The Crop Tool allows you to crop designs in a number of ways. It can be used for creating co-ordinates; cropping a design to a particular repeat size; cropping a selected area larger than the current design; cropping out one repeat; or simply cropping the design smaller.
Cropping files
- Select the Crop Tool from the Tools Palette or press X on the keyboard.
- Drag an area inside your design to create a crop box. A box will appear where you dragged, which has grey nodes on each corner and each side.
- Move the cursor over one of the nodes. You will see that the cursor changes to a heavy four way cross. Or if you move your cursor over one of the sides of the box, the cursor will change to a double ended arrow. Both of these cursors will allow you to alter the size of the box.
- Whilst on a node or an edge, click down and drag in or out to resize the box.
If the Info Window is open, you will see the width and height measurements of the crop box change, and if you hold down the shift key as you drag, the box will be constrained to a perfect square.
- If you need to modify the position of your crop box, place your cursor inside the crop box and drag it to the new position.
- When you are satisfied with the chosen size and area of the box, move the cursor over it. The cursor changes to a pair of scissors.
- Double click inside the crop box and the design will instantly crop to the size and position selected.
Understanding the contextual menu
The steps listed in the 'Cropping files' tab can be used to crop designs bigger or smaller, however if you wish to access additional crop functions, you will need to use the crop tool contextual menu. With the Crop Tool selected in the Tools Palette, hold down ^ (control key) and click inside the design. The contextual menu will appear.
The items listed in the contextual menu will vary depending on whether there is already a crop box in the file and whether there is a selection in the file. If no crop box has been created, and there are no selections, the only option available will be Set... If there is a selection, but no crop box in the file, there will be two options available; Set… and Set From Selection.
Set...
This lets you type the size of a crop box needed. You can set the exact origin point of the box using the top two dialogue boxes marked Left and Top in the snapshot below. The value entered into the Left dialogue box will set the top left origin of the crop box in the specified amount from the left of the document. The value entered into the Top dialogue box will set the top of the crop box in the specified amount from the top of the document.
Other options available in the Left popup menu are Right, Centre and Horizontal Ruler.
Other options available in the Top popup menu are Bottom, Centre and Vertical Ruler.
All values entered will determine the distance from the selected start point.
Note: Whichever set of options you choose, for example Top, Left, Right, Bottom… will be remembered the next time you use this function.
Once you have determined where the crop box should start, you can then set the size of the crop box using the Width and Height dialogue boxes.
Set from Selection
A crop box is created at the same size as the selected area. The extremities of the selection are used to form the crop box when irregular areas are selected. If there is no selection this item does not appear in the menu.
After cropping a document with an active selection, the entire selection is retained in the new cropped document.
If you have created a crop box in the design already, the following options will be available:
Crop
This acts in the same way as double clicking within the crop box using the Crop Tool.Crop Selected Layers
Crop One Repeat
This works in the same way as the normal crop function but when you are viewing multiple repeats, it sets the number of repeats shown back to 1×1. This avoids having to manually set the repeat back to 1×1 in the Set Repeat window after cropping.
Crop to New Document
This creates a new untitled document of the cropped area and leaves the original document in tact. It is a very useful function and can aide the creation of co-ordinating files. It is also a key part to the function Carbon Copy from Crop Box, which is a fantastic method for putting designs into repeat. When cropping to a new document, the layers in the new document retain the names of the layers in the old document. If you use this function on a design which as several colourways, the colourway which is visible at the time of cropping will be the visible colourway in the new untitled document.
Note: If any grids or vectors are present in the design before cropping to a new document, these will be carried over into the new document. Grids will retain their original size, and therefore may be bigger than the new document, and vectors will be cropped accordingly. The snapshot below shows the original file on the left, and the new cropped file on the right.
Tip: A shortcut for this function is to hold down the option key and click inside the crop box, rather than using the contextual menu.
Clear Crop
This removes the crop box from the design so that no area is cropped.
Note: Crop boxes are remembered within the design when the file is saved in .ava4 format.
Delete
Setting the size and shape of the crop box
You can accurately set a crop box around a specified area of a design by choosing one of the following methods:
- double click on the Crop Tool
- select the Crop Tool from the Tools Palette and whilst holding down the control key, click in the design and choose Set... from the contextual menu
With each of the above methods, a sheet will open where the dimensions and origin of the crop box can be entered.
Choose either Top, Bottom or Vertical ruler and Left, Right or Horizontal ruler and enter your co-ordinates. Leave the Top, Left point at 0, 0 if you are unsure what to enter.
Enter the required dimensions for the selection in the width and weight fields and click Set. A crop box will be created according to your chosen settings.
Choose whether to centre the crop box around the specified origin. For example, in the snapshot below, the origin is set to Left = 20 and Top = 20 (meaning the crop box will start 20cm from the left and 20cm from the top, and the centre box is ticked. This means the centre of the crop box will be located at the 20,20 origin.
Note: The vertical ruler and horizontal ruler options use the current ruler origin to set the start point of the crop box. For more information on this subject, refer to the Measure Tool article found in the Related Articles listed under this article.
The size of any existing crop box can be adjusted by moving the cursor over one of the nodes or one of the edges. The cursor changes to a heavy four way cross when positioned over a node, or a double ended arrow when positioned over an edge. Both can be used to adjust the size of the box by dragging in or outwards.
Double click inside the crop box to perform the crop.
DeleteAutomating cropping
All the functions found in the contextual menu for the Crop Tool can be recorded in a Palette, meaning they can be recalled at the click of a button at a later date.
- Go to File Menu > New > Palette. This opens an untitled Palette.
- Save the palette on your hard drive.
- Go to the AVA Menu > Settings > Menus.
- Click the disclosure triangle next to the word Edit to reveal all a list of functions located in the Edit Menu and navigate the the crop options.
- Drag your desired menu item to the Palette. Each option has a unique icon.
- Save the Palette. These functions can now be performed by clicking on the Palette Button.
Tip: The above functions can be used in conjunction with other tasks to automate more complex workflows. If you have a workflow which you feel could be automated, saving you time in the future, please contact AVA Technical Support.