Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

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marco.molteni
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Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

Beitrag von marco.molteni »

Hi, I have a (1) clarification question and a (2) suggestion for a better wording.

Some tools such as the brush and the eraser have, in the Tool Setting window, a button labeled "K" and a button labeled "Work on Whole Picture", as you can see in the screenshot:
channels-K-whole-picture.png
(1) clarification question. After looking in the manual, at the end I was able to figure out that K means black. Still, it is not clear to me what happens when the button is selected/unselected, and what is it's relation with the Channels. I suggest to:
1.1 put a better explanation in the help system
1.2 add a tooltip (the little yellow popup with a short explanation) for the K, since there is none.

(2) suggestion for a better wording. What the "Work on whole picture" does is to actually fill the current layer with the foreground color. I think that "work on whole picture" is misleading, since it makes think that it is a toggle: after clicking the button, the effect of the tool will be on the "whole picture" and not on the current layer. So my suggestion is to rename it to something similar to "Fill whole layer", or maybe just to remove the button completely because (at least this is my thinking) it is misleading and its operation can be easily obtained by the flood fill tool.

what do you think?
marco
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Hoogo
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Re: Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

Beitrag von Hoogo »

marco.molteni hat geschrieben:...K means black. Still, it is not clear to me what happens when the button is selected/unselected, and what is it's relation with the Channels...
It depends on the kind of layer what buttons appear. If your current layer is an ordinary rgb-layer, there will be the buttons R, G, B. If transparency is enabled, an additional button "A" appears. For grayscale-layers it is "K". For most tools and filters and layers you can choose the color-model to be used. That is the dropdown in your picture that currently displays "gray".
Every button corresponds to a channel. When the button is pressed the function applies to that channel, an unpressed button protects that channel. When no button is pressed nothing happens.
The "layer / channel"-list is something similar. You can enable/disable channels there, too, and that's the way it is done by PS. But I really prefer the buttons.
marco.molteni hat geschrieben:...something similar to "Fill whole layer"...
Sounds good to me.
marco.molteni hat geschrieben:...maybe just to remove the button completely because (at least this is my thinking) it is misleading and its operation can be easily obtained by the flood fill tool.
I think its different. The eraser will fill the whole picture with transparency if the layer allows transparency. That is something only the eraser can do, all other tools have to use the current ink, and for ink transparenca has a little different meaning. And the flood-fill-tool will care about the current content of a layer, while the button in the brush tool completely ignores that.
marco.molteni
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Re: Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

Beitrag von marco.molteni »

Hi Hoogo,
thank for both the explications of the K button and of the behavior of the eraser tool and transparency. My questions are answered! :-)
lutz
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Re: Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

Beitrag von lutz »

Marco,
you will notice that it is actually not that easy to fill an entire layer with the flood fill tool in PhotoLine. :? (quirk)
Thus the "work on whole layer" button is necessary in PL - .... I also agree with your renaming suggestion - "fill entire layer" ???
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Gerhard Huber
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Re: Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

Beitrag von Gerhard Huber »

lutz hat geschrieben:Thus the "work on whole layer" button is necessary in PL - .... I also agree with your renaming suggestion - "fill entire layer" ???
It's not what the function does.
The function acts like using the tool on the whole layer. It will preserve the mask, it will use transparency, ...
marco.molteni
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Re: Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

Beitrag von marco.molteni »

Gerhard, if I understand correctly, you are against renaming "Work on whole picture" to "fill whole layer" because the tool actually has a more nuanced behavior (transparency and such). If this is the case, then I suggest at least to rename it to "work on whole layer", because the term "picture" is too ambiguous.
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Gerhard Huber
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Re: Tool Settings: "K" button and "Work on Whole Picture"

Beitrag von Gerhard Huber »

marco.molteni hat geschrieben:then I suggest at least to rename it to "work on whole layer", because the term "picture" is too ambiguous.
"layer" is used in PhotoLine for every kind of layer: vector layer, text layer, raster image layer. So "image" would be better, but an image in our terms consists of a picture and a transparency channel.