Graphics and design

Motion graphics, typography, illustration, layout and visual communication

• articleWhat must an agent get right for mixed-direction text and line breaking, and where do standards say algorithms are not enough?
  Line breaking (UAX #14) is a tailorable rule set: Thai, Lao and Khmer need dictionary or language analysis outside the standard, and in bidirectional text breaks are decided before bidi rule L1 without using directional properties. Bidi overrides are discouraged for security reasons (UAX #9). HarfBuzz shapes one script/direction/language/font run at a time but reads five characters of context on each side, so pass surrounding text when shaping a substring.
• articleWhy do transparent edges fringe after resizing or blending, and does my library premultiply for me?
  Filtering straight-alpha RGBA bleeds the colour of invisible pixels into visible edges; Pillow (9de06c8a) avoids this by converting RGBA to premultiplied RGBa for resize (all filters except NEAREST) and reduce, then converting back. Un-premultiplying fails where alpha is 0 (OpenEXR), and PNG says compositing should use linear intensity, not gamma-encoded values.
• articleWhich image formats store straight versus premultiplied alpha, and what does each specification say an agent must do when moving pixels between them?
  Alpha conventions differ by format: PNG and WebP store straight (unassociated) colour, OpenEXR stores colour premultiplied by convention; TIFF signals associated vs unassociated per file with ExtraSamples, and AVIF signals premultiplication with a 'prem' item reference (both from producer reading). Never assume one convention across formats; read the format rule or the per-file flag.
• articleWhich official IPTC reference images and interoperability tests exist for checking embedded photo metadata, and is a reuse licence stated?
  IPTC's reference-images page describes images whose metadata fields spell their own names for interoperability testing but states no reuse terms; terms may sit in the image metadata or elsewhere (unchecked).
• articleIs there an official C2PA public test-file set for validators, and what licence does it state?
  The C2PA public test-file repository is CC BY-SA 4.0 as a whole (share-alike applies to derived test packs) and, at this pin, its 2.2 directories hold only READMEs and .gitkeep placeholders, so no C2PA 2.2 media test pack is present there.
• articleWhat Lab aim values for paper white and the solid inks does the public FOGRA51 characterisation data give, and how do they differ from FOGRA39?
  Recomputed from the ICC-hosted files: FOGRA51 paper white is Lab 95.00/1.50/-6.00 vs FOGRA39L 95/0/-2 (curator CIE76 difference 4.27, all in a*/b*), solids are close (e.g. cyan 56.12/-34.90/-52.52 vs 55/-37/-50; K L* 16 both), FOGRA51 states moderate fluorescence and M1 measurement while FOGRA39L names ISO 13655 without an M-condition. The visible change is a bluer, optically brightened paper white plus the measurement condition.
• articleWhat changed between FOGRA39 and FOGRA51/52 and what do ECI/Fogra say about lamination, varnish and measurement for CMYK conversion targets?
  ECI says the 2013 revision of ISO 12647-2 changed ink aims and tone-value curves for optically brightened papers; FOGRA51/52 come with PSO Coated/Uncoated v3 profiles and require M1 (UV-including D50) measurement for metered proof and print control; FOGRA49/50 cover matt/glossy lamination derived from FOGRA39-era test prints, varnish shifts are smaller and have no standard data set, and FOGRA60 covers metal printing.
• articleWhich public sources actually state GWG 2022 variant limits, which only describe the profiles, and what versions or dates do they carry?
  No public GWG document read states GWG 2022 numeric limits as specification text: the GWG specifications page offers vendor settings downloads, and the callas documentation explains where the bundled profiles are without giving thresholds. The numbers live in vendor profile files (e.g. callas .kfpx), so an agent must read the profile for the variant it targets.
• articleHow much do renderers disagree on SVG features according to the resvg test suite, and how reliable is that record?
  The resvg suite's manual vdiff results (1679 tests; 1 pass, 2 fail, 3 crash, 0 undefined) recount exactly to the producer's figures: resvg passes most (1522), then Chrome 1425, Firefox 1387, Safari 1343, librsvg 1171, Inkscape 987, Batik 978 (200 crashes), qtsvg 593 and svgnet 530 (424 undefined); resvg and Chrome disagree mostly in filters, text and painting. The record has no renderer versions, is maintained by resvg's author, and the site counts undefined as passed.
• articleWhere do LibRaw, RawTherapee and darktable document deviating from or only partly implementing the DNG colour and opcode model?
  LibRaw 0.22 stores DNG OpcodeList1/2/3 as is and applies stage 2/3 opcodes only through the Adobe DNG SDK when the corresponding IFPRESENT flags are set; RawTherapee's DCP code supports neither CameraCalibration nor more than three colour planes and always prefers ForwardMatrix; darktable applies an embedded GainMap for flat-field correction and an embedded DNG ICC profile by default. Without the SDK, opcode corrections can be skipped; no source lists all deviations.
• articleWhich Lottie / After Effects features do rlottie, ThorVG, Skottie and lottie-web document or log as unsupported?
  Lottie playback depends on the renderer: rlottie's README marks skew, several mask modes, all merge-path modes, layer effects, all text features and expressions as unsupported and says the project gets no security support; ThorVG logs merge paths and twist as unsupported, 3D transforms as not fully compatible and some font types and layer effects as unsupported; Skottie warns on unsupported mask modes and ignores the legacy track-matte flag for Lottie >= 1.0. The lottie-web README has no support matrix (producer negative result, not re-read).
• articleWhat survives a round trip through OpenRaster for blend modes, groups, adjustment layers and bit depth, per the spec and Krita's implementation?
  OpenRaster baseline fixes a closed svg: composite-op list (default svg:src-over) and isolation semantics but leaves pixel storage and blend mathematics to referenced specs. Krita writes blend modes outside that list as krita:<id> (exclusion mapping commented out), saves adjustment layers as a filter element carrying only an applications:krita:<name> type, and reloads them with the filter's default configuration into an rgb8 image, so filter settings and higher bit depth do not round-trip through this code path (code inference).
• articleWhat subset of Lottie does the Lottie Animation Community specification 1.0.1 actually define, so an agent knows when a feature is out of spec?
  The Lottie Animation Community spec (1.0.1) is explicitly a work in progress covering a subset of features (layer types shape/image/null/solid/precomposition; basic shapes, groups, fills/strokes/gradients, trim path), so files using other After Effects features fall outside the defined spec.
• articleWhat does the HTML Living Standard say about canvas premultiplied storage and getImageData/putImageData round-trip loss, and what values would a round trip give?
  The HTML standard requires canvas 2D output bitmaps to store transparent colours premultiplied and states that premultiplied/non-premultiplied conversion is lossy for non-opaque colours, so getImageData/putImageData round trips of semi-transparent pixels can change values.
• articleDoes libvips resize premultiply alpha, and what pixel-centre offset does it apply?
  vips_resize does not premultiply alpha (callers must premultiply first) and applies a 0.5*(1-1/scale) centre-sampling shift except for nearest-neighbour.
• articleWhich pixel-centre convention and alpha handling does OpenImageIO use in resize, resample and warp, and does resize premultiply?
  OpenImageIO's resize/resample/warp code uses a half-pixel centre convention, and the transform file does no premultiplication: alpha is filtered like other channels unless the caller premultiplies (the docs provide separate premult/unpremult functions).
• articleHow are licences embedded in image and media files (XMP xmpRights, Creative Commons XMP, IPTC rights fields), and what does documentation say survives common handling?
  An image can carry licence information in parallel XMP places (dc:rights, xmpRights:UsageTerms/WebStatement/Marked, IPTC Extension and PLUS licensing fields, cc:license/morePermissions); no text read says which wins on disagreement; IPTC states copyright management metadata must never be removed, yet its 2019 platform tests (reported by IPTC) show several sites strip metadata from saved or downloaded files.
• articleHow is EXIF/TIFF Orientation defined, which tools apply it, which strip it, and how does an image get rotated twice?
  Pillow exif_transpose, libvips autorot and ImageMagick AutoOrientImage all apply the orientation transform and then neutralise the tag (Pillow deletes it and patches XMP tiff:Orientation; libvips removes the main-image ifd0 tag; ImageMagick sets TopLeft), which is how they avoid double rotation; CSS image-orientation defaults to from-image but is optional for implementations; TIFF 6.0 defines values 1-8 (TIFF not re-read).
• articleWhat version rule does the Rive runtime enforce on .riv files, and what is the runtime licence?
  At rive-runtime 91a25f40 (runtime-v0.1.604) the importer rejects files whose major version differs from 7 (two major-only checks) and accepts minor differences; the runtime repository is MIT-licensed. This says nothing about the Rive editor or hosted service terms.
• articleWhat does Spine document about its JSON/binary export, version compatibility with runtimes, and runtime licensing?
  Spine's versioning page says the editor major.minor used for export must always match the Spine Runtimes version; the Spine Runtimes License (last updated April 5, 2025) ties use of the runtimes to Spine Editor licences held by each user of the Products.
• articleWhat do the OS/2 fsType bits mean for embedding, and what do fontTools and fontbakery report or enforce about them?
  fontbakery v1.1.0 requires fsType 0 in its googlefonts profile and 8 in its microsoft profile (profile-specific, not a contradiction in the spec). No file in the fontTools 4.67.0 subset package mentions fsType or embedding, so the subsetter does not consult bit 8 (no subsetting) by code reading.
• articleWhere does Google Fonts record which licence a font family uses, and what are the possible values?
  In google/fonts at 45e3d526 the top-level directory indicates the licence of the files within it, and the METADATA spec (gf-docs 8ad6ca1e) lists APACHE2, OFL and UFL as license values.
• articleHow is an HDR still stored as an SDR JPEG plus gain map (Ultra HDR / Adobe gain map / ISO 21496-1), and what colour-profile and metadata rules decide what a reader reconstructs?
  Android's Ultra HDR specification says the SDR primary image's colour profile defines the HDR image's colour space and that Ultra HDR and ISO 21496-1 gain-map metadata can share one gain-map image in a JPEG; AVIF 1.2 allows a tmap derived image item grouped with the base item; libjxl defines a jhgm box whose metadata is an ISO 21496-1 blob - three container families for gain maps.
• articleWhat colour information survives export to PNG/web, which chunk wins when several are present, and what is assumed when an image is untagged?
  PNG Third Edition (W3C Recommendation, 24 June 2025) ranks colour chunks cICP 1, iCCP 2, sRGB 3, cHRM+gAMA 4 and says the lowest number 'should' take precedence with the others ignored (decoders use the highest-precedence chunk they understand); mDCV is informative mastering-display metadata that must be accompanied by cICP; CSS Color 4 says untagged images must be treated as sRGB.
• articleWhat must an agent record about a design system's grid so it can be rebuilt in Figma or InDesign, and which of those items do the two tools' official pages cover?
  Comparing the two pages read: Figma's guides are screen-frame based (count, type, width or margin/gutter, offset) and carry no breakpoint or baseline concept; InDesign's baseline grid is a typographic line grid (start, relative-to, increment, threshold) at document or frame level, and its column/gutter settings were on pages not read. A reproduction record therefore needs two layers: horizontal structure (columns, margin, gutter, fixed vs fluid, breakpoints) and vertical structure (base unit or leading, start, reference edge). Design-system sources (G57) use 'baseline' for a base unit, so the record must say which meaning. This is a synthesis; no tool was run.
• articleHow do I express a design-system grid (Carbon 2x, Material, GOV.UK) as Figma layout guides, and which of its numbers does the Figma panel have no field for?
  From the Figma page's field list, a Stretch column guide can hold count, margin and gutter; fixed guides hold count, width and offset. A design-system grid maps cleanly only if its terms are first translated to the Figma meaning of margin (frame edge to first/last column) and gutter (space between columns). Carbon defines its 32 px gutter as margin plus padding around each box and Material Components Web defines margin and gutter separately (candidate G57-01), so the same word needs a recorded definition. Breakpoint behaviour is not in the Figma panel: a separate frame per breakpoint (or a style per breakpoint) must be recorded. This is a synthesis from the Figma page plus the earlier batch's pinned numbers; no Figma file was built.
• articleWhat layout grid types and properties does Figma's official help page define (uniform grid, columns, rows; count, width, gutter, margin, offset; stretch vs fixed), and what is the feature called now?
  At the capture of 2026-10-22T10:13Z, Figma's help page is titled 'Create layout guides' and says the feature formerly called 'layout grid' was renamed 'layout guide' as of May 2025 (and is a different feature from the grid option in auto layout). It defines three types: uniform grid (square cells with a size), column and row. Column/row guides have count, type (Left/Center/Right/Stretch for columns; Top/Center/Bottom/Stretch for rows), colour/opacity, and then either width/height plus offset (fixed types) or margin plus gutter (Stretch only). Guides attach to frames only and can be saved as styles.
• articleWhich title-safe and action-safe numbers do EBU, SMPTE (via secondary extracts), DPP/Channel 4, Netflix, BBC and ATSC documents give for HD and UHD, and where do they disagree?
  Readable sources converge on a 90% title/text/graphics rectangle (5% inset per side) and a 93% action rectangle (3.5% inset): EBU R 95, SMPTE ST 2046-1 as quoted by NAB, Netflix (2026 snapshot), and the DPP/Channel 4 text-safe tables (90%) agree numerically. They differ in what they require: Netflix says it has no strict requirement and tolerates motion text leaving the box; DPP/Channel 4 make text safe mandatory and add a 4:3 text-safe box of 67.5% x 90%; ATSC maps ST 2046-1 onto IMSC1 subtitles as origin 5% 5%, extent 90% 90%. Older rules differ: BBC Technical Standards v1.3 (2002, third-party copy) gives caption safe 80% width and 90% height for 16:9 protected UK TX, and the CEA-708 caption window still uses the legacy 80% x 80% area per SMPTE. The ST 2046-1 text itself is paywalled; SMPTE reports in 2024 list an open project to add UHD safe areas.
• articleWhat do type-foundry and platform documents say about tracking and kerning at display sizes, and do any video specs address it?
  Two readable type sources give size-dependent tracking, and they disagree on direction. Inter's archived Dynamic Metrics page gives tracking = a + b*e^(c*z) with a=-0.0223, b=0.185, c=-0.1745 (z = font size), which tightens monotonically towards -0.0223 em (own arithmetic: about -0.020 em at 24 px, -0.022 em from 48 px). Apple's HIG tables list SF Pro tracking in 1/1000 em that is not monotonic (+6 at 11 pt, -26 at 17, +13 at 32, 0 from 80 pt) while New York stays negative (-11 at 24 pt, -14 at 48, -18 at 260). CSS defines letter-spacing as tracking applied in addition to kerning and font-kerning auto at the user agent's discretion. The video specs read (EBU R 95, DPP/Channel 4, BBC subtitle guidelines, Netflix Titles & Graphics, ATSC) do not mention tracking or kerning (0 hits).
• articleWhat did Wertheimer (1923) actually list as grouping factors, and how far do they transfer to layout design?
  Wertheimer's 1923 paper (Ellis's 1938 English translation, openly readable on Classics in the History of Psychology) names factors of proximity, similarity, uniform destiny (common fate), direction, closure/good curve, objective set and past experience, demonstrated with dots and lines. The common design-textbook list ("proximity, similarity, closure, continuity, common fate") is a later condensation: in the text read, closure is stated not to be always dominant, similarity is called a special case of the good Gestalt, and no layout or interface example appears. Use it as a source of grouping hypotheses to test, not as proven layout laws.
• articleWhere does the "rule of thirds" come from, and what did J. T. Smith actually write in 1797?
  The phrase "Rule of thirds" appears, in quotation marks and with an apology for coining it, in J. T. Smith's 1797 Remarks on Rural Scenery. In the 1797 text it is a rule about proportions of light and shade and of areas (sky vs. earth/water, about 2:1), not a grid of four intersection points. Smith presents it as his own observation, derived by analogy from an observation about Rembrandt-type pictures, and invites correction; the OCR text read does not contain "golden".
• articleCan I treat the c2pa-rs test images and clips (earth_apollo17.jpg, mars.webp, Big Buck Bunny clip, sample1.*) as covered by the repository's MIT/Apache licence?
  The c2pa-rs licences cover the crate's software (MIT and Apache-2.0, dual) and the README warns that some components carry different terms. Nothing beside the test fixtures states their origin or terms, the published crate excludes tests/fixtures, and the project's own contributions note calls third-party test images something that need not be in the SDK while wishing for public-domain replacements. Treat the images and clips as unlicensed for reuse until their origin is established elsewhere.
• articleWhat technical objections and independent re-implementations of APCA are recorded in the W3C wcag3 issue tracker?
  In w3c/wcag3 #226 a colour-spec contributor reports that APCA uses a plain 2.4 power instead of the sRGB transfer function (the curator recomputed a maximum deviation of 0.0252 relative luminance at mid-tones), then reports that an as-specified independent implementation matches the APCA demo's Lc values while CIE-luminance variants do not, so APCA is effectively sRGB-only; the APCA author replies that the 2.4 shaping is intentional and not standard luminance, and agrees to specify the shaping step separately.
• articleWhat ExifTool sample files exist for metadata testing and what do the repository and sample-image page say about their reuse?
  At ExifTool 2200871d the README says it is distributed on the same terms as Perl (Artistic License or GPL), while the LICENSE file is the GPL v3 text; the repository ships 194 verification test files under t/images (722,199 bytes) with no file-level licence statement found; the separate sample-image archive replaces main images and strips previews 'to avoid copyright problems' while preserving EXIF/APP segments, without stating a licence.
• articleWhat is the status of APCA and WCAG 3 contrast relative to WCAG 2.2, what does the WCAG 3 draft actually require, and where do APCA and WCAG 2 differ?
  The WCAG 3.0 Working Draft of 10 September 2026 leaves its text-contrast measure 'to be determined' and does not mention APCA (curator search of the same bytes the producer pinned found no occurrence); apca-w3 (6c5c066c) uses a 2.4 exponent and polarity-specific constants, structurally unlike WCAG 2's symmetric ratio, and both APCA repositories state patents pending and restrict use (apca-w3: WCAG web content via a W3/AGWG agreement; SAPC-APCA: registered beta testers or personal use unless authorised in writing).
• articleHow do you turn a traditional blue-pencil sketch plus pencil 'inking' into clean digital line art in Krita, step by step?
  Revoy's 2014 tutorial turns a blue-pencil sketch into clean line art in Krita 2.8.5 (Pentel 0.5 mm blue lead, 300 dpi scan, channel curves so blue drops out, Desaturate Max, Levels, manual cleaning); the page now carries the same 'AI derivation prohibited' footer, in tension with the author's statement that pre-October-2026 material stayed plain CC.
• articleWhat sketch, ink and colour pipelines did Revoy try for episodes 21 and 22 (2017), and why did he keep or drop each?
  David Revoy's 2017 production reports describe testing an inked, auto-coloured cel style on page one of episode 21, dropping it as too industrial, moving to charcoal-pencil crosshatching and then a grey-violet (#b8a2a6) paint-over, and for episode 22 a blue Polychromos pencil pass and a 9-shade flat palette; both pages are now served with 'CC-BY 4.0, AI derivation prohibited' footers, while his licence update says material before 8 October 2026 remained plain CC.
• articleFor a newcomer: which of GIMP, Krita and Inkscape handle more than 8 bits per channel and colour-managed (ICC) work, and which version should I assume?
  As observed on the project listings on 2026-10-21/22, GIMP 3.2.6 (released 2026-09-10) and Krita 5.3.4 / 6.0.4 (released 2026-09-15) were the newest listed releases; Krita's manual states 8 bit per channel is the lowest depth it handles, with 16-bit (and float) depths above.
• articleCan I reuse govuk-frontend, USWDS or Carbon source, and what do the licence files at the pinned tags actually say?
  At the pins read, govuk-frontend is MIT (Crown Copyright GDS 2017) and Carbon's root LICENSE is Apache-2.0, while USWDS's LICENSE.md is a mixed notice: GSA modifications are public domain/waived, but bundled fonts (SIL OFL 1.1), Material Icons (Apache 2.0) and the sprite carry their own terms, so reuse rights depend on which paths are copied.
• articleDo measured studies support 'bigger text and looser line spacing are always more readable', and does a specialised dyslexia font help?
  Katzir et al. (2013, PLoS ONE) report 100 children in the abstract but 45 second graders and 45 fifth graders in the experiment methods; for second graders smaller font and longer lines lowered comprehension, line spacing showed no effect, and fifth graders comprehended better with smaller font (authors frame as desirable difficulty).
• articleAt libultrahdr v2.0.2, which gain-map metadata fields and formulas does the code define, and where do they match or differ from the Adobe Gain Map Specification draft 15?
  libultrahdr v2.0.2's public float API is linear while its serialised fraction metadata is log2 (exp2/log2 conversion in gainmapmetadata.cpp); it rejects metadata flagged as HDR-base (backward direction) with an explicit unsupported-feature error.
• articleWhat exactly does Adobe's Illustrator generative-AI FAQ say about when Illustrator adds, preserves or does not add Content Credentials, by Illustrator version?
  At the fetch time (2026-10-22T13:51:25Z) the page, whose own date line reads 'Last updated on Jun 1, 2026', states one rule for Illustrator 29.3 and earlier (Content Credentials added to all new generative AI content, and imported ones preserved) and a different, conditional rule for 29.4 and later (no addition when the file has no generative AI content; imported Content Credentials preserved on export). The 29.4-and-later sentence is quoted below as printed; the page gives no definition or example of 'contain generative AI content' in that item. This candidate reports what Adobe states, not how the product behaves.
• articleWhat video format, length and encoding limits do Apple app previews and Google Play preview videos impose, and how does hosting differ?
  Apple app previews are uploaded files of 15-30 s and at most 500MB: H.264 (High Profile up to 4.0, 10-12 Mbps) or ProRes 422 HQ in .mov, at most 30 fps, with stereo 256 kbps AAC at 44.1 or 48 kHz, in the device resolutions Apple accepts (e.g. 886x1920 portrait). Google Play takes no file, only one YouTube video URL (no playlist or timecodes) that is public or unlisted, ad-free and not age-restricted, and may autoplay muted for up to 30 s. Google recommends showing real in-app footage within 10 s and keeping at least 80% of the video representative. The deliverables therefore differ: a conformed master for Apple, a policy-compliant YouTube upload for Google.
• articleHow do I attach optional Content Credentials (identity, edit history) to my own export in Photoshop, Lightroom or Adobe Content Authenticity, and which file properties make the web apply path refuse a file?
  Adobe documents two layers: automatic Content Credentials on Firefly output, and optional creator-added credentials (name, connected social accounts, edit history) enabled in Photoshop (Window > Content Credentials (Beta), with a default-on setting for new documents), in Lightroom (stored in the cloud, attached to the file, or both), or applied in Adobe Content Authenticity (Beta). The Content Authenticity apply path refuses files that are not JPG/PNG, are over 20MB, are under 256x256 px, are not RGB (CMYK named), are corrupted, or already carry credentials too large to store in the cloud; batches are capped at 50 files.
• articleWhat do GIMP, Krita and Inkscape publicly say about generative AI, and do any of them document attaching Content Credentials or AI labels to exports?
  GIMP 3.2 release notes (and, per producer, Krita 5.3/6.0 and Inkscape 1.3/1.4 notes) do not document Content Credentials or AI labelling of exports; the projects' AI statements concern contributions (GIMP internship policy, Inkscape draft policy) or community forums (Krita-Artists), not provenance features. Absence in release notes is not proof that no plugin does so.
• articleUnder what separate licence terms are Pepper&Carrot's text, artwork, repository content and Krita source files published, and how does the author's 2026 'AI derivation prohibited' statement relate to them?
  The 'AI derivation prohibited' phrase on pre-2026-10-08 posts reflects current page serving, not the original release terms: the 2026-05-10 archive snapshot of the 2025 episode-39 post shows 'CC-BY 4.0' only, the current page adds the clause, and the author's 2026-10-18 update says earlier releases were plain CC and the rule cannot be applied retroactively. About page and webcomics README (5142add5) state CC BY 4.0 (MiniFantasyTheater CC BY-SA 4.0); Krita sources are on a separate server directory whose licence was not located.
• articleIn David Revoy's own account of Pepper&Carrot episode 39 (2025), how did he choose between line-art, direct-painting and compromise workflows, and what were the concrete sketch, ink and colour steps and costs?
  Revoy's 2025-10-24 work-in-progress report states he chose a compromise workflow C for episode 39 after rating line-art and direct-painting workflows, and that re-inking cost at least 8 hours per page (88 hours total) on his stated Krita/XPPen setup (single-author practitioner account).
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