Page 394 - Xara Designer Pro X17

394 The Photo Tools

You can tell whether a photo has been clipped or not from the status bar which will
describe it as a "clipped photo".

Clear
Press the "CLEAR" button, or just click outside the marked clip region to clear the current
clip rectangle.
Un-clip

Press the UN-CLIP button with any clipped photo selected, to restore the original photo.
This restores the clip rectangle, which you can adjust or clear by clicking outside it.

The UN-CLIP button in the CLIP TOOL will change the outline of any clipped photo, and also
arbitrarily formed shapes with a bitmap fill, to that rectangular outline of the complete
photo or bitmap used as the fill. You may have to select the Clear button to clear the crop
rectangle (or click outside the rectangle).

Adjusting the clip region
Because the un-clip button restores the clip rectangle (showing the area outside faded),
you can easily make fine adjustments to a clipped photo. Just select the photo, press the
Un-clip button and adjust the sides of the clip rectangle as required. Double click inside
the photo to clip it again.

Width / Height
After drawing a clip rectangle, you can enter values directly into the width and height
fields on the InfoBar to set the clip rectangle dimensions to exact values.
Lock Aspect

Select the "LOCK ASPECT" check-box to constrain the clip rectangle to a specific aspect
ratio as you drag. The radio buttons to the right of the check-box determine the aspect
ratio used. Select "CURRENT" to maintain the aspect ratio to that of the photo before the
clip. Note that the clip rectangle automatically changes between landscape and portrait
orientation as you drag a corner of the rectangle. So if you drag sideways it tends to
create a clip in landscape orientation. If you drag downwards more, then it will create a
clip region in portrait orientation.

The common preset crop aspect ratios are available of 4:3 (most consumer digital
cameras and old-style TVs and monitors), 3:2 (that of traditional film cameras and higher
end SLR digital cameras), and 16:9 (aspect ratio of widescreen TVs).

You can override the lock-aspect option by using "Ctrl" while dragging. So if you're
dragging out a clip rectangle (or adjusting one) without aspect ratio lock, then holding
"Ctrl" will lock the aspect to the last selected aspect ratio. Similarly if you have lock
aspect option on then "Ctrl" will temporarily un-lock the aspect ratio.