I am quite a user of imagemagick, or imagick in php. This is far more useful than Photoshop or Gimp when it comes to cropping images and applying basic filters such as a sharpen on thumbnail images. I also use Gd2.
You would be surprised at what can be done in code. You would also be surprised at how much of the stuff that can be done in code is done the time consuming way by people with expensive Photoshop rigs.
So, to a certain extend a lot of what you desire can already be done with code. However there is not one single 'graphic artist' degree where such possibilities could be entertained, plus programmers are not allowed to touch images under any circumstances whatsoever. There is a rift valley between programmers and graphic artists, a deep cultural one.
You would be surprised at what can be done in code. You would also be surprised at how much of the stuff that can be done in code is done the time consuming way by people with expensive Photoshop rigs.
So, to a certain extend a lot of what you desire can already be done with code. However there is not one single 'graphic artist' degree where such possibilities could be entertained, plus programmers are not allowed to touch images under any circumstances whatsoever. There is a rift valley between programmers and graphic artists, a deep cultural one.