The cropping rectangle confusion

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davidh
Posts: 835
Joined: June 9th, 2009, 2:16 am

The cropping rectangle confusion

Post by davidh »

The cropping rectangle in the Crop/ add Border shows confusion between the current and previous input image orientation and the dialog Orientation setting.

Example 1:
Crop a portrait oriented image with the Portrait orientation setting and then open a landsape oriented image: the crop rectangle will have the Landscape orientation even though the setting in the Crop/Add Border dialog remains set to Portrait.

Example 2:
Crop a portrait oriented image with the Landscape orientation setting and then open a landsape oriented image: the crop rectangle will have the Portrait orientation even though the setting in the Crop/Add Border dialog remains set to Landscape.

It can be reshaped to the correct orientation by dragging or just clicking at any of its sides.

An additional observation:
If instead of dragging or clicking, you keep cancelling and reopening the Crop/ Add Border Transformation, the cropping rectangle moves bit by bit down and right until it hits either the bottom or right side of the image and then reshapes itself to the correct orientation. This behavior looks similar to the image movement after cancelling the Print dialog posted before, with the difference that at the Print dialog the image moved up and left.

David
ksinkel
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Joined: April 2nd, 2009, 11:58 am
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Re: The cropping rectangle confusion

Post by ksinkel »

There is one other setting that is involved -- It's near the bottom of the crop dialog among the settings which tell crop how to behave on subsequent images. The Crop Orientation setting should be set to As Is rather than Align with Image Orientation.

Kiril
Kiril Sinkel
Digital Light & Color
davidh
Posts: 835
Joined: June 9th, 2009, 2:16 am

Re: The cropping rectangle confusion

Post by davidh »

after some additional enquiry for me to better understand the logic behind, it looks as if under certain settings when the first image orientation and its cropping orientation are not the same, does the cropping rectangle of the next image behave differently from the other cases, as can be seen in the Scenario 1.

Scenario 1

Align with image orientation (Proportions <> Arbitrary):

a portrait image cropped with the Portrait orientation setting - then a landscape image displays a Landscape cropping rectangle
- it follows the second image orientation

a portrait image cropped with the Lanscape orientation setting - then a landscape image displays a Portrait cropping rectangle
- if follows the first image orientation ??

a landscape image cropped with the Landscape orientation setting - then a portrait image displays a Portrait cropping rectangle
- it follows the second image orientation

a landscape image cropped with the Portrait orientation setting - then a portrait image displays a Landscape cropping rectangle
- it follows the first image orientation ??


Scenario 2

Align with image orientation (Proportions set to Arbitrary):

a portrait image cropped with the Portrait orientation setting - then a landscape image displays a Landscape cropping rectangle
- it follows the second image orientation

a portrait image cropped with the Landscape orientation setting - then a landscape image displays a Landscape cropping rectangle (even if the initial rectangle was manualy shaped as Portrait, which the Arbitrary proportions setting makes possible)
- it follows the second image orientation


a landscape image cropped with the Landscape orientation setting - then a portrait image displays a Portrait cropping rectangle
- it follows the second image orientation

a landscape image cropped with the Portrait orientation setting - then a portrait image displays a Portrait cropping rectangle - it follows the second image orientation

Scenario 3

As is: (follows the orientation cropping setting of the first image)

a portrait image cropped with the Portrait orientation setting - then a landscape image displays a Portrait cropping rectangle
- it follows the first image orientation cropping setting

a portrait image cropped with the Landscape orientation setting - then a landscape image displays a Landscape cropping rectangle
- it follows the first image orientation cropping setting


a landscape image cropped with the Portrait orientation setting - then a portrait image displays a Portrait cropping rectangle
- it follows the first image orientation cropping setting

a landscape image cropped with the Landscape orientation setting - then a portrait image displays a Landscape cropping rectangle
- it follows the first image orientation cropping setting

David
ksinkel
Posts: 594
Joined: April 2nd, 2009, 11:58 am
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Re: The cropping rectangle confusion

Post by ksinkel »

The idea behind the Align with Image Orientation is that your crop is aligned with the image orientation -- i.e. if the you start with a portrait image and then proceed to a landscape image (or vice versa), the original crop is rotated 90 degrees. This way the crop maintains its relationship to the aspect ratio of the image. It doesn't matter if the crop itself is landscape or portrait.

The 'Align' feature is useful where you are applying the same crop to a mix of landscape and portrait images, such as in workflows. Among other tasks, it lets you trim 2:3 images to standard sizes like 8x10 or 5x7 automatically.

Of course when you do not want this automatic alignment, you can use the 'As Is' option.

Kiril
Kiril Sinkel
Digital Light & Color
davidh
Posts: 835
Joined: June 9th, 2009, 2:16 am

Re: The cropping rectangle confusion

Post by davidh »

Kiril, thanks for the clarification. What led me to posting this topic was my curiosity why, under certain circumstances, can the cropping rectangle be moved by its interior without any orientation change, but refreshes its orientation as soon as it is dragged or clicked at its sides. I wondered whether this might have something to do with that movement down and right after cancelling the transformation using the Cancel button.

David
ksinkel
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Joined: April 2nd, 2009, 11:58 am
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Re: The cropping rectangle confusion

Post by ksinkel »

David,

There is no one-size-fits-all way to create a dialog or choose its default settings. No matter what choices we make, there will be situations where they are not optimum. Therefore there are two built-in ways you can avoid automatic alignment.

1. You can choose As Is and the save that as your default setting. Save As Default is in the options menu.

2. Hold down the Shift key when selecting the Crop transformation. This clears the previous settings, so the dialog starts from its defaults. This shift-key method is applicable to transformations generally.

Kiril
Kiril Sinkel
Digital Light & Color
davidh
Posts: 835
Joined: June 9th, 2009, 2:16 am

Re: The cropping rectangle confusion

Post by davidh »

Kiril,
My post was not a complaint at all nor a call for help. If it sounds like that, it is because my English is fairly limited. I have been using the PWP since the version 3.5 (I guess) and since then I have got rid of all the other fotoediting SW as redundant (except Silverfast for my Epson scanner which came with it).
This post was just another curious exploration into some more functional detailes of my most favourite SW to understand it even better.
David
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