Creating Tiff's from perl

JediWizard has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Thanks in advance for any wisdom shared.

I need (want) to dynamically create fairly simple tiff images in perl. I need tiffs of a specific demension, containing only text of a specified font (and size) at very specific locations. The images must be 600 DPI, one bit per sample (black text on a white background), with CCITT Group 4 Fax Compression.

I have tried using the Imager package, as it looked to best match my needs, but have not yet been able to get it to output 1 bit per sample, nor Group4 compression. Below is sample code using Imager:

#!/usr/local/bin/perl -w
use strict;

use Imager;


my $impact = Imager::Font->new(file => '/home/me/test/IMPACT.ttf');
my $times  = Imager::Font->new(file => '/home/me/test/times.ttf');

my $img = Imager->new(xsize=>5500, ysize=>6600, chanels=>1, class => '
+fax') || warn Imager->errstr;

my $image = $img->to_paletted(colors=>[Imager::Color->new(255,255,255)
+],
                  class => 'fax',
                  make_colors => 'none',
                  translate => 'errdiff',
                  errdiff => 'stucki') || die Imager->errstr;

$image->string(text=>'14', x=>1750, 'y'=>1220, size=>1470, font=>$impa
+ct, color=>'black', aa=>1, align=>0) or warn $image->errstr;

$image->string(text=>'13716', x=>750, 'y'=>3100, size=>1450, font=>$im
+pact, color=>'black', aa=>1, align=>0) or warn $image->errstr;

$image->write(file=>'./foo.tif') or die $image->errstr;

exit;
[download]

They say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.

—Andy Warhol

Comment on Creating Tiff's from perl Download Code

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Re: Creating Tiff's from perl by mpeters (Chaplain) on Jul 11, 2005 at 15:17 UTC
Crazy as this sounds, I had to to almost the exact same thing recently. I too used Imager. Not only did my images need text in exact locations, but they also needed certain markings, etc. Here's how I did it: First create a tiff of the desired size with any needed markings, at 600 dpi and black and white mode. In perl, use Imager to open that image, create a font, and then write to it in the specified coordinates. Something like: `my $img = Imager->new(); $img->open( file => '/path/to/tiff/file' ); my $color = Imager::Color->new("#000000"); my $font = Imager::Font->new( file => '/path/to/ttf/font', color => $color, ); $img->string( text => $stuff_to_write, x => $x, y => $y, font => $font, );` [download] My project also had the requirement that each letter of each word need to be in a certain place, so I just had a wrapper sub that would take a word and the x/y coords, split the word into individual letters and then use a 'spacing' var to increment the x value and print each letter one by one. HTH -- More people are killed every year by pigs than by sharks, which shows you how good we are at evaluating risk. -- Bruce Schneier	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Creating Tiff's from perl by JediWizard (Deacon) on Jul 11, 2005 at 15:44 UTC
Thank you for you advice. This code does come closer to what I want, but not quite there yet. Even with a one bit input image, with Group4 fax compression, the outputed image becomes 8 bit, without compression. They say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself. —Andy Warhol	[reply] [d/l]
Re^3: Creating Tiff's from perl by mpeters (Chaplain) on Jul 11, 2005 at 16:32 UTC
I'm sorry, I forgot to show how to write out the image, silly me! `$img->write( { file => $tmp->filename, type => 'tiff', class => 'fax', } );` [download] And then in order to get the Group4 compression I did resort to ImageMagick's convert util. `system("convert -page Letter -compress Group4 $filename $filename") +;` [download] The last part I'm still not completely happy with, but since this is a batch process I didn't have to worry so much about having the extra system call. -- More people are killed every year by pigs than by sharks, which shows you how good we are at evaluating risk. -- Bruce Schneier	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Creating Tiff's from perl by marto (Cardinal) on Jul 11, 2005 at 16:15 UTC
As discussed, I think Image::Magick is the way to go with this. The ImageMagick website. Hope this helps Martin	[reply]


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