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Is anyone aware of a way to create a fisheye effect with elements in InkScape? Freehand used to have an xtra tool that did just that.

The specific effect I'm trying to achieve is applying horizontal lines on a spherical object...akin to the latitude marks on globe. If you're staring at the equator, the latitude lines above bend upwards towards the pole and the reverse for those below the equator.

I could do this a number of ways and have some alternatives in mind, but Freehand's Fisheye tool seemed the easiest if there was something similar to that in Inkscape.

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This isn't perfect, but one way is to use the Envelope Deformation path effect.

First convert your object to a path (you have to remove all groups and just end up with one path -- yes this is limiting). Then choose "Path" > "Path Effects Editor...". Select the Envelope Deformation path effect and click "Add". I suggest only enabling top and bottom paths. Then click the icons to edit the top/bottom paths on screen. You can play with them a bit to get the desired effect.

The downside of course is that using path effects necessitates destructive editing and can't be applied to groups of objects.

See this image for an example: example

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Sean gets the answer. This isn't quite a nice as an actual fisheye lens filter, but perhaps that'll be coming down the pipe eventually. – DA01 Jun 10 '12 at 1:03

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