How to create a field of dots that clusters tighter together toward the center

Question

I'm trying to build a very specific texture in Photoshop, and I'm a little stumped. Anyone know if this is possible?

I want a field of dots that meets these 4 criteria:

Dots are packed together tighter toward the center and looser toward the edges
Dots don't overlap
Dots are not distorted into ovals (as would happen if I use Distort filters to spread them out)
Dots are in a semi-random organic pattern
Dots are all the same size [EDIT: Added this. Forgot to put this in originally—apologies.]

I can do this in Illustrator with the Symbol Sprayer tool up to a certain point (see attached image), but then the program slows to a crawl. I need something I can do on a much larger scale.

Thanks in advance!

Semaphoric · Accepted Answer

There is a program you can download called StippleGen, which generates points using Voronoi diagrams. If you run it on a radial gradient, you get something like so:

The result is saved as an SVG file. You can open it in Photoshop,but the paths for the individual points have a stroke but no fill, and can have little hollow white dots in their centers. If you open the file in a Vector editor like Illustrator, you can add fills and remove the strokes, and then copy and paste as a Shape into Photoshop (as I did here).

Myra Ferguson · Answer

You could try the free Comic Kit plugin on Adobe Exchange (https://exchange.adobe.com/apps/cc/13159).

After you install it, do the following

1. Choose Edit > Fill
2. Choose Content: Pattern
3. Check the check box next to Script: under Options
4. Choose Screen_Pattern_ex from the script dropdown menu
5. Click OK

Then in the Screen Pattern dialog, select the following:

In the Basic tab, set Pattern Gradation to Radial
Increase the Randomize Patterns amount as desired
Modify the other settings as desired
Click OK

You may need to test various settings to make the dots not overlap.

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