Please add constrained selection option!

[therenderman]

While using the rectangle select tool, it would be great if you could add a feature so that you can constrain the aspect ratio of the selections. I use this feature aaaalllllllllllllllllll the time in photoshop and it would be great if you would implement this into Paint.NET, because then I wouldn't need to start up photoshop every time I needed to do a simple crop and resize.

And no, please no one tell me to make a selection and then use the resize handles on the selection box. That is not what I want. What I want to do is specify a certain aspect ratio, so then the dimensions of the selection I drag out will stay constrained to that ratio. This is needed when you want to easily crop something to a certain aspect ratio.

I know other users would also find this feature useful.

Thanks,

Shawn

[SearedIce]

There is a way to do this.

Select an area (if you can get it to be the proper ratio at this time, go for it). Next, click on the "Move Selection" tool, which is down and to the right from the "Rectangle Select" tool. Now, either adjust the arrows until you get the right ratio, or go on to the next step if you have the ratio already. To resize the selection, and keep the ratio, hold down Shift on your keyboard while dragging one of the handles. This preserves the ratio of the selection box. Then just crop it...

[SearedIce]

Oh...I see the problem.

When you hit Shift, it constrains it to the original ratio...you cannot simply resize the selection, and then expect this new ratio to hold. So, when making the initial selection, you must get the correct ratio at this time. Then, the Shift key gets the job done.

Rick Brewster, it might make more sense to make the ratio used by the Shift key update when you use the handles to resize a selection, and not to remain at the ratio of the original selection.

[Rick Brewster]

Oh...I see the problem.

When you hit Shift, it constrains it to the original ratio...you cannot simply resize the selection, and then expect this new ratio to hold. So, when making the initial selection, you must get the correct ratio at this time. Then, the Shift key gets the job done.

Rick Brewster, it might make more sense to make the ratio used by the Shift key update when you use the handles to resize a selection, and not to remain at the ratio of the original selection.

I remember considering both possibilities when implementing this (constrain to original vs. current ratio), and there was a strong reason for going with the original ratio. I can't remember why at this point, but the code for that stuff (the Move* tools and especially their history actions) is easily the most complex in the whole application. So I must have had a good reason. I'll revisit it at some point though and see if it still makes sense to do it this way, or if there's some possible workaround.