Question

Our company website features a “random shard generator”, built in Flash, which creates a number of overlapping coloured shard graphics at random just below the site header.

http://www.clarendonmarketing.com

I am trying to replicate this effect using HTML5, and whilst I can generate the random shards easily enough, the blended overlapping (multiply in Adobe terms) is proving a challenge.

I have a solution which basically creates an array of all the canvas’s pixel data before each shard is drawn, then another array with the canvas’s pixel data after each shard is drawn. It then compares the two and where it finds a non transparent pixel in the first array whose corresponding pixel in the second array matches the currently selected fill colour, it redraws it with a new colour value determined by a ‘multiply’ function (topValue * bottomValue / 255).

Generally this works fine and achieves the desired effect, EXCEPT around the edges of the overlapping shards, where a jagged effect is produced.

I believe this has something to do with the browser’s anti-aliasing. I have tried replicating the original pixel’s alpha channel value for the computed pixel, but that doesn’t seem to help.

Javascript:

// Random Shard Generator v2 (HTML5)

var theCanvas;
var ctx;

var maxShards = 6;
var minShards = 3;

var fillArray = new Array(
    [180,181,171,255], 
    [162,202,28,255], 
    [192,15,44,255], 
    [222,23,112,255], 
    [63,185,127,255], 
    [152,103,158,255], 
    [251,216,45,255], 
    [249,147,0,255], 
    [0,151,204,255]
);

var selectedFill;

window.onload = function() {

    theCanvas = document.getElementById('shards');
    ctx = theCanvas.getContext('2d');
    //ctx.translate(-0.5, -0.5)

    var totalShards = getRandom(maxShards, minShards);

    for(i=0; i<=totalShards; i++) {
        //get snapshot of current canvas
        imgData = ctx.getImageData(0,0,theCanvas.width,theCanvas.height);
        currentPix = imgData.data
        //draw a shard
        drawRandomShard();
        //get snapshot of new canvas
        imgData = ctx.getImageData(0,0,theCanvas.width,theCanvas.height);
        pix = imgData.data;
        //console.log(selectedFill[0]+','+selectedFill[1]+','+selectedFill[2]);
        //alert('break')

        //CALCULATE THE MULTIPLIED RGB VALUES FOR OVERLAPPING PIXELS

        for (var j = 0, n = currentPix.length; j < n; j += 4) {
            if (    
                //the current pixel is not blank (alpha 0)
                (currentPix[j+3]>0)
                    && //and the new pixel matches the currently selected fill colour
                (pix[j]==selectedFill[0] && pix[j+1]==selectedFill[1] && pix[j+2]==selectedFill[2])
            ) { //multiply the current pixel by the selected fill colour
                //console.log('old: '+currentPix[j]+','+currentPix[j+1]+','+currentPix[j+2]+','+currentPix[j+3]+'\n'+'new: '+pix[j]+','+pix[j+1]+','+pix[j+2]+','+pix[j+3]);
                pix[j] = multiply(selectedFill[0], currentPix[j]); // red
                pix[j+1] = multiply(selectedFill[1], currentPix[j+1]); // green
                pix[j+2] = multiply(selectedFill[2], currentPix[j+2]); // blue
            }
        }
        //update the canvas
        ctx.putImageData(imgData, 0, 0);        
    }


};

function drawRandomShard() {

    var maxShardWidth = 200;
    var minShardWidth = 30;
    var maxShardHeight = 16;
    var minShardHeight = 10;
    var minIndent = 4;
    var maxRight = theCanvas.width-maxShardWidth;
    //generate a random start point
    var randomLeftAnchor = getRandom(maxRight, 0);
    //generate a random right anchor point
    var randomRightAnchor = getRandom((randomLeftAnchor+maxShardWidth),(randomLeftAnchor+minShardWidth));
    //generate a random number between the min and max limits for the lower point
    var randomLowerAnchorX = getRandom((randomRightAnchor - minIndent),(randomLeftAnchor + minIndent));
    //generate a random height for the shard
    var randomLowerAnchorY = getRandom(maxShardHeight, minShardHeight);
    //select a fill colour from an array
    var fillSelector = getRandom(fillArray.length-1,0);
    //console.log(fillSelector);
    selectedFill = fillArray[fillSelector];

    drawShard(randomLeftAnchor, randomLowerAnchorX, randomLowerAnchorY, randomRightAnchor, selectedFill);

}

function drawShard(leftAnchor, lowerAnchorX, lowerAnchorY, rightAnchor, selectedFill) {

    ctx.beginPath();
    ctx.moveTo(leftAnchor,0);
    ctx.lineTo(lowerAnchorX,lowerAnchorY);
    ctx.lineTo(rightAnchor,0);
    ctx.closePath();
    fillColour = 'rgb('+selectedFill[0]+','+selectedFill[1]+','+selectedFill[2]+')';
    ctx.fillStyle=fillColour;
    ctx.fill();

};

function getRandom(high, low) {
    return Math.floor(Math.random() * (high-low)+1) + low;
}

function multiply(topValue, bottomValue){
    return topValue * bottomValue / 255;
};

Working demo:
http://www.clarendonmarketing.com/html5shards.html

Answer 1

Do you really need multiplication? Why not just use lower opacity blending?

Demo http://jsfiddle.net/wk3eE/

ctx.globalAlpha = 0.6;
for(var i=totalShards;i--;) drawRandomShard();

Edit: If you really need multiplication, then leave it to the professionals, since multiply mode with alpha values is a little tricky:

Demo 2: http://jsfiddle.net/wk3eE/2/

<script type="text/javascript" src="context_blender.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
  var ctx = document.querySelector('canvas').getContext('2d');

  // Create an off-screen canvas to draw shards to first
  var off = ctx.canvas.cloneNode(true).getContext('2d');

  var w = ctx.canvas.width, h = ctx.canvas.height;
  for(var i=totalShards;i--;){
    off.clearRect(0,0,w,h);        // clear the offscreen context first
    drawRandomShard(off);          // modify to draw to the offscreen context
    off.blendOnto(ctx,'multiply'); // multiply onto the main context
  }
</script>