Inspiring

Answered

Frequency separation action

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
October 6, 2021
4 replies
3007 views

There are several ways to do FS. In all of them there's a step with blur - either Gaussian, or Surface, or Median. At this step the action asks the user to choose the appropriate radius. We choose 10 or 20 pixels, or any other number, and it's done. My question is: can this number be automatically added to the name of the FS group? Just curious. I always add it manually not to forget what radius was used.

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Correct answer Stephen Marsh

I believe that it would require a script.

Earth Oliver

Legend

Unfortunately, you can't do the thing you're asking about. In my FS2 action, i got around this by converting the base layer to a SO and then the Median amount would be visible via the smart filter. This also has the side effect of maintaining the original image in the SO.

Stephen Marsh

Community Expert

I thought of this, however, I didn't bring it up as it didn't meet the original request criteria. Now that the topic has panned out, this is the only other alternative that I can think of to automatically capture the original value.

JJMack

Community Expert

You do not have to make the blur step interactive. You can simply record a Gaussian blur step with a Gaussian blur step with a fix radius and not make the step interactive by turning on the steps dialog. I normally use the spot healing brush on the color layer to smooth out the color. The healing brush act quite like blurring filter

JJMack

Ivan ZajatsAuthor

Inspiring

You do not have to make the blur step interactive.
By @JJMack

WRONG

JJMack

Community Expert

If you do now want the blur step radius fixed or interactive what would set the blur step's radius how would a script know what radius would you would want for the current image's content? What does the script need to do to come up with the setting you want used. You seem to want it to be in the range of 10 to 20. How would the script come up with your number?

Post your current Action there are so many of then on the web. You are going to interactivity use the layer in the group what is so bad about an interactive step during it setup?

JJMack

Chuck Uebele

Community Expert

The action that stops to let you change the radius should just have the dialog box turned on, so just turning off the dialog should work. However, different images require different radii. To set the radius, you would want to have an image at the point where you are going to apply the blur. Then you double click on the gaussian blur step, and it will record that step.

Stephen Marsh

Correct answer

Community Expert

I believe that it would require a script.

Ivan ZajatsAuthor

Inspiring

I believe that it would require a script.

By @Stephen Marsh

I guess, you're right, but I know nothing about scripts... so, I need a detailed explanation.

Stephen Marsh

Community Expert

An action can't rename a layer group with the number used in the GB step. A script can...

Therefore you would need to either:

1) Recreate the entire FS action as a script. Best would be to rewrite from scratch with "clean code", however, using xtools one can cheat and convert an action to script. Then all one needs to do is add some extra code to capture the GB value as a variable and rename the group using the variable value.

2) A quicker/easier step would be to use a couple of "helper scripts" for only for the blur value as a variable and the rename group step using the variable. You would then remove the native action recording step to use the GB "helper script" and to rename the group using the variable. Although faster to code, the downside is that the action would not be self contained, it would have dependencies on having the supporting scripts accessible as well. This may or may not be an issue depending on various factors (is this only for you, will this be shared, if shared how competent will the other users be in installing the scripts to a relative path or re-recording the scripts as an absolute path etc).

EDIT: With some reflection, I don't believe that the second option would work, as the variable for the GB value from the first helper script would not be availale to the second renaming script, unless one used a log file.

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