DitherFlow UI Introduction

The DitherFlow interface is divided into several key areas:

1. Title and Menu bar

Title bar indicates the current version and the file name being processed. Menu bar contains the options to perform actions such as import/export, customizations etc.

2. Workspace View

The center of the application features two main toggleable viewports:

• Original View: Displays your source media.
• Dithered View: Provides a real-time preview of the applied dithering algorithms and effects.

3. Algorithm & Palette Selection

• Algorithm Dropdown: Choose from a wide variety of dithering methods, including Error Diffusion (Floyd-Steinberg, Atkinson...), Ordered & Blue Noise (Bayer, Bit tonic...), and Custom(Halftone, Polka, Frequency Modulation...).
• Palette Dropdown: Select from built-in Default palettes (Black and White, GameBoy, CGA, NES), Source palettes(Generated from input image) or load your own custom color palettes based on your settings.

4. Algorithm Parameters

An optional panel which appears for selective algorithms comprised of various parameters to control the algorithm output.

5. Adjustment Controls

A comprehensive suite of sliders allows you to fine-tune your media before and during the dithering process:

• Brightness & Contrast: Basic exposure adjustments.
• Midtones & Highlights: Granular control over specific tonal ranges.
• Threshold: Controls the cutoff point for 1-bit dithering.
• Scale & Depth: Adjust the resolution and bit-depth of the output.

6. Specialized Docks

• Special Effects: Add post-processing filters like pixelate, sharpening, Glow and a lot more.
• Presets: Load and Save your favorite configurations or import presets shared by your friend or community to speed up your workflow.
• Palette Generator: Create, save and share custom color palettes according to your choice.
• Settings: Control center for DitherFlow providing settings like Auto Update, Custom Palette Directories and Cache Directory.

7. Bottom Status bar

It indicates the live activities of DitherFlow and provide controls on how your ditheres are rendered in the workspace view.

• Left Corner: It is the live status text of the processing being carried out by DitherFlow.

• Right Corner: It provides the controls like Preview and Pre-Process Video toggleable buttons.

  • Preview toggle: Controls how frequently the dithered view is updated when the parameters are modified.

    • Realtime mode- Updates the dithered view immediately when the parameters are changed.
    • Performance mode- Updates the dithered view with a small delay/de-bounce while you are adjusting your parameters. It is suitable when working with high-resolution files or on low specification computers.

  • Pre-Process Video toggle: This toggle is only visible when working with video files. Default OFF mode renders the dithered frames in realtime during the video playback. When turned ON, playback controls are disabled and whole video is pre-processed with the selected parameters for smooth playback.

Bonus Tips

• Flexible Layout: Toggle the visibility of Original and Dithered view as per your needs. You can also drag-and-drop Control Panel from top to change its position to left or right or minimize the Control Panel with the ">>"
• Viewport Navigation: Use Ctrl/Cmd + Scroll to zoom or the "Fit" buttons to quickly reset your view.
• Quick Interaction: Hover over any selector or slider and scroll to change the values.
• Interactive Labels: Click on any slider value to type in a precise number.
• Effect stack: Hold and drag-n-drop any effect in the effect stack list to change the order how the effect is applied on the final output.