Joe Maller: Joe's Filters: Joe's Minimum Maximum

Joe's Minimum Maximum is a part of Joe's Filters, a shareware package of utility and image processing tools for Final Cut Pro.

What it does

Joe's Minimum Maximum grows the light or dark pixels in an image. This effects is purely digital, and does not mimic anything I've ever seen in nature. Negative values grow the darks, positive values grow the lights. This has the effect of closing up spots in the image.

Minimum and Maximum are the Photoshop names for Erode and Dissolve, two fundamental digital image processes missing from Final Cut Pro's built-in toolbox. Applying these effect in sequence, once positive and once negative, is called Opening or Closing.

This filter recreates morphologial image processes using standard FXScript commands. Because this filter is something of a hack workaround for something simple, it's not very fast to render with large values.

If you are curious about FXScripts and Final Cut Pro, I also wrote a page about the FXScript behind Joe's Minimum Maximum...

Example Images

Original Image
Amount: -5	Amount: 5

The Controls

• Amount (-20 - 20)

  The number of iterations out from the source pixel. Negative values darken, positive values lighten. The larger the absolute value entered, the larger the resulting squares. Large values (over 10) can significantly increase rendering times.

• Mode, Opacity

  Composite controls to specify how to apply the processed image back onto the original.