On Tue, 2013-10-29 at 11:32 +0100, alemelo wrote:

Hello,
as I write in the subject: is there a way to restrict tool movement along a single (horizontal or vertical) axis?

Yes, with the control key, but not with the perspective tool, which is pretty hard to use in that regard. There's a new perspective tool in the 2.9/2.10 development branch but for me it was pretty useless when I last tried it (I work with images bigger than the screen, and in reverse/corrective mode) and no more accurate. But it's more likely to be improved than the old one.

Liam

Liam Quin - XML Activity Lead, W3C, http://www.w3.org/People/Quin/
Pictures from old books: http://fromoldbooks.org/
Ankh: irc.sorcery.net irc.gnome.org freenode/#xml

On 30.10.2013 at 12:34 A.M., alemelo wrote:

So bad (and strange) that a pretty simple function hasn't been implemented yet.

thank you Alemelo for bringing up this topic. Let's not stick with complaints, sitting back and doing nothing. The usual way to at least increase the chance that it will be in GIMP at sometime, is to discuss the need and requirements and file an enhancement request. In later steps it could be regarded in a UI specification and become implemented.

So, let's begin with the first step:

Are there more GIMP users (especially some who use GIMP often) who need this?
What are your requirements on this? Is this request complete or something missing?

Kind regards,

Sven

On 10/30/2013 3:57 PM, scl wrote:

So, let's begin with the first step:

Are there more GIMP users (especially some who use GIMP often) who need this?
What are your requirements on this? Is this request complete or something missing?

Kind regards,

Sven

I would find this very helpful. As far as the other two questions, I'll need to give it some thought.
mark

On 10/29/2013 03:15 PM, Liam R E Quin wrote:

On Tue, 2013-10-29 at 11:32 +0100, alemelo wrote:

Hello,
as I write in the subject: is there a way to restrict tool movement along a single (horizontal or vertical) axis?

Yes, with the control key, but not with the perspective tool, which is pretty hard to use in that regard. There's a new perspective tool in the 2.9/2.10 development branch but for me it was pretty useless when I last tried it (I work with images bigger than the screen, and in reverse/corrective mode) and no more accurate. But it's more likely to be improved than the old one.

Another problem with the perspective tool is how it behaves with guides. When you click on a corner handle and drag it, what snaps to guides is not the center of the handle, but the point of the handle where you clicked down. This makes it hard to align the handles.

hi

Such tool option: "move by guide" / "move by path" would be appreciated. One thing is primary problem: moving tool or handle (like in perspective tool) along single axis. Something like this (or adjusting behavior while pressing Ctrl) would be really usefull.

Another thing is to look at this problem from different point of view. IMHO we deal with one example of slightly different problem. Maybe developement is in so early stage that I could suggest slightly different approach.

Imagine that we put on our graphic tablet triangle (or any other tool from technical drawing tradition). We could get desired effect of restricting pointer movement. In fact we'd restrict tablet/pointer movement to the edge of template/ruller.

In digital graphic we use guides, mesh, paths or selection/quick mask. Each of these tools behave like our virtual template but for different tasks. They mostly affect tools.
Why dont make one tool that will affect not tools, but pointer? Why don't add easily adjustable input for this new tool - like paths? We could use predefined "pointer restricting paths" or easily prepare new one by preparing such path in Gimp, Inkscape or any other path creating software.

Don't get me wrong - i like idea of improving tools. I would like even more improving them in more "user adjustable way". And i'm pretty aware that every such change will have dramatic consequences in someones workflow.

For example Ofnuts mentioned handle behavior in perspective tool. I understand - it's frustrating when You have to precisely catch center of the handle and later move it to guides.

On the other hands this behavior let me catch any point within selection and position it in new place. I do a lot such things while adjusting perspective in photographs of paintings, documents etc. - In photographs of my painting i catch the corner of painting, not the corner of photo.

I do simple perspective correction to guides - everything around painting will be cut away later. I dont want to reshape selection at this stage, because later another tool is applied (bent between paths).

While leaving this behavior as it is - i'll save my fast correction technique, and Ofnuts will be dissapointed. While changing it to automatic moving center of nearest handle to exact pointer location, problem mentioned by Ofnuts will be solved ... and I'll lost my primary tool.
When we get some modifier key, that will allow to move pointer to center of a handle instead of moving the handle itself - we will both get our desired functionality.
This compromise require change in thinking - we could use pointer as input device, and modify it's XY input.

Is such change in understanding pointer behavior possible? Or we are sentenced to compete which workflow, which task is more important? Hope we can find a compromise that will be possible to code.

Dominik Tabisz

On 10/31/2013 06:57 AM, scl wrote:

On 30.10.2013 at 12:34 A.M., alemelo wrote:

So bad (and strange) that a pretty simple function hasn't been implemented yet.

thank you Alemelo for bringing up this topic. Let's not stick with complaints, sitting back and doing nothing. The usual way to at least increase the chance that it will be in GIMP at sometime, is to discuss the need and requirements and file an enhancement request. In later steps it could be regarded in a UI specification and become implemented.

So, let's begin with the first step:

Are there more GIMP users (especially some who use GIMP often) who need this?

I don't need it, but I think it's a good idea. I have just encountered it with Autodesk Sketch Pro on my tablet. If you set a ruler or circle it will draw either a line parallel to the ruler or an arc with the same centre based on where you begin drawing.

On 10/31/2013 05:57 AM, Brendan Scott wrote:

On 10/31/2013 06:57 AM, scl wrote:

On 30.10.2013 at 12:34 A.M., alemelo wrote:

So bad (and strange) that a pretty simple function hasn't been implemented yet.

thank you Alemelo for bringing up this topic. Let's not stick with complaints, sitting back and doing nothing. The usual way to at least increase the chance that it will be in GIMP at sometime, is to discuss the need and requirements and file an enhancement request. In later steps it could be regarded in a UI specification and become implemented.

So, let's begin with the first step:

Are there more GIMP users (especially some who use GIMP often) who need this?

I haven't used Gimp a lot in the past, but I plan to in the future. Restricting movement to just one axis is a feature I would very much want and use.

Elle

On 10/31/2013 03:20 AM, Dominik Tabisz wrote:

In digital graphic we use guides, mesh, paths or selection/quick mask. Each of these tools behave like our virtual template but for different tasks. They mostly affect tools.
Why dont make one tool that will affect not tools, but pointer? Why don't add easily adjustable input for this new tool - like paths? We could use predefined "pointer restricting paths" or easily prepare new one by preparing such path in Gimp, Inkscape or any other path creating software.

Like "View/Snap to active path"?

(which suffers two probems as far as I know: 1) you cannot set the capture radius like you can for guides and canvas edges, and 2) it doesn't work in the path editor... where it would be most useful.

2013/10/31, Ofnuts :
Like "View/Snap to active path"?

(which suffers two probems as far as I know: 1) you cannot set the capture radius like you can for guides and canvas edges, and 2) it doesn't work in the path editor... where it would be most useful.

Would You please explain why.

I'm not sure how serious this problems are. Whether it is impossible to set capture radius due to some Gimp/GTK internal restriction or we haven't try it yet?

I'm open to any suggestions: how both of us could keep our desired workflow.

Dominik Tabisz

On 3.11.2013 at 1:24 PM alemelo wrote:

Hello,
[...] I want to be able
to pick a corner - say the bottom right one - and move it *only* right or left, without any vertical shift.

I tried with guidelines but I cannot make them stick to the exact side of the image neither if I tell GIMP they're magnetic. But what's worst is that even if I manually put guides along the edge, it seems that the corners of the perspective tool ignore completely the magnetic attribute.

In Photoshop I could simply pick one corner, hold the shift key and restrict movement to the two main axes.

Any analog trick in GIMP?

In GIMP there's a similar trick for the Move tool: use the arrow keys to move the layer horizontally or vertically. If you press Shift+Arrow keys the movement is in bigger steps (ca. 25 display pixels) -> depending on zoom level you can move across the image in smaller or bigger steps.

Unfortunately the arrow key method has some flaws:

1. It can only move the active layer. Picking up a layer doesn't work, because the Shift key is double-bound to 'Tool toggle' and 'Move in bigger steps'. At the end 'Move in bigger steps' wins. Using the mouse to select a layer and the arrow keys to move precisely doesn't work.

2. Moving the currently selected guide doesn't work. Instead the active layer is moved.

3. The arrow keys don't support precise application of the Transform Tools consistently:
- Crop Tool: only move the crop area around if it was moved with the mouse before.
- Rotate Tool: rotate in steps of 15 degrees, the same way as using Shift+Arrow keys or Ctrl+Mouse
- Scale, Shear: up/down arrow keys in-/decrease the value of the selected input field (width, height, shear magnitude) - Perspective Tool, Unified Transform Tool (in GIMP master): no function.

As described in another posting the magnetic rulers have the effect to let the mouse cursor snap in at the ruler, not the center of the handler what can be a bit unpredictable and thus unprecise. I could reproduce this with all Transform Tools except the Move and Crop tools.

Kind regards,

Sven

Hi,

thank you for the input and the constructive comments. I filed an enhancement request here: https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=715105

Kind regards,

Sven