Crop Tool Functionality – Simultaneous Crop Opposite Sides and Snapping

[Mr. Doodlezz]

Hey everyone,

I honestly don't know exactly how to describe what I've been missing for a long time (actually since day one of Photo) other than the title. But I can try to describe what behaviour I would expect.

As you can already tell from the title, it's about the Crop Tool. 

From certain other tools I am used to being able to click on the top and bottom and left and right centre nodes of a selection, a shape or an artboard and adjust the element symmetrically by holding down the ⌘ key. Here is a short demonstration of what I mean by this (Sorry for the poor quality, but I didn't want it to be a big clip):

Crop_Tool_function.mov

You could say: »Why don't you just move the active area so that it snaps into the middle?«

But here's the thing: Snapping to the centre of the current canvas for some reason does not work with the cropping tool – only document edges and rulers are recognised. All other elements in the document are ignored as snapping candidates.

For some reason these two functionalities (simultaneous crop opposite sides and snapping) apparently never made it into the crop tool and I really don't know why because these to me are the most basic functions I use on a daily bases – to crop equal parts from the sides or to snap to elements/candidates on the canvas.

I really miss these – am I the only one? 😔

[Mr. Doodlezz]

And of course, I know that there are probably 10 workarounds for both problems, of which I probably already use 6.

But – as is the case with workarounds – they need more clicks, and each click takes time, and time is money.

At least for simultaneously cropping opposite sides would be holding down one single additional key instead of 1. creating a shape 2. create rulers for that shape and 3. finally switching to the crop tool and crop.

[loukash]

43 minutes ago, MrDoodlezz said:

Snapping to the centre of the current canvas for some reason does not work with the cropping tool – only document edges and rulers are recognised. All other elements in the document are ignored as snapping candidates.

Almost true.
You've forgotten one options that works: Pixel selection bounds
Make sure this snapping option is turned on.

33 minutes ago, MrDoodlezz said:

But – as is the case with workarounds – they need more clicks, and each click takes time, and time is money.

Jaja, immer diese Binsenweisheiten… 
(Nichts für ungut, gell! )

Anyway…

33 minutes ago, MrDoodlezz said:

instead of 1. creating a shape 2. create rulers for that shape and 3. finally switching to the crop tool and crop.

Well, it works a bit faster than that when you snap to pixel bounds:

1. create a rectangular shape the same way you would want the Crop tool to work
2. command-click it in the layers panel to make it a marching ants selection
3. delete the shape (selection marching ants will remain)
4. crop tool: will snap to the marching ants
5. voilà

Just tested it: took me about 20 seconds from finding the snapping center of the canvas to pressing Enter to crop.

~~~

That all said, don't get me wrong: 
I definitely do support the request for having more snapping and construction options for the Crop tool!

[Mr. Doodlezz]

55 minutes ago, loukash said:

You've forgotten one options that works: Pixel selection bounds

55 minutes ago, loukash said:

Just tested it: took me about 20 seconds

You are right about that. So that would be one of the 4 workarounds I haven't used yet, and probably even the one that requires the fewest clicks.
But these tricks are not as intuitive or comparable to the method we know and use from the other tools. I don't understand why this learned habit is broken for a single tool.
(In fact, it is broken in at least two places I know of: The Crop Tool and the Tiltshift option within the live filter Depth of Field. Unfortunately it also does not pick up the function of adjusting the opposite sides at the same time when holding down the ⌘-key. Probably I’m super picky with this … oh well, what can I say, I do like precision.)

Now if the selection were automatically detected when switching to the crop tool or offered as a potential crop, that would almost be an acceptable alternative. I saw this or a similar request as well somewhere in the forums.

55 minutes ago, loukash said:

Jaja, immer diese Binsenweisheiten… 

Haha, I know – aber der Spruch musste jetzt noch kurz sein. Und ist doch nun mal am Ende des Tages auch tatsächlich so, oder nicht? 😁

[loukash]

19 minutes ago, MrDoodlezz said:

Und ist doch nun mal am Ende des Tages auch tatsächlich so, oder nicht? 😁

Naja, ich hab mich vor fast 35 Jahren selbständig gemacht, damit ich mich eben nicht hetzen muss und mir meine Zeit selbst einteilen kann.  

21 minutes ago, MrDoodlezz said:

In fact, it is broken in at least two places I know of

There's more. Some places are possibly oversights, some might be "by design" (haha), some are bugs.