ControlPoints v1.1.4

ControlPoints is a little application that allows you to select control points more easily than PtPicker. By easily, I mean that I don't like the fact you have to select a point with the cursor of the mouse because it hides what you want to point. My philosophy is that you drop "pointers" and move them around.

Here is a little guide:

• ControlPoints doesn't have a menu bar. Since pictures can be big (mine are usually 1500 * 1500 pixels), space is important... If you want to use more space right-click the mouse and select "Show/Hide toolbar". When the toolbar is not visible, use the pop-up menu (again with a right-click) to add/delete/edit control points, etc...
• To load a picture, double-click a panel a select a picture (*.JPG, *.BMP, *.TIF, *.PSD). Be aware that the first picture loaded is named 0, the second 1, etc... And thus that naming convention will be used to export the control points. That information is really important: if you load a control points file before loading any pictures, be sure to open your pictures in the good order.
• To move around use the scrollbars, click and drag the picture or use the mousewheel.
• You can zoom by pressing the toolbutton. By default, the zoom factor is 200% but you can zoom up to 500%. To do so, right-click the mouse and select a new ratio in the "Zom factor" menu.
• To add control points, click the "Add new point" button or menu. After that, you can move the pointer around to make it point the pixel you want to choose. If you click on a control point, you will notice its tag number will become bold: it's now the active control point. You can move that active control point by one pixel with the arrow keys. If you hold the "Shift" key, it will move it by 10 pixel.
• If you double-click a control point, you will be able to change a few things:
  1. its position by entering new X, Y values;
  2. its color. You can choose a transparent fill too;
  3. its orientation.
  Rem: you can make the control point active first and then click the properties toolbutton or menu.
• The application will save the control points using the PanoTools format. If you load a file first, then add or move control points and choose Save, it will replace the control points in the file.

ControlPoints is free and distributed on an "AS IS" basis, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, either expressed or implied.

Version 1.1.4:

• I've fixed a toolbar bug that stopped toolbuttons from responding. The bug was due to an incompatibility between my programming software and XP manifests. The solution is easy: no more XP theme support until I upgrade or find a solution... Sorry about that (Thanks again to A. L. Frenyo).
• You can specify in the ini file what is the default color and orientation for your pointers. You add a [Pointer] section in the ini file with two entries: "Color" and "Orientation". Color can have the following values: Aqua, Black, Blue, Gray, Green, Lime, Maroon, Navy, Olive, Purple, Red, Silver, Teal, White, Yellow. While Orientation can be 0 (up), 1 (down), 2 (left), 3 (right). I was too lazy to add an editor inside the software; maybe for version 1.1.5.

[Pointer]
Color=White
Orientation=1

• The image adjustments (brightness, contrast, and gamma parameters) have been improved. They have a "memory" now: if you reload a previously modified image, the adjustments are automatically applied. Also the trackbars reflect the current settings even when the image is reloaded.

Version 1.1.3:

• When you change the color of a pointer its twin's color is changed accordingly (suggestion of A. L. Frenyo).
• Fixed a bug: when choosing the dark grey color for a pointer, the ID wasn't displayed.

Version 1.1.2:

• A bug when saving blank projects has been fixed. Thanks to A. L. Frenyo.

Version 1.1.1:

• Drag and drop support for files. You can now drag a script file and drop into ControlPoints.

Version 1.1.0:

• Support for XP themes.
• You can sort the entries in the "Control points list" floating window by simply clicking the corresponding columns header.
• The status bar of "Control points list" window now display the v, a, b, and c values when the optimization is done.
• The "new" toolbutton of the toolbar has a dropdown menu that allow you to choose the default color and orientation for the new control points.

Version 1.0.9:

• Fixed a bug when parsing the distances after a optimization (bug due to the decimal separator which can be different than dot on some (european) systems). Thanks to Andreas Schömann.
• Added a column in the "Control points list" floating window: the alignment. None, vertical, horizontal and custom (with its value).

Version 1.0.8:

• I'm ashamed to say I have only fixed a few unexpected behaviours of the 1.0.6 and 1.0.7 releases. You will notice that you cannot set the orientation of the toolbar on the left or the right at run-time (the menus are grayed). However, you can edit the ini file and use the following values: 1 (for top), 2 (for bottom - default), 3 (for left), 4 (for right). The value to edit is quite obvious.

Version 1.0.7:

• Added Brightness/Contrast/Gamma correction. Right-click one of the panels and choose "Adjust image settings". The changes are not permanent, if you switch to another picture the settings are lost.

Version 1.0.6:

• Fixed a few "known issues" like the scroll in view method that is called when you double-click a couple of control points in the "control points list" floating window, ...
• If you want to select a control point with the mouse and be sure you won't move it inadvertently, press the CTRL key before clicking on it.

• If a control point is active, pressing space bar will switch to its corresponding point in the other panel (if needed it will be scrolled in view).

• Removed the possibility to have a different color for the border and the interior of a control point. It was useless in my humble opinion. Note that if you choose a transparent color, the border color will be the last one used; ie if a control point is red and you choose a transparent color, the border color of the control point will remain red.

• You can right-click the mouse on a control point to quickly change its orientation and color in a contextual menu.

• You can change the orientation of the toolbar. Right-click it to display the popup menu and choose a new orientation.

• Optimization from the software is now possible. The first time you'll try that feature, you'll be asked for the root folder of PTOptimize.exe. Here an example of use:
  1. Create an empty script file with everything ready for optimization but the control points:
  

  ---

  p f2 w2000
  i f2 w1500 h1500 y0 p0 r0 v189 n"pic1.jpg" a0.01 b0.01 c0.01
  i f2 w1500 h1500 y120 p0 r0 v=0 n"pic2.jpg" a=0 b=0 c=0
  i f2 w1500 h1500 y-120 p0 r0 v=0 n"pic3.jpg" a=0 b=0 c=0
  v v0 a0 b0 c0 y1 p1 r1 y2 p2 r2
  

  ---

  2. Open the file in ControlPoints
  3. Drop all the control points
  4. Click the "!" button in the toolbar to launch PTOptimizer
  5. Display the "control points list" floating window to check the distance of each control points (note the status bar is giving the average distance)
  6. If needed you can uncheck one or several control points and start a new optimization. All unchecked control points are not used in the script.
  7. Note two important things: running an optimization doesn't mean the script file is saved (a temporary clone script file is used and deleted), so don't forget to save your work; all unchecked control points are saved to the script file but commented out with a #. Be aware though that ControlPoints will ignore them next time you will load the script file.

Version 1.0.5:

• Changed a few things like converting to lowercase all filenames (in order to save space and ease comparisons), the dropdown menu for the image filenames now shows a check on the left of the current opened image (fyi the caption of the application is pretty explicit too), improved the "scroll in view" feature when you double-click on a control point ID in the "List of control points" floating panel, fixed a bug in the saving procedure, etc...
• Now you can select the alignment type for your control point (none, vertical, horizontal, and custom) in the control point property floating panel.

Version 1.0.4:

• Changed the properties dialog, it's now a floating window that allow you to change the properties of a control point "on the fly" (no need to click on the properties button then click the OK button).
• Now parsing the filenames of the script file when loading it (along with the control points coordinates). Please note that the filenames are not saved (yet) if you click on the save button; only the control points are saved.
• Added two buttons to load image files, the dropdown button open a menu that allow you to reopen quickly previously opened files. If you opened a script file, the menu is filled with the filenames of the i-lines.
• Changed the way the pointers are tagged. Before, for each couple of images, I was calling the pointers 1, 2, ... Now, the first pointer is 0, the second 1, etc... no matter the couple of images. In fact, exactly as it is in the script file.
• Added a floating window that lists all the control points. If you want to display a couple of control points, double-click on an item of the list: the image files will be loaded (if needed) and the control points will appear automatically (scrolling if needed).
• Please note that I have added a lot of features, and I'm not sure this version is stable (even if I do hope it's the case).

Version 1.0.3:

• Better approximation of the pointer positions when the picture is zoomed.
• Support for Tiff, Photoshop (not layered), Paint Shop Pro images (not layered) and Kodac Photo-CD images.
• The caption of the window now give the following information: [<Name of left image>/<Name of right image>] - [Control points file]

Version 1.0.2:

• Fixed a color bug for the pointers.
• Fixed a problem with pointers ID when loading a file of control points.

Version 1.0.1:

• Fixed a bug in the file parsing procedure.
• Completely rewrote the zooming procedure. It requires no memory and work in Windows 9X whatever the zooming ratio.

Version 1.0: First release.

Download v1.1.4 (479K)