# ImageMagick: Command-line Tools: Composite
ImageMagick® is a software suite to create, edit, and compose bitmap images. It can read, convert and write images in a variety of formats (about 100) including GIF, JPEG, JPEG-2000, PNG, PDF, PhotoCD, TIFF, and DPX. Use ImageMagick to translate, flip, mirror, rotate, scale, shear and transform images, adjust image colors, apply various special effects, or draw text, lines, polygons, ellipses and Bézier curves. ImageMagick is free software delivered as a ready-to-run binary distribution or as source code that you can freely use, copy, modify, and distribute. Its license is compatible with the [cut: 1167 characters, first 599 kept]
Author: ImageMagick Studio LLC
Keywords: command-line, tools:, composite, ImageMagick, ImageMagic, MagickCore, MagickWand, PerlMagick, Magick++, RMagick, PythonMagick, JMagick, TclMagick, Image, Magick, Magic, Wand

Use the `composite` program overlaps one image over another. See Command Line Processing for advice on how to structure your `composite` command or see below for example usages of the command.

## Example Usage

We list a few examples of the `composite` command here to illustrate its usefulness and ease of use. To get started, lets overlay a letter over a a rose:

    composite -gravity center smile.gif  rose: rose-over.png

over

You can create three-dimensional effect with the Atop:

      convert -size 70x70 xc:none -fill red -draw 'circle 35,35 10,30' red-circle.png
      convert -size 70x70 xc:none -draw 'circle 35,35 35,20' -negate -channel A -gaussian 0x8 white-highlight.png
      composite -compose atop -geometry -13-17 white-highlight.png red-circle.png red-ball.png

atop

You can find additional examples of using `composite` in Examples of ImageMagick Usage. You can find out more about them and the mathematics by looking at SVG Alpha Compositing

## Option Summary

The `composite` command recognizes these options. Click on an option to get more details about how that option works.

Option | Description
--- | ---
-affine matrix | affine transform matrix
-authenticate value | decrypt image with this password
-blend geometry | blend images
-blue-primary point | chromaticity blue primary point
-channel type | apply option to select image channels
-colors value | preferred number of colors in the image
-colorspace type | set image colorspace
-comment string | annotate image with comment
-compose operator | set image composite operator
-compress type | image compression type
-debug events | display copious debugging information
-define format:option | define one or more image format options
-density geometry | horizontal and vertical density of the image
-depth value | image depth
-displace geometry | shift image pixels defined by a displacement map
-dissolve value | dissolve the two images a given percent
-dither | apply Floyd/Steinberg error diffusion to image
-encoding type | text encoding type
-endian type | endianness (MSB or LSB) of the image
-extract geometry | extract area from image
-filter type | use this filter when resizing an image
-font name | render text with this font
-geometry geometry | preferred size or location of the image
-gravity type | horizontal and vertical text placement
-green-primary point | chromaticity green primary point
-help | print program options
-identify | identify the format and characteristics of the image
-interlace type | type of image interlacing scheme
-interpolate method | pixel color interpolation method
-label string | assign a label to an image
-level value | adjust the level of image contrast
-limit type value | pixel cache resource limit
-log format | format of debugging information
-matte | store matte channel if the image has one
-monitor | monitor progress
-monochrome | transform image to black and white
-negate | replace every pixel with its complementary color
-page geometry | size and location of an image canvas (setting)
-profile filename | add, delete, or apply an image profile
-quality value | JPEG/MIFF/PNG compression level
-quantize colorspace | reduce image colors in this colorspace
-quiet | suppress all error or warning messages
-red-primary point | chromaticity red primary point
-regard-warnings | pay attention to warning messages.
-rotate degrees | apply Paeth rotation to the image
-sampling-factor geometry | horizontal and vertical sampling factor
-scene value | image scene number
-set attribute value | set an image attribute
-sharpen geometry | sharpen the image
-size geometry | width and height of image
-stegano offset | hide watermark within an image
-strip | strip image of all profiles and comments
-support factor | resize support: > 1.0 is blurry, < 1.0 is sharp
-thumbnail geometry | create a thumbnail of the image
-tile | repeat composite operation across and down image
-transform | affine transform image
-transparent-color color | transparent color
-treedepth value | color tree depth
-type type | image type
-units type | the units of image resolution
-unsharp geometry | sharpen the image
-verbose | print detailed information about the image
-version | print version information
-virtual-pixel method | access method for pixels outside the boundaries of the image
-watermark geometry | percent brightness and saturation of a watermark
-white-point point | chromaticity white point
-white-threshold value | force all pixels above the threshold into white
-write filename | write images to this file

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