OT: Photo Mosaic recommendation needed

FightingIllini1977 wrote on 3/5/2008, 4:51 AM

For one of my videos, I want to create a large photo mosiac of a source picture and zoom in and out of it in my video. My library that I"m utilizing has 4000 pictures from the event so i thought this would be a cool thing to do.

I've been trying to figure out which Photo Mosiac software to go with. If anyone has any recommendations, that would be great. Here are the ones I've reviewed so far: (other options are welcome too)

Mosaic Creator (cost 100 for professional): I'm using the trial and I"m limited to 10,000kb so it's hard to tell the full potential of this software. Everything I output is very low quality and I'm guessing it's largely to do with the fact I'm restricted on the kb's of the output. This editor by far is the most complicated but I think it gives you the most control.

AndreaMosaic(free - donations welcome): This program does the best between all of the mosaic editors but that may be because the quality is not limited. The quality is still slightly lower than what I want for my video as I want to zoom way in on each picture.

Mazzaka (100 bucks): This program again limits your quality so it's hard for me to judge it. It does give you a unque feature to change a specific cell after the render.

RichMosaic: Limited to A4 size so I immediately throw this one out.

Comments

DGrob wrote on 3/5/2008, 11:15 AM

http://www.vasst.com/resource.aspx?id=7505a4df-c080-4a9b-a831-9a7585322a7f

Can't remember how to post the link, but cut and paste this link to Alan Collinge's PictureWall II on the VASST site.I've used it several times and it don't get much sweeter for a Mosaic.

Darryl

jetdv wrote on 3/5/2008, 12:20 PM

Can't remember how to post the link

FightingIllini1977 wrote on 3/5/2008, 1:45 PM

I will test this out later tonight. Thanks for the help.

Jim H wrote on 3/5/2008, 3:03 PM

I had a similar problem getting the perfect solution. I used Andrea Mosaic in this video but it would crash whenever I got the photo size large enough to zoom in on. So I had to cheat it which is obvious here:

http://vimeo.com/141568Team Morph[/link]

Also, to get a jpg as big as you'll need for your 4K images at the size you'll need them, Vegas might burp on you as well.

Jim H wrote on 3/5/2008, 3:09 PM

Darryl, I don't think that Alan Collinge's Picture Wall effect does what these Mosaic programs do...that is take a bunch of images, analyze them by color and brightness and arrange them to create a new image. I could be wrong, but my memory when I tried it it just arranged the images on one screen in whatever order?

nolonemo wrote on 3/5/2008, 5:41 PM

That's great morphing, Jim (although the moving hair is a little creepy)! What did you use for the morphing?

FightingIllini1977 wrote on 3/5/2008, 6:07 PM

Your photo mosaic video you did for the cross-country team is exactly what I'm trying to do. I couldn't even get the picture wall effect to execute in vista so I don't even know if this will achieve the effect.

I'm using the WInMorph3.1 for my morphing and i'm torn on which mosaic software to use. Andrea's looks the best because it's freeware but the quality isn't perfect.

Your video inspired me to try and make Andrea's mosaic work. I like your simple transition at the begining from the actual picture into the mosaic picture.

Any recommendations on settings for Andrea's mosaic software would be appreciated also.

Thanks for all the help.

Jim H wrote on 3/5/2008, 7:10 PM

I used Winmorph for the morphs.
I can't remember what settings I used for the mosaic...it's been a couple years. It didn't take too long to figure out though. I know I gave it to the cheat mode where the program shades the entire image for you to create a better match. I actually printed a poster size photo of it at Kodak's online site (was Ofoto) and it came out really nice as a gift to the coach.