Reload/replace images after ediing in Outside Editor

Running Xara Designer Pro 6.6.6.63205 on win7 64 bit

How to handle this scenario:

I have several photoshop images loaded into xara and trying to make a sensible 4 way arrangement of 4 images. Imagine that one image is outsized compared to the others and needs to be cropped.

I open the original image in photoshop and make the edit, now what is the most expeditious way to refresh/replace/reload... etc the newer state into xara.

I don't see any replace/reload sort of menu item anywhere and have just been deleting the the bad image and reimporting the newer one.

I suspect there is some quicker way to do it. Can anyone give me a tip?

Hi Harry,

You can crop the photos very quickly in Xara itself. Click on the photo in Xara, and using the ‘Shape Editor’ tool (F4), marquee select the nodes you wish to move (say the two left side corners), and nudge them across to where the crop should be. You can also alt/arrow them across for the pixel nudge. See attached pic.

Another way to crop is to place a rectangle over the photo, where you wish to crop, and select both the rectangle and the photo. Then press subtract shapes (ctrl/2) to crop.

Or you can use clipview (Q). Place a rectangle over the photo that represents your crop (you would like the photo to fill and be the same shape as the rectangle). Place the rectangle behind the photo (ctrl/b), select both and press ‘Q’ to clip the photo inside the rectangle.

In order to edit a photo with Photoshop you can configure Xara to open PS when you double click a photo. Go to Options (shift/ctrl/O) and select ‘Effects & Plugins’. Under ‘Editing Bitmaps’ you can check the ‘Edit Bitmaps with this program’ and find Adobe Photoshop’s ‘Photoshop.exe’ file. It will probably be something like "C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS4 (64 Bit)\Photoshop.exe"

After that, just double click a photo to initialize PS, edit photo and save, and you’ll find it changed accordingly in Xara.

Still, cropping is much faster in Xara to begin with, so I would use PS for other things, not cropping. ;)

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Originally Posted by James Allen

Hi Harry,

You can crop the photos very quickly in Xara itself. Click on the photo in Xara, and using the ‘Shape Editor’ tool (F4), marquee select the nodes you wish to move (say the two left side corners), and nudge them across to where the crop should be. You can also alt/arrow them across for the pixel nudge. See attached pic.

Another way to crop is to place a rectangle over the photo, where you wish to crop, and select both the rectangle and the photo. Then press subtract shapes (ctrl/2) to crop.

Or you can use clipview (Q). Place a rectangle over the photo that represents your crop (you would like the photo to fill and be the same shape as the rectangle). Place the rectangle behind the photo (ctrl/b), select both and press ‘Q’ to clip the photo inside the rectangle.

In order to edit a photo with Photoshop you can configure Xara to open PS when you double click a photo. Go to Options (shift/ctrl/O) and select ‘Effects & Plugins’. Under ‘Editing Bitmaps’ you can check the ‘Edit Bitmaps with this program’ and find Adobe Photoshop’s ‘Photoshop.exe’ file. It will probably be something like "C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS4 (64 Bit)\Photoshop.exe"

After that, just double click a photo to initialize PS, edit photo and save, and you’ll find it changed accordingly in Xara.

Still, cropping is much faster in Xara to begin with, so I would use PS for other things, not cropping. ;)

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Thanks for the excellent tips... all look useful in the extreme.
I did see the cropping ability, but I left out one step in my message. Maybe this can also be accomplished easier in Xara?

It was really two moves...

But first: All images have been pre edge feathered in photoshop so to maintain that look the steps below need to be taken instead of just a bare crop.

1) Set some amount of feather on rectangle select tool. Rectangle select, (A rectangle leaving some amount around the perimeter. Invert the selection and delete the perimeter pixels leaving a nicely faded perimeter to the image and leaving the part to be cropped devoid of pixels.

2) Select with Crop tool far enough outboard from the fade line left in previous step and crop the image to a more sensible size leaving the new cut line nicely feathered

I'm wondering now if Xara may offer some sort of feathered masking that would have the same effect but not really necessitate cropping, also allowing all the work to be done in one application?

Mask to proper size with feathered mask and export.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by James Allen

Hi Harry,

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[...]

Quote:

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In order to edit a photo with Photoshop you can configure Xara to open PS when you double click a photo. Go to Options (shift/ctrl/O) and select ‘Effects & Plugins’. Under ‘Editing Bitmaps’ you can check the ‘Edit Bitmaps with this program’ and find Adobe Photoshop’s ‘Photoshop.exe’ file. It will probably be something like "C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS4 (64 Bit)\Photoshop.exe"

After that, just double click a photo to initialize PS, edit photo and save, and you’ll find it changed accordingly in Xara.

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I'm not finding that to hold true here. I took the steps you laid out. Only difference was that in my version it isn't under `Effects and plugins' but under `Photo Editing'.

I set it to photo shop and saved the preferences. No amount of double clicking brings up photoshop.

I thought Maybe I needed to restart Xara for changes to take effect, so restarted, still no amount of double clicking brings up photoshop.

Then I thought maybe I needed to close photoshop, so did that. Still nogo. And I don't see anything on context menu or anywhere else to do it from a menu. Although I'll admit it was something of a quick scan.

While we figure out the mouse business, you can select the photo and go to Utilities/Bitmap Editor and that should open PS if it is assigned as your bitmap editor.

In Options, under ‘mouse’, does your ‘left mouse button’ say ‘Normal click’?

Or it may be that your mouse double-click speed is configured at the wrong speed. Try checking this in Windows/Control Panel/Mouse to see the double-click speed. Mine is set on the second notch from the right, but then again, I double click pretty fast. I have nothing else checked in that box.

You can do the feathering in Xara too, much faster than in PS, and in groups of photos too. You won’t need to crop the result – just export as PNG – true colour + Alpha (or, for transparent Gifs you need to make sure the images are exported against a colour that matches the one you intend to put the result against).

In the attached file I took 4 photos and feathered them in Xara (all at once). See the attached xar file for instructions.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by James Allen

While we figure out the mouse business, you can select the photo and go to Utilities/Bitmap Editor and that should open PS if it is assigned as your bitmap editor.

In Options, under ‘mouse’, does your ‘left mouse button’ say ‘Normal click’?

Or it may be that your mouse double-click speed is configured at the wrong speed. Try checking this in Windows/Control Panel/Mouse to see the double-click speed. Mine is set on the second notch from the right, but then again, I double click pretty fast. I have nothing else checked in that box.

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Yeah, I found the menu item shortly after saying I didn't see it (of course). So I know for sure PS is properly set there.

I tried various speeds right away with no luck, and now I've checked at control panel as you suggest... Mine was set on second from left... way slower than yours... I set it to second from right and tried again with various speeds... still no soap.

What I see on double click (on an Image) is my cursor change to a tiny four way stop on a street. A hollow box appears to the right and lower than the 4 way stop. All the handles on the Image become white hollow boxes.

Still the menu item alone is much faster than what I was doing... thanks.

Hello James Allen,

Re: "Another way to crop is to place a rectangle over the photo, where you wish to crop, and select both the rectangle and the photo. Then press subtract shapes (ctrl/2) to crop."

Don't you mean, ctrl-3, Intersect shapes? If you do ctrl-2, you get the original photo with a rectangular hole in the middle. ;)

Peace

James

Thanks James - it should be ‘ctrl-3, Intersect Shapes’. :)

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Originally Posted by HarryPutnam

I tried various speeds right away with no luck

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In my own case Harry, I prefer not to have that function anyway, because every time I was clicking around a photo PS would start up. I ended up disabling it by directing it to a dummy exe file, so now nothing starts up. :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by James Allen

In my own case Harry, I prefer not to have that function anyway, because every time I was clicking around a photo PS would start up. I ended up disabling it by directing it to a dummy exe file, so now nothing starts up. :D

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Thinking about a bit, I think I would find (if it were working), like you, that it is mostly annoying, so I think I will stand happy with double click not calling PS.