Book Image

Python 2.6 Graphics Cookbook

By : Michael J Ohlson
Book Image

Python 2.6 Graphics Cookbook

By: Michael J Ohlson

Overview of this book

Python is a great object-oriented and interactive programming language that lets you develop graphics, both static and animated, using built-in vector graphics functions that are provided with Python. Python 2.6 Graphics Cookbook is a collection of straightforward recipes and illustrative screenshots for creating and animating graphic objects using the Python language. This book makes the process of developing graphics interesting and entertaining by working in a graphic workspace without the burden of mastering complicated language definitions and opaque examples. If you choose to work through all the recipes from the beginning, you will learn to install Python and create basic programs for making lines and shapes using the built-in Tkinter module. The confusing topic of color manipulation is explored in detail using existing Python tools as well as some new tools in the recipes. Next you will learn to manipulate font size, color, and placement of text as placing text exactly where you want on a screen can be tricky because font height, inter-character spacing, and text window dimensions all interfere with each other. Then you will learn how to animate graphics, for example having more than one independent graphic object co-exist and interact using various Python methods. You will also learn how you can work with raster images, such as converting their formats using the Python Imaging Library. Next you will learn how you can combine vector images with raster images so that you can animate the raster images with ease. You will also walk through a set of recipes with the help of which you can handle and manipulate blocks of raw data that may be hundreds of megabytes in size using datastreams, files, and hard drives. You will also learn how you can use Inkscape to dismantle existing images and use parts of them for your own graphics and Python programs. At the end of the book you will learn how you can create GUIs for different purposes.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
Python 2.6 Graphics Cookbook
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
Preface
Index

Tracing the shape of an image in Inkscape


We want to use Inkscape to capture a complex series of shapes – ones that would be tedious and difficult to draw with pencil and paper. A practical example of the use of this could be that you may want to paint a picture of an elephant and you need some reliable guidelines, based on a magazine picture or photograph, for the outlines of the limbs and body. One way is to draw a grid on the picture with a pencil and ruler, then repeat a scaled version of the grid on blank canvas and finally to draw the outlines with a lead pencil. An alternative method is to pull a JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP, or TIFF image of the elephant into Inkscape and trace a series of lines over it using the pen tool. These outlines can be printed and traced onto your canvas. These same shapes can be used in Python with Tkinter.

There are other ways of converting raster images to SVG paths but they require a fair amount of pre-conditioning of the images such as color separation and converting...