Bulk Photo Tools and Behind the Scenes

I hope you had a nice weekend. Over Easter we decided to make our own large, hollow chocolate eggs. We bought some moulds and chocolate, melted it down, and poured it in with our own fillings. It was a lot of fun, and slightly “healthier” than shop-bought eggs since we could use better quality chocolate. I filled mine with cornflakes and peanut butter, which turned out excellent.

There’s something quite nice about making things from scratch, even when it’s a bit messy. That mindset has carried over into what I’ve been working on this week. It’s messy, but that’s half the fun.

Over the past week I’ve been working on an update to Brush Ninja, improving the drawing tool I call Paint Ninja. It’s a lightweight alternative to Photoshop, or more closely Procreate. A simple, fun drawing app that runs in your browser. I’ve collected a lot of feedback over the years, and the main request has been layers, which I’ve now added.

It’s a fairly big update, and there are probably a few bugs I haven’t spotted yet, but I’m really happy with how it’s working. While I was in there I also added a new smudge tool, a colour picker, and a handful of smaller improvements.

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PhotoEditTools

I mentioned in the last issue that I was working on a new tool, and it turned out really well. PhotoEditTools is a website with tools to bulk edit your images.

This is very much in the same spirit. Simple tools that let you make something quickly, without getting in your way.

The tool I recently completed lets you edit images using a stack of filters. I had the idea for this a couple of years ago, and it’s actually the reason I bought the domain. I just hadn’t found the right approach to building it until now.

After buying the domain I built a series of smaller tools for specific tasks, resizing, compressing, renaming, and so on. But I wanted a single tool that lets you build up a stack of filters and apply them all at once. Something flexible enough for custom setups, but simple enough to just pick up and use.

While building it I realised I could create templates from these filter stacks and preload them to make more focused tools. For example, there’s a pixel art template that reduces colours and resolution, and another that gives images a retro TV look.

I was a bit worried it would end up too complex, but I landed on a simple plugin system. Each filter is its own little module, and you can add, remove, and tweak them as needed.

I’ve been using it a lot myself, which is always a good sign. Hopefully it’s useful if you want to bulk edit images without opening something heavy like Photoshop or GIMP.

All the tools are free, and everything runs locally in your browser, so it’s completely private.

Try PhotoEditTools

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Project Hail Mary: Behind the Scenes

Project Hail Mary is a science fiction film based on the novel by Andy Weir. It follows Ryland Grace, a lone astronaut on a mission to save humanity from an extinction-level threat.

I haven’t seen it yet, but I have seen The Martian, and this looks like it has a similar feel. What caught my attention though is how they made it.

They used a surprisingly small amount of CGI, relying instead on practical effects and real sets wherever possible.

There’s a rock character in the film that you would assume is CG, but it turns out it’s actually a puppet. They also built full spaceship sets and used practical effects for many of the space scenes. The trailer and behind-the-scenes footage look incredible, and I’m looking forward to watching it properly.

These days you often hear filmmakers say they “didn’t use CGI”, which usually just means they’re downplaying the huge teams of artists involved. That never quite sits right with me. There’s sometimes a strange snobbery around CGI, even when it’s doing most of the heavy lifting.

But here it feels more balanced. They’ve pushed for as much as possible to be done physically, while still using CGI where it makes sense. It’s less about avoiding CGI, and more about choosing the right way to make something feel authentic. I like that approach. Technology can enhance films, but overuse can make everything feel a bit artificial. I remember watching the Total Recall remake and thinking everything looked too smooth compared to the original, where everything had more texture because it was done in camera.

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The Making of Gorillaz: The Mountain, The Moon Cave & The Sad God

Continuing the behind-the-scenes theme, a couple of issues back I shared the new Gorillaz video and mentioned there was a making-of.

It used to be paid, but it’s now free to watch. It’s a great look at the creative process, and very much a love letter to traditional animation.

What stood out to me was how much physical work went into it. They used models, practical shots, and real materials alongside traditional animation. Things like the turning book pages and some of the environmental shots were filmed for real.

It’s another nice example of mixing physical and digital techniques to make something feel more real.

Watch the video

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Sparked Discoveries

Here’s a handful of links I found interesting recently:

IAMAG Masterclasses

IAMAG is one of those corners of the internet that’s been around for years, quietly doing its thing. It grew out of It’s Art Magazine and has built a space for artists working in games, film, and animation. The focus is firmly on high-end concept art and visual development, so everything leans towards real industry workflows rather than quick tips.

What makes it especially interesting right now is their collection of free masterclasses. These are proper, in-depth sessions from working artists, often the same people behind big-name films and games. They focus more on process and decision-making than step-by-step instruction.

They’re less about copying steps, and more about understanding how to approach making something from scratch, which makes them well worth a look.

To find the free ones, open the link above, then use the dropdown next to the search bar and select “Free Classes Only”.

If you like behind-the-scenes content but don’t want full tutorials, you might also like Befores & Afters. It focuses on visual effects, but there’s a lot of insight into how films and TV shows are made.

Gradient Horse

This is a funny little app that lets you draw a horse, then animates it running across a gradient. It’s a bit of fun, but also a nice reminder that simple ideas can still turn into something worth making.

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Currently…

I’ve just started watching For All Mankind on Apple TV+. It’s an alternate history where the Soviet Union wins the space race, and explores how that changes everything. I’m only a couple of episodes in, but the premise is great and it looks fantastic.

That said, I do wish the episodes were shorter. I miss when “long” episodes were about 40 minutes. It’s much easier to fit into a day. On the flip side, I do like shorter series overall, they tend to stay focused and avoid filler.

We’ve also been listening to the Radio X Best of British countdown. Every Easter they run a listener-voted chart, and this year they expanded it to a top 500 over three days.

Oasis took the top spot, which isn’t surprising, and appeared all over the list. There were some newer entries too, including The Lathums and Wolf Alice, both of which we’ve been enjoying recently. Around this time last year we saw The Lathums live with our son, and they were fantastic.