diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'README.rst')
| -rw-r--r-- | README.rst | 154 |
1 files changed, 154 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/README.rst b/README.rst new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c937116 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.rst @@ -0,0 +1,154 @@ +Gerbolyze high-resolution image-to-PCB converter +================================================ + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/sample1.jpg + +Tooling for PCB art is quite limited in both open source and closed source ecosystems. Something as simple as putting a +pretty picture on a PCB can be an extremely tedious task. Depending on the PCB tool used, various arcane incantations +may be necessary and even modestly complex images will slow down most PCB tools to a crawl. + +Gerbolyze solves this problem in a toolchain-agnostic way by directly vectorizing bitmap files onto existing gerber +layers. Gerbolyze has been tested against both the leading open-source KiCAD toolchain and the industry-standard Altium +Designer. Gerbolyze is written with performance in mind and will happily vectorize tens of thousands of primitives, +generating tens of megabytes of gerber code without crapping itself. With gerbolyze you can finally be confident that +your PCB fab's toolchain will fall over before yours does if you overdo it with the high-poly anime silkscreen. + +.. contents:: + +Produce high-quality artistic PCBs in three easy steps! +------------------------------------------------------- + +Gerbolyze works in three steps. + +1. Generate a scale-accurate preview of the finished PCB from your CAD tool's gerber output: + + .. code:: + + $ gerbolyze render top my_gerber_dir preview.png + +2. Load the resulting preview image into the GIMP or another image editing program. Use it as a guide to position scale + your artwork. Create a black-and-white image from your scaled artwork using GIMP's newsprint filter. Make sure most + details are larger than about 10px to ensure manufacturing goes smooth. + +3. Vectorize the resulting grayscale image drectly into the PCB's gerber files: + + .. code:: + + $ gerbolyze vectorize top input_gerber_dir output_gerber_dir black_and_white_artwork.png + +Image preprocessing guide +------------------------- + +Nice black-and-white images can be generated from any grayscale image using the GIMP's newsprint filter. The +straight-forward pre-processing steps necessary for use by ``gerbolyze vectorize`` are as follows. + +1 Import a render of the board generated using ``gerbolyze render`` +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +``gerbolyze render`` will automatically scale the render such that ten pixels in the render correspond to 6mil on the +board, which is about the smallest detail most manufacturers can resolve on the silkscreen layer. You can control this +setting using the ``--fab-resolution`` and ``--oversampling`` options. Refer to ``gerbolyze --help`` for details. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/01import01.png + +2 Import your desired artwork +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +Though anime or manga pictures are highly recommended, you can use any image including photographs. Be careful to select +a picture with comparatively low detail that remains recognizable at very low resolution. While working on a screen this +is hard to vizualize, but the grain resulting from the low resolution of a PCB's silkscreen is quite coarse. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/02import02.png + +3 Paste the artwork onto the render as a new layer +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/03paste.png + +4 Scale, rotate and position the artwork to the desired size +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/04scale_cut.png + +For alignment it may help to set the artwork layer's mode in the layers dialog to ``overlay``, which makes the PCB +render layer below shine through more. If you can't set the layer's mode, make sure you have actually made a new layer +from the floating selection you get when pasting one image into another in the GIMP. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/05position.png + +5 Convert the image to grayscale +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/06grayscale.png + +6 Fine-tune the image's contrast +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +To look well on the PCB, contrast is critical. If your source image is in color, you may have lost some contrast during +grayscale conversion. Now is the time to retouch that using the GIMP's color curve tool. + +When using the GIMP's newsprint filter, bright grays close to white and dark grays close to black will cause very small +dots that might be beyond your PCB manufacturer's maximum resolution. To control this case, add small steps at the ends +of the grayscale value curve as shown (exaggerated) in the picture below. These steps saturate very bright grays to +white and very dark grays to black while preserving the values in the middle. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/08curve_cut.png + +7 Retouch details +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +Therer might be small details that don't look right yet, such as the image's background color or small highlights that +merge into the background now. You can manually change the color of any detail now using the GIMP's flood-fill tool. + +If you don't want the image's background to show up on the final PCB at all, just make it black. + +Particularly on low-resolution source images it may make sense to apply a blur with a radius similar to the following +newsprint filter's cell size (10px) to smooth out the dot pattern generated by the newsprint filter. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/09retouch.png + +In the following example, I retouched the highlights in the hair of the character in the picture to make them completely +white instead of light-gray, so they still stand out nicely in the finished picture. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/10retouched.png + +8 Run the newsprint filter +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +Now, run the GIMP's newsprint filter, under filters, distorts, newsprint. + +The first important settings is the spot size, which should be larger than your PCB's minimum detail size (about 10px +with ``gerbolyze render`` default settings for good-quality silkscreen). In general the cheap and fast standard option of chinese PCB houses will require a larger detail size, but when you order specialty options like large size, 4-layer or non-green color along with a longer turnaround time you'll get much better-quality silk screen. + +The second important setting is oversampling, which should be set to four or slightly higher. This improves the result +of the edge reconstruction of ``gerbolyze vectorize``. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/11newsprint.png + +The following are examples on the detail resulting from the newsprint filter. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/12newsprint.png + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/13newsprint.png + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/14newsprint.png + +9 Export the image for use with ``gerbolyze vectorize`` +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +Simply export the image as a PNG file. Below are some pictures of the output ``gerbolyze vectorize`` produced for this +example. + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/14result_cut.png + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/15result_cut.png + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/screenshots/16result_cut.png + +Gallery +------- + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/sample2.jpg + +.. image:: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jaseg/gerbolyze/master/sample3.jpg + |