post them shortly). So
far the mockups will show some examples of the intended result. I
haven't done the UI yet because I'm not sure on what features people
need. There are some ideas on the blueprint page:
https://blueprints.launchpad.net/inkscape/+spec/bevel-lpe

What i suggest is that the color of the bevel to be independent of
the objects color, so the bevel color should be editable on the LPE
dialog. I'm not so sure about the stroke configuration.

The above leads me to the following suggestion. I'm planning on doing
(on the long run) blueprints for LPEs for shadow, emboss and
extrusion, and a widget that let's you see and edit a color (for
general using on those LPEs and on future ones) could be useful. What
do you think? The point is that all named LPEs have a lot in common in
the way the should work:

* Bevel LPE: needs color selector for stroke/fill of the bevel and light
                    needs adjusting the position of light
* Shadow LPE: needs color selector for shadow
                        needs adjusting the position of shadow
* Emboss LPE: <none?>
                         needs adjusting thedirection of emboss
* Extrusion LPE: needs color selector for stroke/fill of the extrusion
and light
                          needs adjusting the position the extrude and light


Doubts, suggestions, ideas...:

1- Is it a good idea to set stroke&fill independently from the objects
attributes? (I find this useful but want your opinions about coding
and usability).

2- What are your thoughts about creating a color selector widget? Just
a swatch showing a color that jumps to the Fill&Stroke dialog when
clicked.
Would it be any good to have for these LPEs and future use? or is
better to use the current one? but how? The LPE settings dialog should
show this information somehow and the problem is that using the
current dialog like that won't make clear what color are you setting
exactly.

3- The selection of direction and position has similarities between
LPEs and maybe some code could be shared. Or use a widget like the
Gimp is using, but I would prefer on-canvas editing.

4- The color of the light should be added to the color of the objects,
so the final aspect of the object depends on both. CorelDRAW X3 does
this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzlaE4IJzr8 (@2:10)

5- Should rounded corners be faceted or not (with an option for the
number of facets)?

6- CorelDRAW does bevel with soft edges, but this can get things
complicated as we would need blur and a clipping path.

I think that's everything for now.

Regards. Pablo Trabajos.

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[Pajarico]

Steren:
> Can't all this be done with Filter Effects ?
Yes but filters are really hard to use and don't have any intuitive
way of editing on canvas. Fortunately, most of the people I heard
talking about this agree.

> LPE are for paths, what you propose is more for style. And the filter
> effects are here to dynamicaly modify the style.
> I'm used to the LPE code, and your ideas require a total rewrite of the
> actual LPE system.
Understood. I misunderstood LPE's purpose.

> Did you have a look to the "Drop Shadow" pre made filter effect ?
> (Effects>Filter> Drop shadow  and Object > Filter Effect to see how it's
> made).
>
> I would agree that the Filter Effects UI is too technical and that a UI for
> some pre-made filter could be great for a better control.
I tried that pre-made filter and for drop-shadows something like that
is what i was looking for.The problem is that currently, filters are
hard to edit and a tool serving as front end would be much better. I
think the same would apply for the rest of proposed "LPEs". Your
thoughts?

Johan:
> I thought up a solution that unfortunately does not work:
> - clone original path and apply LPE to the clone
> - adjust the style of the clone to whatever you want.
> I checked but unfortunately this does not work, because the original
> path's style overrides the clones' style :(
A filter would avoid the need for clones/copies. So i think is the way to go.



Aside from this, I have added some examples of the results I would
like to see for BEVEL tool (i won't call it LPE anymore):
http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/SpecBevelLPE
As you see, is not something doable with LPEs because style of the
bevel has to be editable and not inherited from the object.
In this case filters doesn't seem to achieve this although some of the
pre-made filters give a "3D", relief or emboss effect but not like my
mockup. I actually think the emboss tool could be made with filters.

In some way, the bevel tool would be like the 3d box tool: both create
a group editable with the tool, or you can edit the elements of the
group sepparately if you ungroup it.

Regards.


PS: Steren, sorry for sending you this message twice.

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