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154 lines
6.9 KiB
154 lines
6.9 KiB
<chapter id="introduction">
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<title>Introduction</title>
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<sect1 id="introduction-chalk">
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<title>What is &chalk;?</title>
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<para>
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&chalk;, part of &koffice;, can do everything you want with images — or
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it will be able to one day. Everything from photo retouching, image editing,
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and last but not least creating original art on your computer as if you were
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working with real paint and brushes, pencils, pen and ink. Every day
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&chalk; becomes a little better, a little more useful. We are working on it,
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anyway. We, that is, Adrian, Bart, Boudewijn, Casper, Cyrille, Michael and Sven.
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It could be you, too — whether you would like to help with some artwork
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for the user interface, cool ideas for the todo, helpful bug reports, usability
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reviews or even actual code, you will not be snubbed by us.
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</para>
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<para>
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&chalk; is as much yours as it is ours. It should be fun, innovative, and
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experimental — first and foremost a pleasure to use and to hack on.
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</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="introduction-keyfeatures">
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<title>Key features</title>
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<para>The most important features &chalk; currently has to offer, are:</para>
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<itemizedlist>
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<listitem><para>Plugins: Chalk is extensible through plugins. There are tools,
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colorspaces, paint operations, filters and kpart-based user interface plugins.
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</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Scriptable: &chalk; is scriptable in Python and Ruby using
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Kross, the cross language scripting engine that originated in Kexi. The
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scripting is compatible with PyQt/KDE and Korundum for adding GUI
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items, such as dialog boxes.</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Color models: &chalk; uses lcms for a dependable color
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workflow using icc profiles for importing, exporting, selecting paint colors,
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printing, cutting and pasting. 8, 16, and 32 bit colorspaces are available
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(RGB, CMYK, L*a*b*, ...) and colors can be selected from a color wheel, rgb or
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grayscale sliders or with a palette.</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Editing and viewing: Unlimited undo and redo are available.
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You can cut, copy and paste between lagers and images, with conversion through
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icc profiles if this is necessary. OpenGL is supported for display. The view
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can be made fullscreen and can be split. Rulers are available, the
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image can be zoomed, and for maximizing the workspace all palette windows can
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be hidden in one go. Also a histogram palette is available.</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Images and layers: Layers and entire images can be mirrored,
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sheared, rotated and scaled, converted between colorspaces, and layers in
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different colorspaces can be merged. An image can be separated into colorspace
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channels.</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Layers: Layers can be added, removed, grouped, locked, made
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(in)visible, and re-ordered. Adjustment layers (layers which perform a filter
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function) can be added as well. A layer can be saved as a separate image and
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its colorspace can be changed.</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Tools: Through the innovative paintOp plugin system, all
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painting tools (brush, ellipse, line, etc.) can paint aliased, anti-aliased,
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erase, airbrush and more.</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Filters: &chalk; can multithread the operation of some
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filters. Filters can be previewed in the filter gallery. Available filters
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include color adjustment, sharpen or blur, emboss, raindrops, and
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more.</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Brushes: The GIMP brush shapes can be used, both colored and
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grayscale brushes and pipe brushes. Custom brushes can be created, even from
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entire layers or images. Colored brushes can also be used as
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masks.</para></listitem>
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</itemizedlist>
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<sect2 id="introduction-keyfeatures-colormanagement">
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<title>Color management</title>
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<para>
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One of the most distinguishing features in &chalk; is its color management.
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If you put two screens side to side, you will notice that there is often a lot
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of difference in the way they display colors. Even white, especially white, is
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often not the same thing at all. On one screen it can be a dirty yellow, on
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another screen a sickly bluish. Very seldom is it a creamy milk-white. The same
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holds, unfortunately, for scanners, printers and digital cameras. So, if you
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want to see the right colors on screen and on paper, being the colors that you
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saw when taking your snapshot, you will have to compensate.
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</para><para>
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&chalk; can do this for you: in &chalk;, a color is (almost) never just a set of
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numbers, one for each color channel; it is a set of numbers with information
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attached. And that extra information is contained in a profile: your image has a
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profile, your scanner has a profile, your camera should have a profile and your
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screen has a profile. When passing information from your image to your screen,
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the profiles are checked and the correct color is computed. This may cause a
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little slowness, now and then, but the result is that you can work with colors,
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instead of almost meaningless RGB triplets.
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</para><para>
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Available colorspaces are: 8 bit/channel RGB, CMYK, grayscale and wet
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watercolors, 16 bit/channel RGB, CMYK, grayscale and L*a*b*, <quote>half</quote>
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RGB, and 32 bit float RGB (HDR) and LMS.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2 id="introduction-keyfeatures-imageformats">
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<title>Image formats</title>
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<para>
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&chalk; currently supports the following image formats, both for importing and
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exporting, apart from its own: PNG, TIFF, JPEG, Dicom, XCF, PSD, GIF, BMP,
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XPM, Targa, RGB, and OpenEXR. Additionally, &chalk; can import
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ICO files. PSD (the Photoshop file format) is only supported up to version 6,
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from version 7 on, the Photoshop file format is closed.
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</para><para>
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Embedded icc profiles and exif information are preserved on export to
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supporting file formats. &chalk;'s native file format stores icc and exif
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information.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="introduction-manual">
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<title>About this manual</title>
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<para>
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We are assuming you have got a good working knowledge of &tde; and of your
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operating system. The first chapter will give you a quick tour of &chalk;'s
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cool features; the other chapters will expand on that information.
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</para>
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<note><para>
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This manual is not complete. The invitation to join us and help out extends to
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the manual, too!
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</para></note>
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<para>
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Should you have any questions, comments or suggestions, please contact the
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documentation maintainer at <email>sanderkoning@kde.nl</email>.
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</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="introduction-maintainer">
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<title>About the application maintainer</title>
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<para>
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Hi! I'm Boudewijn Rempt — the current maintainer of &chalk;. I was
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educated as a linguist, retrained as a database developer, work as a Java
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hacker, study theology and I have always liked to paint and sketch a little.
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Conspiciously absent in my life have been two important things for a developer
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of an image app: mathematics and experience with graphic design. That means that
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I am probably not the best person to explain the niceties of using an image
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editor or a paint application to you. If you catch me in an error, please don't
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hesitate to mail me: <email>boud@valdyas.org</email>.
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</para>
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</sect1>
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</chapter>
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