Complex Graphics Generation via PHP?

[luftikus143]

Hi there,

I wonder if anyone can tell me if it's possible with PHP to generate an graphic like this:

(or see attachement) (see image in high resolution here, in PDF here or other examples here)

In the moment, it's a Javascript which is used in Illustrator to read data from the UNEP GEO Data Portal and display them automatically in this way.

I know that there is some potential of generating images via GD and PHP. But I have no idea if it's possible to (relatively easily) generate this kind of stuff. Otherwise, I guess I would have to use SVG or Flash.

Thanks for any hints.

[Atli]

It can of course be done, yes. Keep in mind the PHP is a complete programming language, so you can make it do pretty much anything you can think of.

For this particular task I would consider using either - as you suggested - GD to generate an image, or simply output SVG data.

[dgreenhouse]

I took a peek at the site you posted and although it appears that they're having some serious website issues, they should have an API available to generate a number of cool images when they've worked the bugs out.

Of course that takes the fun out of doing it yourself.

They might elect to not do it at all, because I'm sure it'll be quite an undertaking - thus - you'll have lots of hair-pulling-splitting fun anyway! :-)

[luftikus143]

@ dgreenhouse: can you elaborate on "some serious website issues"? Can you send me a private message? As I am responsible for it, I am curious to learn about it. Cheers!

[dgreenhouse]

@luftikus143
luftikus143

I can't send any private messages for some reason at the moment, but I'll go over the issues I encountered on your site sometime today...

I'm starting to---->fade---->to---->black :-)

Great & Cool site by the way...! I'll definitely be banging on it with some wsdl requests...

It covers areas that are near and dear to me...

[nilayanand]

Imagemagick is more powerful. Can draw any kind of complex graphics. I used in my recent project (pixable.com) and then I came to know its power.

[dgreenhouse]

@nilayanand
nilayanand,

What was your part in the pixable.com project - obviously using ImageMagck. ;-)

Nice colors... Sweet Logo... Good layout.

Site looks totally handcrafted without a cms - had to be a lot of work.
(I could be wrong...)

[nilayanand]

Imagemagick work doesn't lie in website design/html. As a facebook user, try to create photobook fetching photo from Facebook, flickr, picasa etc. The cool WYSIWYG editor allow you to compose photobook like any advance photo editor.
Imagemagick role comes when you save your album and order it for printed version. Imagemagick creates hight resolution bigger size photo for printable version.
You need to complete above steps to see the Imagemagick work.