Grab handles invisible if placed outside bounds of the image

[RobS]

Hi,

PL16, MacOSX 10.6.2

If I paste clipboard contents into an image and the pasted selection is larger than the image it's pasted into then the grab handles that are outside the actual area of the image are invisible and their positions can only be guessed at... If located then they are active... I can still scale, rotate and so on... but they're invisible.

There is, I think, a related problem with skewing/warping an image in that the chosen grab handle can be dragged to the edge of the image, but not beyond it, making things such as perspective corrections difficult to make without first having some idea how big to make the containing image area before starting.

Cheers

Rob

[Hoogo]

On Windows the following will help, I guess that the menu entries are the same on Mac.
-Edit > Options
-Display > Document
...and there you find "document frame" with "width image" and "width document". These two create a border around your picture, different for document and picture mode. Increase the image width, and you can move handles out of the picture.

[ono]

On Windows the following will help, I guess that the menu entries are the same on Mac.
-Edit > Options
-Display > Document
...and there you find "document frame" with "width image" and "width document". These two create a border around your picture, different for document and picture mode. Increase the image width, and you can move handles out of the picture.

Yes, this is what I was looking for. Thanks Hoogo!
Still I have a suggestion for devs: Can you please make (an option to) ALL Window area to be active, regardlress of defined edge, so I can always unzoom resize window, put canvas central but work out of the canvas too. Still the defined edge option may have influence for the scrollbars. (So with all window area active this option would be more like "Scrollbar padding").

[bkh]

Can you please make (an option to) ALL Window area to be active, regardlress of defined edge, so I can always unzoom resize window, put canvas central but work out of the canvas too. Still the defined edge option may have influence for the scrollbars. (So with all window area active this option would be more like "Scrollbar padding").

I would support that suggestion. In fact, I can't see a good reason why layers are clipped to the border which is set in the preferences even if the main window shows more than that. Maybe it would even make sense to dynamically adjust the visible border around the document to include all layers in the document, so that if you move a layer outside the currently visible area, you can still scroll there.

Cheers

Burkhard.

[greenmorpher]

Doesn't opening a document (shift-command-n on Mac for a new one) rather than a picture (command-n) then dragging or pasting your picture into the document give you all the live space you want around the picture?

Cheers, Geoff

Geoffrey Heard
Publisher, Editor, Business Writer
The Worsley Press

FREE Bonus book offer. Get "How to make great ads for (sm)all business" FREE when you buy "Type & Layout: Are you communicating or just making pretty shapes?" or "How to Start and Produce a Magazine or Newsletter". Amazon or www.worsleypress.com

[bkh]

Doesn't opening a document (shift-command-n on Mac for a new one) rather than a picture (command-n) then dragging or pasting your picture into the document give you all the live space you want around the picture?

As Hoogo described, you can set the available space around the picture, both for picture and document mode, but everything outside that preset space gets clipped - even if it would still fit into the main window.

Cheers

Burkhard.

[greenmorpher]

Hiya Burkhardt

I'm afraid you're not reading me right. In document mode, if you are running out of space, you just make the document "page" bigger so that everything fits in.

Try it. Start with an A4 page. It has a desktop around the page. It is a certain size in proportion to the A4 page -- about a virtual 15cm each side. Now change the page size to A2. Ha! You STILL have a desktop around the page in proportion to the new size, a virtual 30+cm each side. And all this space is "live".

How big are your photos?

Try it and see.

I work in this document mode rather than picture mode, all the time. It is very similar to the Canvas interface. I find it MUCH handier than working in picture mode simply because you have all that live space around the picture.

Since shifting to this mode already supplies all the space you could possibly want around the image you are working on, I see no need for the Hubers to add live space to the picture mode.

Cheers, Geoff

Geoffrey Heard
Publisher, Editor, Business Writer
The Worsley Press

FREE Bonus book offer. Get "How to make great ads for (sm)all business" FREE when you buy "Type & Layout: Are you communicating or just making pretty shapes?" or "How to Start and Produce a Magazine or Newsletter". Amazon or www.worsleypress.com

[bkh]

Hiya Burkhardt

I'm afraid you're not reading me right. In document mode, if you are running out of space, you just make the document "page" bigger so that everything fits in.

Running out of space is not my issue here - it's just that layers start disappearing with no obvious reason if you move them too far from the document border.

Create an A5 document and view it at a magnification of 10 %, say. You have a small document rectangle in the middle, a white edge around it, surrounded by a grey area. Now as you move a layer off the white area and partly into the grey area, the part on (?) the grey area becomes invisible.

I work in this document mode rather than picture mode, all the time. It is very similar to the Canvas interface. I find it MUCH handier than working in picture mode simply because you have all that live space around the picture.

You can have this in picture mode as well, just go to Preferences/Options -> Display -> Document, and under Picture Mode, set the edge width to whatever percentage you like. In fact, you switched to document mode because you wanted this feature and Picture Mode didn't automatically provide for it (which is what I was suggesting).

Since shifting to this mode already supplies all the space you could possibly want around the image you are working on, I see no need for the Hubers to add live space to the picture mode.

Of course, there is no urgent need for action, imo, this is just another example where PL's user interface could be more intuitive.

Cheers,

Burkhard.

[greenmorpher]

Hiya Burkhardt

I'm afraid you're not reading me right. In document mode, if you are running out of space, you just make the document "page" bigger so that everything fits in.

Running out of space is not my issue here - it's just that layers start disappearing with no obvious reason if you move them too far from the document border.

Create an A5 document and view it at a magnification of 10 %, say. You have a small document rectangle in the middle, a white edge around it, surrounded by a grey area. Now as you move a layer off the white area and partly into the grey area, the part on (?) the grey area becomes invisible.

This discussion is crazy, Burkhardt. DON'T create an A5 document. Or if you have, create a BIGGER document so the layers are still ON THE DOCUMENT and/or within its live desktop area. Problem solved. End of story!!!

Cheers, Geoff

Geoffrey Heard
Publisher, Editor, Business Writer
The Worsley Press

FREE Bonus book offer. Get "How to make great ads for (sm)all business" FREE when you buy "Type & Layout: Are you communicating or just making pretty shapes?" or "How to Start and Produce a Magazine or Newsletter". Amazon or www.worsleypress.com

[ono]

Requested feature is NOW implemented in 16.10, even I don't see it mentioned in changelog! Thank you very much Gerhard. I am changing my mind about Photoline and really getting use to it