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/ Gimp::Pixel

NAME

Gimp::Pixel - how to operate on raw pixels

SYNOPSIS

use Gimp;	# all you need is in Gimp.

# Gimp::GDrawable	- The GDrawable structure
# Gimp::Tile		- The Tile family of functions.
# Gimp::PixelRgn	- The PixelRgn family of functions.

DESCRIPTION

You can access the pixels in a drawable through tiles or pixel regions. This manpage explains how this is done in perl. All classes (Gimp::GDrawable, Gimp::Tile, Gimp::PixelRgn) are available with and without the Gimp:: prefix.

GDRAWABLES

Well, you know drawables? (also known as PARAM_DRAWABLE or Gimp::Drawable)? In the Gimp, drawables are things you can draw on: layers, channels or whole images. While most functions named gimp_drawable_something operate on drawable_IDs, some functions (notably the ones operating on raw pixel data!) need a GDrawable instead. Every drawable has a corresponding GDrawable, you can get it with the gimp_drawable_get function:

my $gdrawable = $drawable->get;

When the $gdrawable is destroyed, it is automatically flushed & detached, so you don't need to do this yourself.

TILES

Tiles are the basic building blocks of all drawables. Each drawable consists of a "grid" of tiles, each tile having the same size. The size of a tile is always the same (it's hardcoded in your Gimp program).

The gimp_tile_width and gimp_tile_height functions return the current width/height of a tile (at the moment, this is 64x64).

How do I get a tile? First, you have to grab a GDrawable structure. You can get one from any drawable, by calling the get function:

my $gdrawable = $drawable->get;

in a sense, <$gdrawable> contains all tiles. Changes you make to them might not be reflected in the image until you destroy this variable. (Thats the reason I used "my" int he above example. Once $gdrawable gets out of scope, the drawable in the gimp automatically gets updated).

To get access to a tile, you have to call get_tile or get_tile2. get_tile expects row/column numbers of the tile, while get_tile2 expects pixel coordinates and will return the tile that pixel is in:

my $tile = $gdrawable->get_tile2(1,75,60);

The data method returns and sets the raw pixel data.

$packed_data = $tile->data;	# you don't want this, use Gimp::PDL
$tile->data($packed_data);	# and modify the tile

PIXELREGIONS

PixelRgns are rectangular parts of a drawable. You can access single pixels, rows, columns and rectangles within these regions. Don't expect me to explain everything now, I don't understand the mechanism too well myself..

How do I create a pixel region? First, you have to grab a GDrawable structure. You can get one from any drawable, by calling the get function:

my $gdrawable = $drawable->get;

Now you can create as many PixelRgn structures as you want from the GDrawable:

my $region = new PixelRgn($gdrawable,0,0,50,30,1,0);	# with "new"
my $region = $gdrawable->pixel_rgn(0,0,50,30,1,0);	# or from a drawable

which method you choose is purely a question of style...

The following functions return packed pixel data (see Gimp::PDL for an easier way to manipulate on image data):

$packed_data = $region->get_pixel(45,60);	# return the pixel at (45|60)
$packed_data = $region->get_row(45,60,10);	# return ten horizontal pixels
$packed_data = $region->get_col(45,60,10);	# same but vertically
$packed_data = $region->get_rect(45,60,10,12);	# a 10x12 rectangle

To modify pixels, the dirty bit of the region must be set (I believe, but I don't see the reason what the dirty bit in a region is for so I might be wrong), and you can write pixel data to the region with the following functions, each one corresponding to a get-function:

$region->set_pixel($packed_data,45,60);	# set pixel at (45|60)
$region->set_row($packed_data,45,60);		# set a row
$region->set_col($packed_data,45,60);		# set a column
$region->set_rect($packed_data,45,60,10);	# a 10 pixel wide rectangle

Please note that (different to the C functions they call), the last parameter (width or height) is missing, it can be calculcated from the perl string (if you use piddles, set_rect can calculcate both dimensions from the piddle).

AUTHOR

Marc Lehmann <pcg@goof.com>

SEE ALSO

perl(1), Gimp(1),