On Wed, Mar 02, 2005 at 01:11:38PM -0800, Michael K. Edwards wrote:
> On Wed, 02 Mar 2005 13:16:44 +0100, Måns Rullgård <mru@inprovide.com> wrote:
> > In your case, your best bet would probably be to provide the
> > photograph without the text, or (even better) provide the image in a
> > more advanced format (e.g. XCF) with the photograph and text in
> > different layers.
>
> Er, reality check? This is the software industry, not the publishing
> industry. It's a pain to work around obscured data and
> compression/decompression cycle artifacts when, say, fixing a spelling
> error in overlaid text, but amateur image manipulators do it all the
> time. If an image isn't permitted in a source tarball unless there's
> a color-glossy-magazine level of professionalism in facilitating later
> modifications, then you might as well toss out 98% of the GUIs in
> Debian, not to mention 99.5% of closed-source software.
Actually, we aim to throw out 100% of closed-source software. But I'm
assuming you were just being careless with trying to make a point.
Unfortunately, the point you're trying to make also misses.
> It's good to encourage people to use sophisticated workflow when
> creating images, as when creating software. But we don't call
> software non-free when it isn't developed using Extreme Programming
> methodology or UML modeling, not least because these techniques are
> overkill for most module-scale programming projects. And we shouldn't
> call images non-free just because they weren't shot Camera RAW,
> imported to a Photoshop clone, and manipulated losslessly at every
> stage.
I deal with archive-quality professional artwork prints (for those who want
the fancy word, look up 'giclee'). For that, I start with a scan of the
origional (normally 'painted with acrylics on pressed paper') artwork, at
anything from 300-1200 dpi (600 is our standard default) on a professional
quality scanner. This is done in a 24-bit uncompressed/lossless format
because that's what's easy to get as lossless out of the scanner, and it's
only travelling a high-speed cable.
First thing after that is a conversion to 24-bit PNG with the addition
of some metadata (date, artist, copyright info, title, etc), done using
Photoshop, followed by color balancing and adjustments as necessary (again,
done in PS).
This is saved as the 'archive' copy. Additional copies (reduced size and
thumbnail) are generated as JPEGs for publication on the sales website,
with the quality set lower both to speed up load times and to prevent
anyone from just downloading and printing a full-quality print without
paying for it.
Let's say that I convince the artist to turn this into a desktop theme
package of some sort. The choices for "What is source" are:
1) The origional artwork
2) The raw scan
3) The PNG
4) One of the JPEGs
#1 is *not* the preferred form of modification. Among other things, it is
quite likely to have been sold, and thus could not possibly be modified
(even though the copyright is retained); even if it had not been, it could
not practically be given to anyone else, due to the lack of a working
unionfs for the universe; one person modifying it would preclude another
person doing so.
2) The raw scan might be - but due to the size and lack of useful metadata,
it is discarded immediately after being converted to another lossless
format. One could argue that it should not be discarded, but again, I
wouldn't choose to work on this format, nor would the artist, so it seems
like a fair bet that this isn't the "preferred source". It might be the
earliest machine-parseable source, but that isn't what the GPL cares about,
nor do I think Debian should need to.
3) The PNG - lossless, compressed, and containing the relevant metadata.
Still not convenient to give to users, perhaps; a lossless PNG can still
be several tens of megs for even an 11x14 print at 600 dpi (the print is
actually smaller than 11x14, that's the outer edge size of the display
matte, not even the print paper). But it *is* the form I would use if I
needed to make additional modifications (add a block text overlay, adjust
color balance, etc).
4) The JPEGs - lossy, and published with a deliberate intent to prevent
easy full-quality reproduction. On the other hand, it is quite possible
that these would be the most useful, as packaged images, due to their small
size and easy of inclusion as theme elements.
5) Transient formats - other than raw scan - may occur, especially in the
process of modifying the preferred format. For example, "Load a PNG, put
it in a layer, create another layer, put text in it, smash them together,
make sure it looks fine, save it as a PNG". I assert that this does not
automatically make the temporary layered format the preferred one; it is
my preferred *method* of modification, but not my preferred *format* for
modification. Now, if I start saving out layered image data because I want
to simplify future modifications, it *would* be my preferred format at that
point.
However, if my scanner only produced JPEGs, and I kept a copy of that and
re-compressed them to be smaller, then the origional JPEG is the preferred
format for modification. The other JPEGs still aren't. So I agree that
it is not *required* that someone use raw mode and lossless manipulation
at every stage (though I find it an offense to my inner purist that they
don't), it *is* required that that be provided (at least in the source
package), *if* that is how they work on the images.
I really haven't ever understood why people find this issue so complicated,
except perhaps a willful disbelief that anyone could be so crude as to work
only in lossy formats.
On a slightly different note: implying that you would need the origional
piece of artwork for it to be source is roughly analagous to requiring
my physical body and brain as the 'source' of a program I write and
distribute. It isn't bits and bytes that Debian can (potentially)
distribute, and therefore, it doesn't enter into the equation of "what is
source?" in any particularly meaningful fashion. "Source" is shorthand
for "Source code", and while the "code" part of that may be better said
"format" to be applicable to all things found on Debian CDs, it still
implies "bits and bytes".
--
Joel Aelwyn <fenton@debian.org> ,''`.
: :' :
`. `'
`-
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