improved picture frame tool

[Thisismandatory]

An option to have the frame fitted to the image and an option to resize the frame without resizing the image.

[Patrick Connor]

@Thisismandatory

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums  and thanks for you input so far to this forum.

[Thisismandatory]

Thanks, I really hope that this beta testing and your work produce a great product. I have been waiting for an ID alternative for quite a while. So far they have cornered the market and that is not good. 

[Thisismandatory]

One more thing. It would be great to have a native shortcut for place image.

[Thisismandatory]

Another thing. There is no visual difference between having the frame selected or the image, that would be very handy.

[somnolentsurfer]

I'll second this. Unless I'm missing something, I can't see an easy way to restore an image to its native proportions (something like Object > Fitting > Fit Content Proportionally in InDesign). It's very easy to accidentally knock something and stretch it. It'd be good to have a way to put that right.

[walt.farrell]

From what I've seen so far, when an image is placed into a Picture Frame and you resize the frame, one of two things will happen:

1. If you hold shift, the image will scale properly/proportionally as you change the frame size; or
2. If you don't hold shift, the frame will resize as you specify, but the image will still scale proportionally. The result may be that parts of the image will lie outside the frame, and will not be shown, but the scale of whatever shows is correct.

(I haven't had much time to play with this, but that's what I'm seeing at this point.)

[walt.farrell]

8 hours ago, Thisismandatory said:

One more thing. It would be great to have a native shortcut for place image.

Preferences, Keyboard Shortcuts, has an entry (under File) for Place... but with no shortcut defined by default. You could define your own.

[walt.farrell]

8 hours ago, Thisismandatory said:

an option to resize the frame without resizing the image.

I think Publisher has the opposite of that, though. With a filled picture frame selected, I see a control below it, that looks like this:

The slider resizes the image without resizing the frame. So, you could resize the frame (which would also resize the image) and then use the slider to resize the image within the frame.

[Schirmbild]

7 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

I think Publisher has the opposite of that, though. With a filled picture frame selected, I see a control below it, that looks like this:

The slider resizes the image without resizing the frame. So, you could resize the frame (which would also resize the image) and then use the slider to resize the image within the frame.

I think this not so intuitive. While Indesign has two options (manual and numerical) I often use the button 'fit content to frame' or 'fit frame to content'. So the UI offers more options for how you want to do the work.

[Thisismandatory]

9 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

I think Publisher has the opposite of that, though. With a filled picture frame selected, I see a control below it, that looks like this:

The slider resizes the image without resizing the frame. So, you could resize the frame (which would also resize the image) and then use the slider to resize the image within the frame.

I am aware of that. but when you need to keep the image a certain height or width and keep the original aspect ratio this is just not cutting it. The only work around is to have the frame size approximate, as in never fitting properly to the image. You can get the result you want, but is still annoying to have the frame a couple of pixels larger on one dimension that the actual image. 

The thing is that this is not done in different way, the issue is that this is a missing feature. Some of us require for the frame to conform to the image, rather that the other way around.

[Cristiano Falaschi]

the picture frame is very smart, too smart. If the image is positioned manually in a specific position and then the frame size is changed, all our work will be lost.

I like the smart picture frame but I would also like a stupid mode like inDesign

[Helmuth Pandora]

21 hours ago, Thisismandatory said:

Another thing. There is no visual difference between having the frame selected or the image, that would be very handy.

+1

[bbwd]

I have found that a single click on an image within a frame allows you scale the frame and image but a double click on an image means you can adjust the size of the image however you want without the frame being resized. Grabbing a corner handle will scale it in proportion, grabbing an edge handle means you can resize however you want.

If you single click on the image and then click on the frame tool the slider shown in @walt.farrell's post above appears.

 

[Thisismandatory]

57 minutes ago, bbwd said:

I have found that a single click on an image within a frame allows you scale the frame and image but a double click on an image means you can adjust the size of the image however you want without the frame being resized. Grabbing a corner handle will scale it in proportion, grabbing an edge handle means you can resize however you want.

If you single click on the image and then click on the frame tool the slider shown in @walt.farrell's post above appears.

 

I don't use slider normally and I realised I haven't tried this, so it took me a while to find how to get the slider out. Only upon coming back and rereading this post I found it. Never would it occur to me that upon selecting the frame I have than select the tool itself to get that 'functionality' - slider. Very counter intuitive. Regardless of it there is still no way to fit the frame to the content. And the options that the slider offers are found elsewhere and I find it a bit redundant and cumbersome since frame tool has no preset shortcut. 

[bbwd]

@Thisismandatory I agree, it’s not a great way to get what is pretty limited controls on picture resizing. 

I think Adobe did get that right in InDesign and I would like Publisher to have very similar picture frame and content controls as InDesign. 

[Thisismandatory]

16 hours ago, bbwd said:

@Thisismandatory I agree, it’s not a great way to get what is pretty limited controls on picture resizing. 

I think Adobe did get that right in InDesign and I would like Publisher to have very similar picture frame and content controls as InDesign. 

and is not much to add in publisher, all they need to implement is a fit frame to content option. One more option under properties

[Coppereye]

On 8/31/2018 at 12:45 AM, somnolentsurfer said:

I'll second this. Unless I'm missing something, I can't see an easy way to restore an image to its native proportions (something like Object > Fitting > Fit Content Proportionally in InDesign). It's very easy to accidentally knock something and stretch it. It'd be good to have a way to put that right.

I was looking for this too.  Also I like the ID method of using the arrow keys in conjunction with the frame tool to split the size of the master frame into a number of smaller frames with a set gap between the frames

[Thisismandatory]

Ok I have now more report on using the picture frame tool. This in my opinion is lacking and needs polishing. After setting up a dummy book I can list annoyances that should be addressed.

As I said the frame needs to conform to the content. Now the workflow looks way cluttered. Setting up the image with the frame filled proportionally. Adjusting to fit the page to my liking. If the frame happens to go into bleed, since this has yet not been implemented I have to manually adjust frame size for it. Because any resizing of the frame will change the size of the image as well, I have to first fit the frame to the content, so I can enlarge the frame into the bleed (only one side). This is now done with copying the image size in mm and copy the value to the frame. Then the frame is adjusted for bleed in one dimension. Prior to that I have to set up a guide so I do not loose the positioning. 

Second issue is that the images get embedded automatically. Because I moved the folders around I cannot simply make them linked, I have to replace every single image and after that make it linked. Here another issue arises the picture frame does not remember the setting I have chosen for it. This means that I have to go to properties and choose again how the image should fit in the frame. Very cumbersome for now.

Finally the workflow as is slow as there is no shortcut for any of it. I know I can do my own shortcuts, but I think most of this would be basic functionality hence I would expect pre-made shortcuts.

 

[Pubcrawler]

Provide a way to fit frame to content, and content to frame, please. Also to resize frame without resizing image. That would be great!

[Nathan Shirley]

Coming from InDesign this took some getting used to, but I think Publisher is actually much more intuitive with how it handles images overall. InDesign's use of frames is not especially intuitive.

One big difference I noticed with Publisher is the ability to place an image with or without a frame. If you place an image without a frame, it works more like many of you are wishing it would. If you want to crop the image, you can apply a vector crop (nondestructive). For my own work flow I think I would end up placing images without frames most of the time, and with them when I wanted to work very quickly, when absolute precision wasn't required.

[Barbara P]

I am very inexperienced in this area, but I was trying to copy an image into a frame and failing.  To use the place image, it seems necessary to have a filename. 

[Thisismandatory]

On 9/6/2018 at 8:46 AM, Nathan Shirley said:

Coming from InDesign this took some getting used to, but I think Publisher is actually much more intuitive with how it handles images overall. InDesign's use of frames is not especially intuitive.

One big difference I noticed with Publisher is the ability to place an image with or without a frame. If you place an image without a frame, it works more like many of you are wishing it would. If you want to crop the image, you can apply a vector crop (nondestructive). For my own work flow I think I would end up placing images without frames most of the time, and with them when I wanted to work very quickly, when absolute precision wasn't required.

It might be more intuitive and it kind of makes sense, the image is resized when the frame is resized. But there are occasions when you need to resize the frame and then fit the image. Is not so much the difference in workflow, there is a lack of functionality. Placing frames for the layout and coming back with images is sometimes more suited for the job. As well replacing an image is common.

Programs like this have to have options for different workflows, it is impossible to predict all use types of the program. And if a tool (program) is adaptable it way more useful than something with a too rigid structure. 

[PMan]

Hi, If you have placed an image in a picture frame and you want to return it to its native properties

i) select the image/frame, then going to Preferences (top left) and selecting None (picture will not be scaled). Image will revert to its original size

ii) As someone else stated, if you double click on an image in a picture frame you can resize it separately and still revert to its original size using i) above or use any of the other Scales in Preferences

Pman 

[Nathan Shirley]

There is a replace image button on the horizontal toolbar. But yes, maybe it would be better when using an image in a frame, to have it scale to fit the original image aspect by default (no cropping), then if you held down some ctrl-alt-shift combination it would kick into the current behavior, and perhaps a different key combination would allow you to reposition the image within the current frame.

I do think they're onto something here and could definitely improve on how InDesign works.