I found a decent-enough solution to my problem. KLatexFormula seems to do what I need. You can type anything you want and it immediately exports an image which may be copied, while also allowing you to efficiently control the preamble.
I found a decent-enough solution to my problem. KLatexFormula seems to do what I need. You can type anything you want and it immediately exports an image which may be copied, while also allowing you to efficiently control the preamble.