Changing my default setting for cropping to "unrestrained"

Hi John, I see that I was too slow :sleeping::sleeping::sleeping:

Nevertheless, I confirm that :arrow_up: does the trick in DPL on macOS.

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George, THAT was the key!!!

“At the moment you use the mouse pointer to draw the rectangle”. !!!

My “problem” is that I don’t draw a rectangle. I click on the crop tool at the top of the page, which brings up the means of adjusting the top/bottom/right/left edges, and as I start adjusting them, my rectangle is constrained.

BUT…

If I do the same thing, and instead of adjusting one of the edges, I hold down the SHIFT key, and draw a new rectangle, the setting changes to UNCONSTRAINED and I can create any cropping rectangle I want.

I’m all set. I’'m just used to doing it like I do in Lightroom, which apparently already has been configured the way I want it to work.

THANK YOU!

That’s interesting, Joanna - - In the Win version, the Shift-key has a different purpose related to cropping;

  • Hold down Ctrl-key when dragging crop handles, and PL switches to Unconstrained
  • Hold down Shift-key when dragging crop handles whilst in Unconstrained mode, and PL temporarily maintains the current aspect ratio while changing the crop size.

John M

Are there any special keys for cropping on the Mac?

To me, cropping is like any other adjustment - I usually crop to make the photo look best. I never fit the image to a crop size, I’m always doing it the other way 'round. If there are distracting elements in a photo that I didn’t eliminate in the camera, this gives me one more opportunity.

I’ll ask one more question here, but I’m sure it belongs elsewhere. Is there a way to “crop” an image to something other than a rectangle/square shape? Can I do a circular crop? Can I adjust the sides so they’re uneven? Instead of a “hard edge” to define the crop, can I allow the image to “fade out” gradually?

No, to both of these.

Yes to his one - - See the “Creative Vignetting” tool … Experiment with the settings to see the affect.

John M

Actually, with FilmPack’s Creative Vignetting tool, you can have a circular crop - sort of. The Intensity and Transition sliders make the vignette anything from a hard transition to black to a gentle fade-out toward the edges. The roundness, center point, and radius may also be adjusted as desired.

Besides the tools FilmPack adds to PhotoLab, one can also use the Local Adjustments to create edges for photos as one wants. Not elegant, but at least possible.

Of course, the exported photo will have a rectangular shape, with anything outside the “crop” being black or perhaps white. Making the edges of an image transparent so that it can have a different shape requires other software.

John-M, is this what I need to learn? If so, do I need to purchase the “film pack” or is that already part of PL3 ?

https://www.dxo.com/project/correcting-vignetting-with-dxo-opticspro-9/

Ah, yes, apologies - - Creative Vignetting is part of FP … I forgot that.

The link you listed, tho, refers to vignette correction - which IS part of PL (it’s applied automatically). This refers to correction of unwanted affect of darkening of corners of image … the opposite of Creative Vignetting.

John M

OK, so I do have both the Creative Vignetting, and also the “vignette correction”. If I read the article correctly, the “creased paper” effect came from the “Film Pack”, whatever that is.

I assume this is how to use the Film Pack:
https://www.dxo.com/project/getting-started-with-dxo-filmpack-5/
Interesting reading, but I think I should stop adding anything new until I fully explore what I already have. If I did want it, apparently it is $79, but it doesn’t say if that’s for the regular version, or the Elite version.

You know, the more I work with PL3, the more I realize I could stop using LR almost completely, but then I would lose the ability to watermark my photos as I export them.

This is all very interesting. I asked the starting question years ago and at that time the answer was nothing like so satisfying; essentially you cannot change it.
Pity I missed the changes but I will change my default immediately.

Perfrode, thank you for the compliment, and yes, I do leave enough room around my image so I can work on them as needed, but there’s more to it.

My most recent photos (and some from long ago) can be found here:

You’ll find that the “crop” is whatever I feel works best with the image - I fit the crop to the image, not the other way around. There are rare occasions when I need to crop to a specific format, but 99% of the time it’s whatever works best with a given image.

So, most every time, I need to change the setting from the default to unrestrained. That’s one my two major annoyances with PhotoLab 3, the other being that I always need to edit in both PL3 and in LR to get my watermark. Not that big a deal, just an annoyance.

I feel I have more control of my images in PL3 than LR, but LR is more convenient. Gradually, I’m doing more and more in PL3. Sometime in the future, maybe the crop tool will be something I can set once and forget, and maybe PL3 will be able to overlay a watermark when I’m saving my final images to upload to Smugmug (or whatever).

Thanks to everyone who responded to the questions. All of it was helpful!

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Hi Mike - - I believe you may still be misunderstanding the advice you were given above (by a number of people, including me);

I’m assuming, when you wish to crop your image, that you “grab” (with your mouse) one of the four boundaries of your image and adjust one or more of them to create your required crop … Right ?

Assuming so; If you hold down the Shift-key (or Ctrl-key on Windows) at the same time as you move one of the image boundaries (as described just above) then the crop tool will automatically switch to unconstrained mode.

Does that not solve the annoyance for you ? … or, am I the one who’s misunderstanding something ?!

Regards, John M

The shift key toggles the crop ratio between variable and a fixed ratio based on what the ratio is when I change the crop.

My default preset has crop ratio set to variable and I can change the crop to e.g. 0.74.
When I change the crop again while pressing the shift key, the ratio is fixed to 0.74 - until I select a different image.

Thanks for the clarification, Platypus - but now I’m confused !

In the Windows version of PL, holding down the Ctrl-key whilst adjusting the crop boundaries will automatically switch the aspect ratio to “Unconstrained” … I understood (based on your post here) that the Mac equivalent of that is the Shift-key.

Are you saying that this handy behaviour is not available on Mac at all ?

John M

Not at all. The switching of unconstrained mode is there, it’s just that the Ctrl modifier is already taken to be the equivalent of right-click to activate a popup menu or to zoom the screen.

Ah, OK - I was misunderstanding @platypus.

So, I’m correct in my advice to @mikemyers as follows … Right ?

John M

I just tested what you wrote - I opened up a test image, and crop was set to “original”. I clicked on the crop tool at the top of the page, then pressed and held the ‘shift’ key on my Mac, and grabbed one corner of the image. Sure enough, the setting changed to “unrestrained”. This is fine - problem solved. Thank you!!!

Thanks; the way you described it up above, it’s obvious. I will try this later today. When I’m about to use the crop tool for the first time, I just hold down the SHIFT key as I select the first adjustment, and it will change to Unrestrained. Not quite what I asked for (making it the default from now on), but easy enough to do, and simpler than all the stuff I’m currently doing. Thank you!!

I’m not going to re-read the earlier suggestions, but " hold down the Shift-key (or Ctrl-key on Windows) at the same time as you move one of the image boundaries" is obvious (now).