Userlandia

The Mystery of Mac OS’ Mangled Image Interpolation Implementation


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-=- Here in Userlandia, I’m talking rainbows, I’m talking pixels. -=-

What is a bug? A miserable little pile of code... or something more? Today we look at a curious quirk in how Mac OS displays images in PDFs. The case: an ordinary strip of colored squares has transformed into a smooth rainbow gradient. Can you channel your inner detective and solve the mystery?

Blog Post: https://www.userlandia.com/home/2021/11/the-mystery-of-mac-os-mangled-image-interpolation-implementation

Published November 16, 2021

-=- Chapters -=-

00:00:00 - Intro 00:00:42 - When There's Something Strange... 00:03:42 - Layers of Quartz 00:09:43 - Resolving Power 00:14:06 - Objection! 00:17:37 - Interpolation Interpretation 00:23:53 - The Fix Is In 00:26:35 - The Final Cut 00:29:02 - Outtro

-=- Links -=-

  • Color Scale Smoothing - Ars Technica Openforum - https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=1477509
  • generic-mapping-tools - http://generic-mapping-tools.org
  • Quartz - https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2000/01/macos-x-gui/
  • Display PostScript - http://www.nextcomputers.org/NeXTfiles/Docs/NeXTStep/3.3/nd/Concepts/Pre3.0_Concepts/04_Drawing.htmld/index.html
  • CoreGraphics - https://developer.apple.com/documentation/coregraphics
  • Image Resolution and DPI - https://guides.lib.umich.edu/c.php?g=282942&p=1888163
  • Matrix Transformations - https://personal.math.ubc.ca/~cass/graphics/text/old.pdf/last/ch4.pdf
  • PostScript Level 3 Reference Guide - https://www.adobe.com/content/dam/acom/en/devnet/actionscript/articles/PLRM.pdf
  • PDF Reference Guide v1.4 - https://www.adobe.com/content/dam/acom/en/devnet/pdf/pdfs/pdf_reference_archives/PDFReference.pdf
  • psscale - GMT - https://docs.generic-mapping-tools.org/latest/psscale.html?highlight=psscale
  • Ace Attorney - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ace_Attorney

-=- Subscribe -=-

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/userlandia/id1588648631 Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1588648631/userlandiaPocket Casts:   https://pca.st/m4tegn1u Spotify:  https://open.spotify.com/show/79LO3vO9avAt3yCLpNWark Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly91c2VybGFuZGlhLmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz

-=- Contact Us -=-

Follow Userlandia: @userlandia - http://twitter.com/userlandiashow   Follow Dan: @kefkafloyd -  http://twitter.com/kefkafloyd Visit The Website: https://www.userlandia.com Email us: [email protected] The Userlandia Discord: https://discord.com/invite/z2jmF93

Theme Song by Space Vixen: https://spacevixenmusic.bandcamp.com Follow them on Twitter @SpaceVixenMusic: https://twitter.com/spacevixenmusic

Music Credits:

Artist: Ron Gelinas Track Title: Gaining Momentum https://youtu.be/RTRl0mD9Y8g

Ace Attorney — Pressing Pursuit — Cornered - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxnvGDK0WGM

Neonscapes by | e s c p | https://escp-music.bandcamp.com Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Tokyo by | e s c p | https://escp-music.bandcamp.com Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Dream Cruiser by Anders Enger Jensen - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FalGOzjuG64

Retro Runner by Anders Enger Jensen - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1l7fOHedd2I

...more
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UserlandiaBy Dan Vincent

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