Posted on 2 CommentsQGIS

QGIS 3 is underway – what does it mean for your plugins and scripts?

With the imminent release of QGIS 2.16, the development attention has now shifted to the next scheduled release – QGIS 3.0! If you haven’t been following the discussion surrounding this I’m going to try and summarise what exactly 3.0 means and how it will impact any scripts or plugins you’ve developed for QGIS. QGIS 3.0 is the first major QGIS release since 2.0 was released way back in September 2013. Since that release so much has changed in QGIS… a quick glance over the release notes for 2.14 shows that even for this single point release there’s been hundreds of changes. Despite this, for all 2.x releases the PyQGIS API has remained stable, and a plugin or script which was […]

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Posted on 11 CommentsQGIS

Introducing QGIS live layer effects!

I’m pleased to announce that the crowdfunded work on layer effects for QGIS is now complete and available in the current development snapshots! Let’s dive in and explore how these effects work, and check out some of the results possible using them. I’ll start with a simple polygon layer, with some nice plain styling: If I open the properties for this layer and switch to the Style tab, there’s a new checkbox for “Draw effects“. Let’s enable that, and then click the little customise effects button to its right: A new “Effects Properties” dialog opens: You can see that currently the only effect listed is a “Source” effect. Source effects aren’t particularly exciting – all they do is draw the original layer […]

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Posted on 2 CommentsQGIS

QGIS – live layer effects Kickstarter update

Here’s another quick video demonstration of the latest developments in layer effects – effects on polygon and polyline layers, and outer glow effects: Time is running out to fund this campaign and make this work happen… Please donate via Kickstarter! I’ve also been asked what will happen if funding exceeds the Kickstarter goal? Well, if this happens, the extra funds will be used to add additional layer effects to QGIS. Next up will be inner glow, inner shadow and color modification effects.

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Posted on QGIS

Kickstarter Alert – Live Layer Effects for QGIS

QGIS is well regarded for its fantastic cartographic abilities – it’s got a huge range of symbology styles and options which can be used to style your maps. But there’s more we can do to push this even further. One long requested cartographic feature has been for live drop shadows on layers. Why stop there? Why not inner and outer glow effects and live blur effects? Just imagine the cartographic possibilities if this functionality was available from within a GIS, and didn’t require exporting maps to external editors… I’ve launched a Kickstarter project to fund implementing live layer effects like this within QGIS. Please consider donating or spreading the word if you’d find this feature useful!

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