N-up photo trouble
Garry Wiegand
>Trying to print my photos four to an 8x11 sheet of paper. Using
>Photo-Paint 8. The 2x2 N-Up format works fine, except ...
>... the clipping frames are always squares.
>How can I print 4 photos to a sheet of paper, using most of
>the paper, gracefully, from PP8??
I found the problem, and a work-around.
PP8 does not give you control over the aspect (height-to-width) ratios
of the painting frames -- it looks at the group of photos you're asking
to print, and "automatically" picks one aspect ratio, and uses that to
lay out the N-Up frames. In other words, N-Up layout doesn't just divide
up the paper, it wiggles around depending on the particular photos being
printed.
Current problem is (well, besides not letting the user control the
process) that it doesn't pick that number very cleverly. If you want to
print 3 landscape-mode (wider than tall) pictures of scenery, with one
portrait-mode (taller than wider) picture of people, it doesn't pick
"wider" or "taller", it simply punts on the portrait-vs-landscape
question and lays out the page using **squares**. Thus the symptom I
saw.
Workaround: before going to Print Preview, rotate that the
portrait-aspect picture 90 degrees, so that now it too is shaped like a
landscape picture.
Now even if you have all landscape-mode (for example) pictures, you can
still have problems with N-Up format if the aspect ratios of those
pictures are not all identical (for example, because you've been
cropping them.) PP8 will look at that group of photos, and then make a
really bad choice of which one to use as the model for laying out the
N-Up frames. It tends to do layouts which, even though they are indeed
using rectangular painting frames, pack into your rectangular sheet of
paper rather poorly, with lots of wasted white space.
Workaround: before going to Print Preview, change the aspect ratio of
the confabulating picture. Do this by adding some white pixels to it, on
one side or the other, in Paper Size.
Yes, the workarounds are a nuisance.
Real Fix: Corel should allow us to simply divide the given sheet of
paper into x-by-x equal pieces, rather than trying to do all the above
nonsensical/dysfunctional automatic layout stuff. The N-up layout should
*not* be wiggling around depending on the shapes of the particular
photos being printed.
I would love to know: Is this problem fixed in PP9 or PP10? Shall I
upgrade?
Hope this helps someone.
Garry
David Macdonald
> paper into x-by-x equal pieces, rather than trying to do all the above
> nonsensical/dysfunctional automatic layout stuff. The N-up layout should
> *not* be wiggling around depending on the shapes of the particular
> photos being printed.
>
> I would love to know: Is this problem fixed in PP9 or PP10? Shall I
I can't answer your question directly as I never use N-Up which has
always struck me as clumsy.
My work around is to create a blank document the size of the printout
and then use Edit > Paste from File to add the pictures as objects. I
can then drag them around and size them to fit. It gives the option of
happily mixing different image sizes and shapes on the page with the
least waste.
It sounds a bit long winded, but in the end it is not only far more
flexible but is usually quicker than diddling with N-Ups shortcomings.
David Mac
David Macdonald
I notice that my answer has turned up in V9 & V10 NG's only though I
replied to V9.
We try to discourage cross posting in these forums, because of this
supurflous traffic generated. If you want to access two forums, do it
separately with a slightly different title in each, that way answers get
confined to a single posting.
No big thing .. just a friendly whisper. :^))
David Mac