Loupe Ideas
Posted: Tue Jun 05, 2007 6:13 pm
The new Adobe Reader 8 has an excellent loupe implementation. Here is a screen clip.
The magnifier marque (magenta in that screen clip) is sizeable by dragging handles at the corners. Sizing the marque changes the zoom amount, moving the marque pans the view in the floating loupe window (of course).
Also, sizing the floating loupe window changes the shape and size of the marque. The interaction between the marque and the floating loupe window is great!
The marque color setting is available in the loupe window mini-toolbar, as is a zoom slider and zoom-in/zoom-out buttons.
This combination of zoom marque PLUS loupe window seems to me superior (for most activities) to the "instant magnifier" approach of FastStone. FastStone's instant magnifier is great, but I would probably use the Adobe approach (if implemented in XnView) more often.
It would also be great to:
- Display a crosshair centered in the marque
- Show a define-able grid in the loupe window
- Have a button (in the loupe mini-toolbar) to toggle smoothing of the magnified portion displayed in the loupe.
- Have a button for "100%" in the loupe mini-toolbar.
- Have a copy-to-clipboard button in the loupe mini-toolbar.
- Have a copy-to-file button in the loupe mini-toolbar.
- Show readouts in the floating loupe window margin for color and position at the crosshair in the marque.
- Be able to dock the loupe window in a sidebar.
- Have the floating loupe window intelligently move (out of the way) as the marque approaches it.
- Choose to snap the marque to the main image grid (if that grid is visible)
The more I use images, the more I use XnView. The more I use XnView, the more tools I wish it had.
A loupe is such a tool.
The magnifier marque (magenta in that screen clip) is sizeable by dragging handles at the corners. Sizing the marque changes the zoom amount, moving the marque pans the view in the floating loupe window (of course).
Also, sizing the floating loupe window changes the shape and size of the marque. The interaction between the marque and the floating loupe window is great!
The marque color setting is available in the loupe window mini-toolbar, as is a zoom slider and zoom-in/zoom-out buttons.
This combination of zoom marque PLUS loupe window seems to me superior (for most activities) to the "instant magnifier" approach of FastStone. FastStone's instant magnifier is great, but I would probably use the Adobe approach (if implemented in XnView) more often.
It would also be great to:
- Display a crosshair centered in the marque
- Show a define-able grid in the loupe window
- Have a button (in the loupe mini-toolbar) to toggle smoothing of the magnified portion displayed in the loupe.
- Have a button for "100%" in the loupe mini-toolbar.
- Have a copy-to-clipboard button in the loupe mini-toolbar.
- Have a copy-to-file button in the loupe mini-toolbar.
- Show readouts in the floating loupe window margin for color and position at the crosshair in the marque.
- Be able to dock the loupe window in a sidebar.
- Have the floating loupe window intelligently move (out of the way) as the marque approaches it.
- Choose to snap the marque to the main image grid (if that grid is visible)
The more I use images, the more I use XnView. The more I use XnView, the more tools I wish it had.
A loupe is such a tool.
