Someone recently asked us a question about how to modify a Vectorizer preset so that the coloring is generated from a specific color palette. As opposed to the original Vectorizer preset coloring which works off of the current source image. The screenshot below shows the Abstract : Rectangular vectorizer factory preset. It generates a rectangular abstraction of the current source image. You can see that the output coloring of the vectorizer effect matches the local coloring of the source image at the top left.
The quick answer to the question of how to modify this vectorizer presets output coloring is to goto the Drawing Setup control panel in the Editor. You can see below the different adjustable options for the Src Color From parameter in the Drawing Setup control panel. Mean is the default option that builds each vectorizer regions coloring based off of the associated local spatial coloring of the source image.
There are many other options for building the vectorizer region coloring. For this example, we're going to focus on the Source Palette Map option for the Src Color From parameter. This option (and any of the others that include 'source palette' in the name build the vector region colorings off of the current colors available in the current source area color palette. I switched the Source Area tab from image to palette so that you can see the source color palette that was being used to map the modified effect's vector region colorings.
Source Palette Map means that the original vector region Mean coloring based on the local coloring of the source image is mapped into the closest source color palette color. If i switch the Src Color From parameter to use the Source Palette random option instead, you can see that the vectorizer effects output coloring is now still based on the current source palette, but rather than using the closest mapping the region color is randomly chosen from one of the current source palette colors.
If you look at the Save Color Palette option in the Drawing Setup control panel, you will see that it is turned off. If you want to store a specific color palette in the vectorizer preset you want to export to a preset file on disk, then you should turn that Save Color Palette option On. Doing so will save and restore the current contents of the source area color palette when you export and later import the vectorizer preset. With the Off setting, the vectorizer preset works off of whatever is currently loaded into the source area color palette.
If you want to build a new color palette off of an image, you can just drag and drop that image into the source area color palette preview cell.
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Thanks John!