* Cropping Pictures to standard aspect ratio

[tparkhill]

I may just not be able to find this, but . . . I am a new user who has imported his father's very large TMG database and I am starting to add photos. I have worked with digital photo editing since the early 90s, so I am not an amateur. The question that immediately occurred to me in adding media, is "how should I control the aspect ratio when cropping individual photos, such that the photos look good and uniform when displayed? "

This was not in the great video on adding media and can't seem to find in a search. I think I saw this come up in an old post that was locked down, and perhaps it ended in a request for a feature??
So, if someone knows the answer, please point me to it.
If there is no answer, then I can offer a suggestion of what I have started to do. It may sound a little crude, but it is working well.
1) I picked my own aspect ratio that i though looked good and drew it in PowerPoint (but any graphics software should work),
2) I copied the box, and created various size boxes with the same ratio,
3) I bought Transparency film that can be used in a laser printer and printed my stacked boxes.
4) I place the transparency film on my computer monitor (and let static electricity hold it up),
5) I bring up each image in Media Window, and slide the acetate until I find the box I want to use and then trace it with the Add Frame Link.

I sounds crude but is a fast workaround until there is a tool in FH.
But please, if I missed the obvious feature - please tell me. Hope this helps.

[ADC65]

As you suspected, there is no tool to be able to crop to a desired resolution.

I had asked the question previously and the discussion is here: Add Frame Link of Specific Proportion (19794)

As pointed out by Mike in that thread, there is a wish list for it, if you would like to vote for it (see Mike's comment): Constrain Aspect Ratio when adding image Media

I wrote a plug-in to change the aspect ratio of thumbnails for export, but I don't think this is what you want: Plugin to output Thumbnails from Frame Links (19835)

Adrian

[Jane]

I think you could write a plugin to walk through your file looking for the media links and setting the frame shape as desired, but it would be tricky if you wanted different aspects for some of them, for example highlighting a name in a Census page would probably want to be a different shape from a "face" link.

[tatewise]

It would be simple for a plugin to differentiate between Face Frames for Media associated with Individual & Family records, versus Detail Frames for Media associated with Citations and Source records.

However, if a Face Frame does not have the desired aspect ratio, how should it be changed?
Should just its width be adjusted, or should just its height be adjusted, or should both be adjusted?
Whatever the plugin chooses is more likely to be wrong than what the user wants.

[Jane]

If I was coding it I would compute the current aspect ratios and both possible adjustments and use the one which is the smallest adjustment.

[tatewise]

But that still may not be what the user wants.
The smallest adjustment may be a reduction in a dimension that is crucial to include specific details.
So perhaps preference should be given to increasing a dimension rather than to the smallest adjustment.

Presumably, any adjustment would still keep the Face Frame centralised on its original position, unless that would cause an edge to move outside the full image.

[ADC65]

The programming required to go through the required media and resize the Frame is not difficult, but as Mike says a decision has to be made about how to resize, and this is not trivial. If the Frames are already close to the desired ratio it isn't so bad, but more drastic changes are likely to make the Frame look strange. I made the decision to resize by expansion of the Frame down and right and adjust if that took the Frame out of the picture, but that is not going to suit everybody.

The real solution is of course to encourage Calico Pie to implement a constraint tool to their stretchy box - even something like CTRL constrains to a square, and ALT constraints to a 3x2 would be a great improvement. Last time I checked the Wish List had 11 votes. How many does it need before CP take notice?