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As a photographer who uses a printer to make mainly A3 prints, I have a couple of issues with Affinity's cropping tool.

 

1. If I don't want to use 'absolute dimensions', 6x4, 8.5x11 or 1024x768px, why is it impossible to change the units? Further, why is 'Absolute dimensions' the only user defined crop which can change units? This is especially an issue since even when I use 'Absolute dimensions', it only allows full numbers (i.e. 29.7= A3 size, becomes 30). 

 

2. Why does the crop rectangle move outside of the image? If I have decided to crop an image, and I have set the crop size (difficult with this program), why would I want to move outside the confines of my picture? 

 

Paul

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Hi Paul,

Welcome to Affinity Forums :)

1. If you don't want to use specific (absolute) dimensions change the Mode dropdown to Unconstrained and adjust the crop area using the crop handles on canvas. You can only change the units in the Absolute dimensions mode because that's where they make sense. If you are working with ratios or in unconstrained mode the units are not relevant (note that Affinity Photo's Crop Tool doesn't resample the cropped area/document). The input "rounding" issue seems a bug. I will check if this was already logged and add it it case it's not.

 

2. The Crop Tool in Affinity Photo is non-destrcutive. If you later want to adjust the crop dimensions you can move the crop's rectangle boundaries outside the canvas to "recover" the previously cropped area.

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Thanks MEB, 

 

I was wrong about the dimensions. It's 'custom ratio' that only allows whole numbers. (Interestingly, 'absolute dimensions' sets 42x29.7 as 41.99x29.68).

 

As I only print my pictures at A3 size, (i.e. 42x 29.7cm) I need to use 'custom ratio' to crop, but the closest I can get is 42x30. Is there a way to set 42x29.7 as a preset ratio in this program? That .3 is only a small difference, but it can be significant in a close crop.

 

Thanks

Paul

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> Why does the crop rectangle move outside of the image? If I have decided to crop an image, ... why would I want to move outside the confines of my picture?

This is a bug. I've been waiting for it to get fixed since before the official launch of Affinity Photo https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/12394-what-happened-to-topic8799-crop-tool-inconsistency.

It's keeping me from promoting AP to my colleagues.

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It is not a bug. It is very handy way to add more canvas to document.

if you cropped the document before, which is non destructive, and expand the area again, the document is not revealed until you apply the "crop" which extends the picture again

 

that is most definitely a bug at least

 

I can definitely see manus point in that it may be desirable in most cases to actually crop and not expand the document by accident 

- quite stunning how long this has survived in AP

 

cheers 

 

 

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> It is not a bug. It is very handy way to add more canvas to document.

 

Then it should be called 'Add canvas'.

 

---

 

- I open a photo that has landscape proportions (width > height)
- I want to crop part of that photo - not add anything to it
- I have to move the crop lines to be within the photo (see screenshot)

 

This is a bug because it works as expected for photos with portrait proportions (height > width).

 

post-5549-0-46462900-1483562509_thumb.png

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Just started using AP. Have used Photoshop and Pixelmator since forever so I thought I knew what I was doing. I want to do something simple and I'm so confused! All I want to do is crop an image down to particular pixel dimensions, then copy the resulting image and place it somewhere else. Photoshop: simple. Pixelmator: simple. AP: ?

 

I choose crop, absolute dimensions, 256 x 256 pixels, I drag the corners of the crop area and they resize to the wrong size. Why? Anyway, I have the wrong size now but I Commit and continue. I use Select All and Copy and get the whole image. Why? I use the marquee tool and select part of the image, then cut. The whole image is cut. Why? I choose Flatten, select all, copy and that, finally works.

 

This program looks great but either it works very differently than every other program on the Mac, it's buggy, or I'm a bit thick. Which is it? I'll have to go back to Pixelmator for now, but thanks for any help you can provide.

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Ok, there are bugs as I see:

 

1. if you select ratio in context toolbar it fits width from the start, not smaller dimension as it should (maybe)

 

2. when "de-cropping" previously cropped image back to original canvas size crop preview does not show previously cropped image area.

 

Also, there is missing feature that snapping does not work with crop tool.

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I choose crop, absolute dimensions, 256 x 256 pixels, I drag the corners of the crop area and they resize to the wrong size. Why?

Because by dragging the corners you are changing the absolute dimensions. Instead, if you want absolute dimensions drag the crop box itself to where you want that crop to occur, not any of its control handles. The pointer changes depending on where you place it to let you know what dragging will do. When it is inside the crop box, it changes to a four way arrow, just like it does with the move tool, to let you know you will be moving the crop box instead of resizing it.

I use Select All and Copy and get the whole image. Why?

 

Because, like with effects, adjustments, & live filters, cropping in Affinity Photo is non-destructive. (Wherever possible AP is non-destructive -- it is one of the primary design goals of the app.)

 

Basically, cropping is just a clipping layer applied to the entire canvas, which is why the Document > Unclip Canvas menu item is provided to remove it, & why if you select all layers you get everything, including the cropped out parts -- they have not been deleted (which would be destructive), just hidden.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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Thanks for the comment, R C-R. A common action I use image editing apps for is to crop an image to certain pixel dimensions, then save the image or copy it to another location. The original image is usually bigger (but might be smaller) than the pixel dimensions I need. In Pixelmator and Photoshop I specify the pixel dimensions, drag the crop rectangle around the area of the image I want, and commit. That's it (to be fair, in Pixelmator I need to resize the canvas because the crop numbers are for aspect ratio, not absolute size). How would I do the same thing in AP, remembering that this is something I do a lot and would like to do it in the minimum number of steps.

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In Pixelmator and Photoshop I specify the pixel dimensions, drag the crop rectangle around the area of the image I want, and commit. That's it (to be fair, in Pixelmator I need to resize the canvas because the crop numbers are for aspect ratio, not absolute size). How would I do the same thing in AP, remembering that this is something I do a lot and would like to do it in the minimum number of steps.

That is exactly how the Absolute Dimensions mode in Affinity works, except of course that it is non-destructive. You just have to be careful to drag the crop rectangle & not any of its 8 control handles. It is particularly useful for enlarging the canvas beyond the image size.

 

However, since it is non-destructive, it isn't the best tool to use for copying a part of an image. Instead, try one of the selection tools like any of the Marquee selection tools, the Freehand Selection Tool, etc. Make your "marching ants" selection with any of them, make sure all the layers you want to copy from are selected in the Layers panel (important!), & use any of the normal copy commands (like CMD + C on a Mac). That puts only what is in the selection in the selected layers on the clipboard, ready to be pasted into another existing document or used to create a new document (like with Affinity's "New From Clipboard" command).

 

It will take a bit more time to do this if you have a multi-layer image, but in return you get control over which layers are part of the copy, which for example can reduce saved file sizes if there are layers that do not need to be included in the copy.

 

If instead you want to crop destructively, as you have discovered you can flatten the cropped document.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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That is exactly how the Absolute Dimensions mode in Affinity works, 

No, Absolute Dimensions in AP does NOT work that way. At least I have not been able to drag a cropping marquee around desired area in Absolute Dimensions mode. Absolute Dimensions just selects area with chosen pixel dimensions, it cannot be used to crop to size. As far as I can see there is no similar crop function available in AP as in PS (that is crop to size).

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No, Absolute Dimensions in AP does NOT work that way. At least I have not been able to drag a cropping marquee around desired area in Absolute Dimensions mode. Absolute Dimensions just selects area with chosen pixel dimensions, it cannot be used to crop to size. As far as I can see there is no similar crop function available in AP as in PS (that is crop to size).

You can't drag the control handles on the canvas in Absolute Dimensions mode & see the dimensions update in the Context menubar?

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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In PS dimensions stay the same and crop also scales content, something that is not doable in AP.

When you say "also scales content" do you mean resampling the content in the crop box to some new pixel dimensions? If so, then Affinity's non-destructive cropping tool won't do that. In Affinity, cropping to absolute dimensions means exactly that -- whatever absolute dimensions you set, either in the Context toolbar or by dragging the control handles, is what you get, no more, no less. It is not a scaling/resampling tool.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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Then you are talking about doing something more than just cropping the document.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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I was wrong about the dimensions. It's 'custom ratio' that only allows whole numbers. (Interestingly, 'absolute dimensions' sets 42x29.7 as 41.99x29.68).

 

Yes, I saw (and reported) that inaccuracy quite recently.

 

As I only print my pictures at A3 size, (i.e. 42x 29.7cm) I need to use 'custom ratio' to crop, but the closest I can get is 42x30. Is there a way to set 42x29.7 as a preset ratio in this program? That .3 is only a small difference, but it can be significant in a close crop.

 

The custom ratio you need for A3 size is 420 x 297.

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Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for Windows • Windows 10 Home/Pro
Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for iPad • iPadOS 17.4.1 (iPad 7th gen)

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Yes, someone understands. That is the feature I need.

 

You can't  do that, but there's a workaround. 

 

With the move tool, type in the dimensions you want in the transform panel.

Then set the crop tool to absolute dimensions, and type in the same numbers. Enter/apply.

 

Edit: This is so cumbersome, you have to "resize" the document to millimetres first.

 

But, there's also Document>resize document of course.

- Affinity Photo 2.3.0
- Affinity Designer 2.3.0
-Affinity Publisher 2.3.0

 

MacBook Pro 16 GB
MacOS Sonoma 14.1.2

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The custom ratio you need for A3 size is 420 x 297.

 

And remember to set the units in MM. 

 

No, a custom ratio is just a ratio! There are no units. :)

Alfred spacer.png
Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for Windows • Windows 10 Home/Pro
Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for iPad • iPadOS 17.4.1 (iPad 7th gen)

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Then you are talking about doing something more than just cropping the document.

Technically, yes. It's just the way the other two programs I use work and it is extremely convenient. I understand what cropping is technically. I just think we shouldn't sacrifice functionality for purity.

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No, a custom ratio is just a ratio! There are no units. :)

 

Thank you for pointing that out. :) Of course.

I was thinking of absolute dimensions.

- Affinity Photo 2.3.0
- Affinity Designer 2.3.0
-Affinity Publisher 2.3.0

 

MacBook Pro 16 GB
MacOS Sonoma 14.1.2

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