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by modulusprime
5154 days ago
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Thanks to commieneko and ssp for a couple of good posts. Followup questions: What do you think about the effect that pixel-alignment produces specifically in the context of this comparison? There seem to be a couple of basic problems with the "clarity" of the pixel-aligned images (please correct): - As lines diverge from rectilinear, aliasing is inevitable. Either the aliasing or the anti-aliasing will produce discontinuity. - High-contrast neighbors on pixel boundaries are more likely to highlight perceptual problems related to frequency. The part that interests me here is the presentation of this comparison on Dustin Curtis' site. His site seems to be pursuing visual impact as an ultimate goal, and contrast is a big part of that:
http://i.imgur.com/UC8ZX.png (OP with histogram overlay) Does the context minimize the negative effects you've described? Do the filtered images look out of place in such a stark environment? |
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Patient: Doctor, Doctor! It hurts when I do this! Doctor: Well don't do that!
Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week ...
Seriously ...
With sampled images displayed on a rectilinear grid, you are going to get into pathological situations that hurt. So don't do that.
One trick you can sometimes get away with is to rotate the work so that it isn't orthogonal to the display grid. Of course then, parts that were okay before may become problems. And the client, bless them, may not like it. No body said life was going to be easy.
Contrast at the edges is where you have the most hurt in this case. Drop shadows, very subtle, please, can help as can can vignetted edges. I've been known to do unclean things like create a 2 or 3 pixel rule the shape of the edge, blur it and multiply or screen it on top of the offending parts. You can even dodge and burn it more or less in the nasty bits. (blending modes are a big topic!) Worse case scenario, try and use the problem as a design element. Once I took a particularly truculent logo and grudged it up with some high frequency noise that was applied with a transparency just so.
Now one thing I used to do all the time for animation was to use temporal sampling to smooth over the rough edges. Even for seemingly static elements, a little bit of focus wiggle or even a slow, smooth slide, barely perceptible, will often cover a world of sins. We probably aren't to the point where that kind of thing is going to be useful on web pages for "static" elements, but the day is coming. There are other advantages, as this allows the graphics to "breath" and seem part of an environment. Of course you may very well not want that effect. But even so, higher resolution displays, faster processors, more resources, will mean that such things, subtly applied, can give us more tools to work with in troublesome situations.
But the best advice, for nearly every case, is "Then don't do that!"