Photomosaic without overlapping images

I am new to Studio Artist and am trying to create a photomosaic where the images do not overlap. The Preset brush included in David Nagel's tutorial is set to overlap the images. I would like the same effect as seen in the Michael Phelps or Steve Jobs mosaics I've seen. Does anyone know the preset trick to get this effect?

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  • Take a look at the Graffiti Brushes category in the 3.5 Collection. There are a few examples in there that generate regular grids that don't overlap. You can import your own movie files into any of these presets to customize them.

    To create the more interesting effects where the blocks change size or are non rectangular you can use the path start regionize features of the paint synthesizer. There have been a number of tutorials posted on the Studio Artist News blog that discuss using this feature with movie brushes. The brick wall photo mosaic post includes some presets you can customize with your own movie files.

    The Art Mapper features in MSG Evolver can also be used to create a wide variety of different photo mosaic styles. The old Studio Artist blog has a few posts that describe some different approaches to creating photo mosaic imagery using Studio Artist and MSG Evolver.
    • Thanks so much for your quick and extensive response. I will try these suggestions immediately. Much appreciated.
    • I am looking for the same preset trick to get this effect. Can you please provide us a preset where the blocks change size and images do not overlap like the Steve Jobs mosaics. I tried to customize the brick wall photo mosaic preset to create the same effect without success:
      http://img43.imageshack.us/img43/8087/screencapturew.jpg
      Thank you in advance!
      • The Jobs and Phelps mosaics you are referring to were done by Charis Tsevis http://www.tsevis.com/. He is a SA user and member of the forum.

        You might try asking him for some hints. Though respect the fact that he does this work professionally and might want to keep some tricks to himself.
      • I actually think you are on the right track, but you probably need more divergent images in your movie brush. By divergent i mean more colors and variation. And you'll probably want to boost the # of path starts.

        You also might want to use something like brush loading to colorize your image blocks on the fly. That's one way to get around having a more limited set of images in your movie brush. Some of the presets in the 3.5 collection graffiti brushes category show off how to do that. You use the brush image as the source for an image processing brush load operation and then use a mean shift algorithm to colorize it, and then fill with the brush load rather than the original source brush.

        I'll try to post some more on photo mosaic tricks tomorrow, it's late here right now.
  • Here's a 3.5 preset that generates a photo mosaic from a movie source brush. It generates adaptive blocks and also colorizes the sub images using the image processing brush load idea i mentioned before.

    Graffitti PhotoMosaic1.zip

  • As i mentioned before, you can also use MSG Evolver to build photo mosaic images. Evolver actually has a lot more options for creating photo mosaic effects than Studio Artist does using movie brushes. You can create a wide variety of different stylistic effects, including many different approaches to creating adaptively sized blocks that don't overlap

    I posted a short tip on the Studio Artist news site today that talks about how to get started using MSG Evolver to create photo mosaic images. It's worth reading the section of the MSG Evolver User Guide pdf that talks about the Art Mapper if you are interested in this, since it contains a lot more information that the short tip post.
  • Thank you for your answer and for the useful tip on the Studio Artist news!
    I am still looking for the way to proportional stretching the sub images in a square block. In the screenshot you will see the Detour picture (Graffitti PhotoMosaic1.zip) is not stretched proportional. I have tried MSG Evolver and SA but still got the same effect.

    • Are you really saying you always want to have square blocks? Or you want the sub images to never get stretched?

      Block Shape Discussion

      The nonstandard block option tends to give a more square shape to the sub blocks, but they aren't always square since some can come out twice as long in horz or vert dimension. But they will never be long and skinny like the standard block option.

      In version 4 you have access to block option parameters for the adaptive block regionize path start generator, so you could choose the Rect NS option which tends to give square blocks.

      In MSG Evolver in the Art Mapper you can choose the nonstandard block option for any of the adaptive blocks algorithms.


      You could take an indirect approach to generating your photo mosaic if you want to always have squares.

      Either by using selection masks and multiple applications of square grid placed photo mosaic paint presets with different brush sizes.

      Or by auto painting flat color regions to build the block pattern, and then using the Flat Region Canvas as Regions path start generator.


      No Aspect Ratio Adjustment for the sub images

      If you use movie background texture as opposed to a movie source brush then the movie frames are not stretched to fill a block. The movie background texture tiles the images if they are smaller than the block.

      You need to fill with the background texture as opposed to using the brush when building photo mosaic presets that work this way.
    • There's another approach you can take to generate what you want, which is to use multiple applications of a tiling photo mosaic preset. The tiling specified with the path application controls will insure the blocks are put down on a fixed tiling grid. And the brush size adjustments you will make on subsequent passes will insure the aspect ration stays the same for all sub blocks.

      Here's an example of the kind of preset i'm referring to attached below. The movie brush i'm using doesn't have square movie frames so you would want to make that change if you really want square blocks.

      So you can hit action for the first pass. The go to the brush modulation control panel and change the max brush size to 50 %. Now hand draw where you want more detail. Or you could generate a selection mask for where you want more detail and use an action draw pass with masking turned on.

      The change the brush size to 25% and hand draw again where you want more detail. Or make another selection mask where you want more detail and use an action draw pass with masking turned on.

      Repeat until satisfied.

      Graffitti PhotoMosaic HandDraw1.zip

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