Better Clipping Layer Options

[notMateo]

First off, thanks for the amazing and affordable software. I really love your guys work. I'm making suggestion from the perspective of a frustrated user unfortunately, though. Not an angry one, mind you, just someone who's having a hard time attaching to the current way of doing things.

So, in Photo and Designer (I don't have Publisher), there are two ways of masking or clipping a layer to another. First, there's the option of having the layer you want masked overtop the object you want it masked to, and clicking Mask to Below. Now this is great, for specific use-cases, but it kinda does the reverse of what I expected, coming from Photoshop. But like I said, this is fine. Second, you can drag the item you want masked into the layer you want it masked to. This method is a lot more typical of other programs I've used like this.

However that's kind of where my gripe begins. Say I want to mask an image into a box, for the purpose of readjusting the information inside afterwords. You kind of just can't. You're stuck with making two adjustments in the best case scenario; first you drag the layer you want masked into the mask, move the mask, and then move the layer inside the mask, and rinse repeat until you get the desired effect, since contents in the mask are dragged when you mask it. So that leaves me with the problem of having no way to use what I consider to be standard "clipping" in either Photo or Designer.

Another use-case I found myself really needing this functionality with was when I tried to place a handful of images until a group, and then mask an adjustment filter to them. This one worked out much more wonky; as I wasn't really able to get the adjustment layer to just clip on-top of the group. 

What I'm proposing here is Photoshop-style clipping masks. They're extremely useful and a big part of my (probably very flawed) workflow. To be specific, the ability to clip to layers underneath the selected layer or group with a button/right click action. I'm not asking for a replacement of existing tools, which have their place, just another tool to supplement what's there.

Hopefully this all makes sense, it's a little bit of a mouthful, and maybe I'm just missing something but I've been looking for a solid solution for some time now. Thanks for reading.

[madPXL]

Hi notMateo,

if I clearly understand your problem, for the first use-case you have to check "lock children" on the context toolbar (the top one) , you will be able to move your boxed layer mask and the content inside will not move.

For the second use-case, you just have to put your adjustment layer inside the group and above all layers.

[notMateo]

16 hours ago, madPXL said:

Hi notMateo,

if I clearly understand your problem, for the first use-case you have to check "lock children" on the context toolbar (the top one) , you will be able to move your boxed layer mask and the content inside will not move.

For the second use-case, you just have to put your adjustment layer inside the group and above all layers.

I tried that first solution already, however if I resize the layer mask the contents inside lose their aspect ratio. I can't really speak to the second solution, that sounds right though.

[madPXL]

You have two ways to create a "mask":

First, you can have a rectangular shape, set its opacity to 0% and drag what you want inside and it will act as a mask.

Or you can have your rectangular shape above your group, set the layer to "mask to below" and everything below the mask will be masked.

For both ways, I have no problem of resizing the mask to not lose any contents aspect ratio with the "lock childen" checked.

If it's not clear, maybe you should post a screen of your problem or your file!

[notMateo]

On 6/2/2020 at 1:09 PM, madPXL said:

You have two ways to create a "mask":

First, you can have a rectangular shape, set its opacity to 0% and drag what you want inside and it will act as a mask.

Or you can have your rectangular shape above your group, set the layer to "mask to below" and everything below the mask will be masked.

For both ways, I have no problem of resizing the mask to not lose any contents aspect ratio with the "lock childen" checked.

If it's not clear, maybe you should post a screen of your problem or your file!

I'm going to give this a try! It sounds like exactly what I need, at least as a work-around. I'd love to see this done a much simpler way in the future, but this sounds like it'll work fine for now! Thank you kind stranger.