Adding JPEG output image file support to VTK

[John M. Linebarger]

I've added JPEG output file support to VTK and would like to contribute
it back to the code base.  But therein hangs a tale, and any advice
would be appreciated.

First, I'm told that others have also added JPEG output image file
support to VTK.  However, I don't see it in the source base, and my
search of the E-mail archives yielded no hits on JPEG.  Please speak up
if I'm wasting my time here.  Also please speak up if there's a good
reason why such support hasn't made it into the code base
heretofore--maybe there's a technical or political issue I'm ignorant of
in this regard.

Second, somehow the configuration script needs to sense both the
presence of libjpeg.{a,so,lib} and the include file jpeglib.h.  And it
needs to run under NT as well (the JPEG library itself compiles and runs
just fine under NT).   I'm not a configuration script maven--can someone
please advise the best way to do this?

Third, the source base needs to be updated.  VTK gurus have CVS access,
but I'm not sure I want to get this deep.  Is there someone I can just
send the diffs to?

Fourth are the details of my implementation.  I just added methods to
vtkRenderWindow.{h,cxx} that parallel the PPM file output methods that
already exist.  The only unusual thing about my JPEG output file
implementation is that I have added code to turn of chroma downsampling
so that the JPEG image is as high quality as can be obtained by an
inherently lossy compression scheme.  Of course, the location of the
origin needed to be remapped between the framebuffer and the JPEG image.

In short, works great, would like to contribute it back to the source
base if others find it useful, but don't wanna get tied up in my
underwear.  How to proceed, O ye gods of VTK?

Enjoy!

John M. Linebarger
Sandia National Laboratories


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