Techineer

Is there a plugin that can identify a single pixel that is different from all of the surrounding same color pixels and remove it or change its color? I frequently work with BW or grayscale scans of varying (often poor) quality that contain many 'speckles' like the snippet that I have attached. I would like to be able to remove those that are a single pixel surrounded by white pixels. When found, the plugin should replace the pixel with the surrounding color. I have seen reference to other plugins that do something similar, but not quite the same. I would envision clicking the pixel to select the primary color, set tolerance, (set radius?) right-click the surrounding pixels to set the secondary color, (or transparent), and execute. This is how I first thought the menu item Effects/Noise/Reduce noise should work, but it apparently doesn't, as I can't see any change when I try to use it on the drawing. I used to have a fax viewer that had this function, and it worked very well. Unfortunately, it was written for XP, and won't work in Win10. Any suggestions would be appreciated!

The documentation on this control is very poor. There is no description of the function or use of the sliders. In many cases, using the globe is much more intuitive. Is would benefit greatly from a fine movement control. Maybe using the CTRL or Alt keys to limit changes to 1 degree or 0.1 degree increments?

Is it possible to create a drawing element such as a line or circle using the desired coordinates of whatever measurement system is in use? I have searched the forums and haven't been able to find an answer. This would be particularly useful for line drawings. For example, if I have a canvas of 8.5x11", and I would like to specify a line to start from x=1.00", y=1.50' and end at x=7.00" and y=1.50"; or maybe a circle with a center at x,y and a radius of r (or diameter, or point on the perimeter). ...or move selected elements to a specific coordinate location, or to move them by a specified distance and direction. I know, it is possible to do this with the mouse, but it is extremely difficult to get a mouse to be precise enough and to target a location in two dimensions simultaneously. And when moving objects, you cannot identify the pixel location of any particular point on the element because the handle is outside the selected element. If the feature is not available, please consider it for a future version. The user interface might consist of a right-click on the tool image that would open a dialog box with fields to specify start, end and other options.

Is there currently any way to load all pages of a multi-page .tif file? This and other file types will store multiple pages in a single file. I would like to be able to view/edit and re-save the file in its original format. I envision loading the pages in as one tab per page, or possibly one page per layer. If this is not currently available, can it be considered as a future feature? Thanks!

Is there any way to stretch and skew only one layer out of several? I repair electronic equipment. Technical data is often very poor. If I am VERY lucky the documentation includes an image showing the conductor traces on a circuit board and the component outlines showing their locations and reference numbers with respect to the conductors. If I am somewhat lucky, they at least show the component outlines and reference numbers (called a Silk Screen). In this case, when I really need it, I make a graphics scan of the circuit board and overlay a scan of the silk screen in another layer. Then the tricky part is getting them to align properly. Sometimes the scan of the board does not come out perfectly rectangular. Resizing and rotation can only go so far, and often I can align one edge of the board with the silk screen, but the other ends and corners no longer match up. I need to be able to select that layer and drag the corner handles until the active layer lines up with the one above or below it. The other corner handles should remain unmoved. Even better would be to be able to select an area of the layer and manipulate the handles. All the plugins I've seen reference to act on the entire image including all layers, and use a low-resolution box that doesn't give me the fine control I need. I had hopes for the Layers/Rotate/Zoom control, but haven't been able to figure out how to make any of the controls do what I want. Is there any hope? Thanks!

I'm having difficulty with recolor, too, in that it never behaves the same with different mouse clicks. It's like it rotates between modes..... one time it replaces the background with the replacement color, another time it replaces the original color with the replacement color, and the next time it writes the original color all over. I'm working with half-tone drawings, replacing gray colors with RGB colors. Very frustrating.

Is it possible to use the scaling handles (nubs?) on a layer when it is zoomed in? I'm working on a technical drawing with several imported layers and fairly high resolution (600 dpi). All areas of each layer must precisely register with corresponding points on the other layers. However, as they were imported, there were several pixels difference between them. If I zoom out to the window, I see the scaling handles at the edges and can move any side or corner to rescale the layer, but the resolution is too low to see the image well enough to place it precisely. If I zoom in, I no longer can access the scaling handles. I would like to zoom in to one corner of the image and align all the layers, then go to the opposite corner, zoom in, and adjust that corner into alignment without changing the first corner. Tia...

Is it possible to change the properties of the dashed line? Specifically the dash length and space between dashes?

Unlike most of the other posts, I DON'T want a transparent background! I'm trying to create an animated GIF for use in a PowerPoint presentation. I've created the images in PDN and saved the cels as GIFs with the transparency threshhold set to 255. (I've also tried 0 and values in between). The individual cels have opaque white backgrounds, verified by inserting them in a PP slide overlapping another image. When I load them as layers into PDN and save as an AGIF, then change the extension and load onto the PP slide, the white backgrounds are now transparent! This wouldn't normally be a problem, except that the transparent areas have an odd mottled effect to them instead of being solid white. Any idea what is happening and why? How can I correct it? Thanks for any info!

Try using the Magic Wand to capture the area you want to turn transparent. Then hit delete. Use the Shift key with the magic wand to select all areas in the image with that color. Adjust Threshhold to determine how specific you want the color selection to be. Alternately, use recolor to change the unwanted color to something really odd, like neon purple, then use the Magic Wand as above on the odd color.

After much frustration and several posts on the forum which gave me answers but no solution, I finally figured it out by accident. Set the primary/secondary colors as described in the docs. Change the BRUSH WIDTH to a large number such as 100 or more. Adjust the tolerance slider to control how precise you want the color replacement to be.... set it at 5%-10% if you want only the exact color replaced, higher if you want more shades of the color replaced. Hold down either the left or right mouse button and note the brush size circle. Drag the circle across the area you wish to color change. (If it doesn't change, try the other mouse button.) You should see the color under the brush circle change as you 'wave' it over the image. The problem is that the brush size is often still at 1 pixel the first time you try to use it. If you are trying it out on a high resolution drawing, the one pixel-wide line change is too small to see any effect, and nowhere in the docs nor the forum is that explained.

Since the location of an ellipse is extremely difficult to predict, would it be possible to make the ellipse tool behave like the Text tool? That is, when you have created the ellipse, have a 'handle' appear next to it so you could move it to the exact location desired. Maybe even a selection box that you could modify its shape and rotation as if you had selected it. The other feature I would like to see is constrainment of all drawing tools (brush, pencil, color change) as is done with the Line/Curve tool. Hold the Shift key to keep the line straight. ..... or is there some way in which these features already exist?

This thread sorely needs a step-by-step guide to using Animated Image. Here it is: I'm using PDN 3.5.8 under WinXP. Installed the AnimGif.dll in the (root)\Program Files\Paint.NET\FileTypes folder. Starting with the original animated .gif file, create a copy of it and rename it to filename.agif. You should be able to drag and drop either one onto an IE or Firefox window and verify that they both play properly. With a freshly opened window of PDN, select File/Open. In the Open dialog, Files of Type field, select "Animated GIF (*.agif)" and select the 'file.agif' file, and click 'Open'. PDN displays only one cel in the main window. To access the other cels, press F7 or select 'Window/Layers' from the menu. The Layers tool window will then list all cels in the animation. Select any one to work with. When done editing, to save your work, select 'File/Save As'. In the dialog box, the 'Save as type' field should show "Animated GIF (*.agif)". If it doesn't drop it down and select it. Click 'Save' Copy and/or rename the new file's filename extension to .gif. Test view the file in a browser. Using APDN files should be similar, except that IE doesn't play them. Trying to open these files drove me nuts until I remembered the Layers command.....

Then someone is clearly too impatient to read. Second and third paragraph respectively. It's not even like you had to read a few pages before reaching it. These paragraphs only tell you how to select the color being replaced and the color to replace it with. I repeat: The "help" page doesn't tell you how to use the tool. I understood how to select the primary and secondary colors. The problem is that when I try to perform the actual replacement of the color by clicking on the color to be replaced, NOTHING HAPPENS. The help page states that if Tolerance is set to 100% it acts like a Flood Fill. NO IT DOESN'T! I have tried selecting an area, but again, nothing happens. I have found that if I click and drag across the area, I get a new color line, but it's not always the colors I picked. What's the secret to APPLYING the color replacement?

I have been fighting with the 'recolor' tool for a long time. I just found the above exercise and tried it. I doesn't work for me. No change. Left button or right button. If I hold the left button and drag it, I get a black line. The 'help' page for Recolor is worthless.....

That help page is just about worthless. It tells you what 'recolor' can do, but DOESN'T TELL YOU HOW TO DO IT!!!!!!!!!! And it DOESN'T work like the flood fill tool. Even at 100%. :evil: I want to replace a color over an entire image, and can't make it work. The best I have been able to get is a line across the old color.