Radial or polar pixelation

[Elsie]

Good day,

I registered on this forum because I am looking for a way to pixelate an image from the center out in either concentric circles or spirals, like a polar or radial grid. Each pixel needs to be approximately the same size and contain only one color. I have seen a couple of examples on the internet, like this one:

https://www.behance.net/gallery/5103119/Radial-Pixel

Do I need special software to do this, or is there some online generator I can use?

Thank you for your help.

[surt]

Ilkke posted about how he does it using Photoshop here: https://twitter.com/iLkKke/status/875906845625303040

[Elsie]

Thanks! I'll check it out to see if it's what I'm looking for.

[eishiya]

Ilkke's approach should work for images styled like the first one in the example. There's one big difference though: the example image has a higher resolution, and in particular, the horizontal resolution is greater than the vertical resolution (i.e. the source "pixels" aren't when they go into the polarization filter). This can probably be achieved by scaling the smart object appropriately. A minor difference is that the example image appears to have "pixels" of varying sizes, this can be achieved by having a very high horizontal resolution (so that the smallest unit can be the smallest radial pixel you want), and having the colours repeat as needed to create the larger "pixels". This can also be used to achieve the look of having the same size "pixels" in the middle as towards the outside - the inner "pixels" would all just consist of several actual "pixels".

The other images in the post aren't made of radial "pixels", in that case the effect uses a radial distortion only as a base to work on.

[Elsie]

Thanks, eishiya. I'm not sure I understand your explanation but I will check it out.

The examples by Ilkke are not entirely what I want to achieve. Ideally, I would like to be able to lay a polar grid on an image so that the first circle in the middle has 12 pixels, the second has 24, then 36, next round 48 etc. But I can work with 6-12-18 and so on too if there's no other option. In any case, the pixels should have more or less the same size (small differences I can live with).

I have seen similar things with dots or halftones instead of pixels. Usually, these start with only 5 dots in the first circle and then 5 more each next round.

https://www.vectorstock.com/royalty-free-vector/abstract-world-map-of-radial-dots-vector-20645503

Another approach is this where you have uninterupted lines in concentric circles or spirals. This actually comes close to what I need but instead of lines I want pixels in different colors or different gray shades. I'm referring to the portrait of Audrey Hepburn by this Etsy seller:

https://www.etsy.com/nl/shop/LinesLab?ref=l2-shopheader-name

And then there's this example with radial pixelation except that there are more than one colors in each "pixel" and I want just one.

https://kentuckyartspeaks.wordpress.com/2012/03/03/an-informative-book-about-figurative-art-that-may/