Keep aspect ratio in crop tool?

[AlexisSorbas]

Hi,

I recently started with Affinity Photo, so I still have some hurdles to overcome.

I tried to crop a picture with the crop tool and a certain aspect ratio. I chose the aspect ratio, but I want to change the size of it.

Now for my question: How can I keep the aspect ratio, since transforming the rectangle changes the ratio... how can I fix the ratio, when changing the size of the cropped area?

Thanks

edit: Got it, I didn't choose a ratio, but a fixed size. My bad!

[MEB]

Hi AlexisSorbas,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
With the Crop Tool selected go to the context toolbar and change the Mode dropdown to Custom Ratio. Enter the ratio you want in the input fields immediately on the right of the dropdown. If you now adjust the crop grid on canvas it should keep the ratio you have set.

[chenxian352]

Can it keep aspect while pressing Shift? Like, after select the preset 1024 x 768, I can resize the crop area pressing shift to keep the aspect.

After select 1024 x 768, once I adjust the handlers it won't keep the aspect. Very frustrating. 

[MEB]

Hi chenxian352,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
Have you changed the Mode in the context toolbar to Custom Ratio? If you do so it should keep the ratio without pressing any modifier key when you drag the handles.

[R C-R]

12 hours ago, chenxian352 said:

After select 1024 x 768, once I adjust the handlers it won't keep the aspect

If you select a preset of 1024 px x 768 px, that sets the crop box size to those specific dimensions of width & height in pixels. That allows you to drag the crop box itself around on the canvas to select which part of it to crop to those pixel dimensions. However, if you drag any of the crop box handles instead, you will override that preset & change the dimensions to something other than those of the preset.

To preserve the aspect ratio, either use the Custom Ratio mode as @MEB suggested, or any suitable preset based on a ratio rather than on image dimensions. If you are not sure which is which, the Context toolbar will dim out the Units field for all modes based on ratios (original, custom, or preset) because ratios are dimensionless.

[Steve.leach]

With every new image you edit the Crop Mode reverts back to "Unconstrained".  At least, could it not keep the Mode for the duration of the Affinity Photo session?

[kaffeeundsalz]

This has been a common feature request for quite a while now, so my guess would be that the developers are at least aware of it.

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, kaffeeundsalz said:

This has been a common feature request for quite a while now, so my guess would be that the developers are at least aware of it.

It has been mentioned a few times that they are reworking the Crop tool, but no details have been given about that, or when we might see any changes.

[Steve.leach]

Anybody have any news on reworking the Crop Tool?  

[R C-R]

The crop tool has been reworked in the 1.7 betas, but the 'crop & resize' feature that was there in earlier betas has since been removed because it created some stability issues and/or conflicts with existing features that they say won't be resolved when the retail 1.7 update is released.

It is unclear if that means the feature won't be added to a later 1.x version or what.

[lemming8020]

Any news about this

On 11/3/2018 at 9:00 PM, Steve.leach said:

With every new image you edit the Crop Mode reverts back to "Unconstrained".  At least, could it not keep the Mode for the duration of the Affinity Photo session?

Any news about this? This is the only thing left that's keeping me from fully switching to Affinity Photo. When I work with lots of images, it's extremely time consuming for me to set the dimensions again and again.

But other than that, I like AP more, than PS!

[lemming8020]

Was this fixed?

[jaedee]

It appears to work. (Not sure if it didn't work in previous versions). However, if you set a custom aspect ratio you have to set it as a Custom Preset in order for it to be used and automatically open (to include with new image) during the same session. 

If you set an Affinity Preset, they appear to automatically open when crop tool is selected.

 

 

[lemming8020]

Thanks, this will be useful. But what I had in mind can be seen in the video that I just made: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hZagN4HytiK1zyBLDkIHJ1eymHQV4Tq7/view?usp=sharing

When I crop an image and move to the next one, the Crop Tool resets itself. In Photoshop it remains on the set dimension no matter which image I work on.

[jaedee]

 

See Link Below. 

 

A Preset must be selected either a Affinity Preset or a created Custom Preset. Instructions or in the help selection for creating a Custom Preset. 

Select Crop Tool > The Settings Icon (Cog) > Select from the Ratio List >  Apply

 

https://recordit.co/TjQI7YukoQ

 

 

[lemming8020]

Thank you so much! This is it.

[jaedee]

👍

[Vlota]

I don't see why this is receiving so many thumbs up as an accepted solution.  It's a palaver to set up and, it doesn't adapt itself to retaining the original aspect ratio, if you're working with a mixture of landscape and portrait orientated images. 

 

Why is it so difficult just to make the damned crop tool retain its previous setting, so that I don't have to reset it to 'Original Ratio' every... single... time... I want to crop an image?   It even resets to 'Unconstrained' if I click off the tool and then go back to use the crop tool again, while editing the same image.  I've only been using Affinity Photo for a few days and this has already annoyed the hell out of me so many times .   

 

As such a trivial to fix issue was originally raised 3 years ago and still hasn't been implemented, it doesn't fill me with much confidence in Affinity's claims to listen to user input.  

 

Sorry guys. No Sale for me, while such basic functionality is left broken  for no good reason.

Edited August 11, 2021 by Vlota
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