xnview wrote:A dialog box similar to batch convert only for cropping??
Nope. Exactly in the same engine.
Let's take it step by step.
What's happening when the user wants to do a Batch Convert?
1. Selects 123 photos.
2. Goes to Tools | Batch Convert...
And then the program does like this:
2.a. Builds a list of 123
TmyFileEntry objects containing the file names and thumbnails of the selection from the step 1.
2.b. Show the Batch Convert dialog with the 1st tab filled with thumbnails based on the list generated at step 2.a.
At this point I propose the following changes:
2.b.1 Move all the widgets from the Batch Convert's tab "Input:" on the bottom of the second tab ("Actions"). We'll have a layout quite similar with the Compare window.
The main reason of this move is to enhance the navigation for the Before/After views in the "Actions" tab.. Of course, when the user clicks on a thumbnail, the corresponding image will be shown in the Before/After pane.
2.b.2 For each entry (object) in the list generated at the step 2.a. add a new property (struct) with 5 numbers (4 integers + one float) to hold the crop information. Initialize this to (0,0,0,0,0) - no cropping information
Till now we have a much better navigation in the Batch Convert window and a struct for each file object doing nothing.
Next step is to add the crop box support:
3. Allow the user to drag a box on the After view in exactly the same manner we can do it today in View mode.
4. Store this info in the struct defined at step 2.b.2
5.
The critical part: In the Crop action, besides options "( ) from position" and "( ) from edge" add another one: "( ) use crop information (box)"
If the latter option is used then read the struct filled with data at step 4 and crop accordingly.
6. (optional, but highly recommended)
Add at all filter actions from Actions menu a check-box saying "Use crop information". Then the crop box will act like a mask. Exactly like in View mode.
7.
Add a tooling button (see the position of the button in the mockup in my original post).
This is very important because in the case of scanned books / documents etc. the crop area is nearly the same on many documents and hence a way to "copy" the coordinates of the crop box on many photos is very necessary and gives us with this simple tool the state of the art in batch cropping.m. Th.
- Dark Themed XnViewMP 1.7.1 64bit on Win11 x64 -
