If you've poked around enough on places like
JPG Mag or
Pinterest, then you may have come across an awesome tool known as the Rasterbator. There are a few different downloadable versions floating around on the web (download one
here or
here) and they basically work in the same way. You upload an image, set an output size, and go. The program will convert your image into a number of individual PDF pages that, once printed, you can assemble on a space as large as a wall...or billboard...or you could tack your larger-than-life face up next to those old dudes on Mt. Rushmore (ok, not really...but see the world's largest known rasterbated image
here). I used a version of the Rasterbator that took this photo:
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| Copyright of Katie Wittkamper - 2010 |
and turned it into this photo (with a lot of help from me and Photoshop):
 | | |
| Copyright of Katie Wittkamper - 2011 |
What you're not being shown is this: once I rasterbated my image, I had 18 individual PDF files that were black and transparent. Everything you're seeing that is pixelated in red in the above picture, was first black; everything that is a gradient of color was transparent. So I opened all 18 PDFs in Photoshop, dragged & dropped them into a new blank canvas, and arranged them into one image file. Then I added a solid color layer (orangey-red, it's a technical term) and created a clipping mask above my newly formed image layer so that now every black pixel was orangey-red. Then I used the gradient tool in a new layer to apply the orange-yellow-seafoam gradient to the transparent areas of the image. I didn't go on to print this as 18 individual PDFs (or at all, for that matter) simply because I was satisfied to have created it at all, even intangibly.
As the server at
homokaasu.org/rasterbator is either overwhelmed or perhaps the online Rasterbator is no longer available, I can't show you another example. I haven't found another rasterization tool that is quite like this one and will work for a Mac, but would love input from other users who have used this tool or a similar one to create some awesome images!
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