I just downloaded the Freeway 5 Pro Trial version, and started to play around with it. What I noticed a couple of times is an oddity which I can’t quite figure out. I have either a jpeg or png file, and when I drag and drop that onto my page, the Freeways shrinks it down into a tiny thumbnail. When I enlarge the graphics box, and tell it to “Scale to Box” then the image is being scaled up from that tiny size and turns into a horribly pixelated image.
So my question is: why does a graphics when I import it, shrink. Some do, some don’t, and I haven’t figured out what’s happening here.
It is simply that Freeway uses the dpi settings in determining initial
scaling.
If it was a 72dpi image Freeway would show it at pixel ‘size’.
If at 300dpi Freeway will show a tiny eighth of the size.
In actuality you can upscale within Freeway and Freeway always uses the
original file - not the apparent tiny rendition.
The pixelated appearance is only within the Freeway interface.
You can doubleclick the image and choose resample.
You can also turn Graphiics preview on to see actual rendition - or of
course preview in browser.
So you may want to have a copy at 72dpi - but you don’t have to.
Freeway has a DTP approach and this dpi behaviour is part of that. I
personally don’t like it as I only think in pixel size for web but its not a
big deal.
hope this helps
regards
Brian
_savage said recently:
Hello,
I just downloaded the Freeway 5 Pro Trial version, and started to play around
with it. What I noticed a couple of times is an oddity which I can’t quite
figure out. I have either a jpeg or png file, and when I drag and drop that
onto my page, the Freeways shrinks it down into a tiny thumbnail. When I
enlarge the graphics box, and tell it to “Scale to Box” then the image is
being scaled up from that tiny size and turns into a horribly pixelated image.
So my question is: why does a graphics when I import it, shrink. Some do,
some don’t, and I haven’t figured out what’s happening here.
Actually, none of hat worked. I dragged the graphics again, it went down to about a handful of pixels width/height. I sized the graphics box to the images original dimensions, with the image now squeezed into the upper left corner. When I switched on “Preview Graphics”, nothing happened. Double-clicking and resampling didn’t change the size either. When I then exported into my browser, the image was indeed tiny and squeezed into the upper left corner of a big empty area on my site.
What color is the outline of this box you are dragging into? If it’s blue or green, you may have a pass-through image on your hands, although that wouldn’t explain why it looked tiny in a browser. Do you have a copy of Photoshop or another pixel-level editor handy? It would be extremely interesting to find out what pixel density this image is on the inside. If the image is somehow saved in 12 ppi or some ridiculous low density, that could explain this, but then it would look truly awful in all cases.
Its always hard to second guess what exact procedures and what exact
settings and formats you are involved with but one other thing:
If you scale an image in a graphic box then Freeway will remember the
scaling applied with that box if you drag an alternate image - at least I
think this is still the case. It might be that apple - b clears content.
(I might be out of date or wrong on those points).
Or just make a fresh graphic box to drag the new pic into.
Walter pointed out that dragging or importing image into html box defaults
as a passthrough image. Freeway doesn’t in any way interact or touch such an
image and nor can one scale, combine, slice or add filters etc to such an
image within Freeway.
All Preview graphics does is to show the exact same page but with the
graphics on the page fully rendered as they will be output. This slows work
so is usually only turned on and off when desired.
If you are still getting nowhere then just start afresh and note the dpi of
the file being imported and the exact steps taken.
There isn’t really a problem so something in the way you are doing it is
likely to be where the issue lies - or you 've maybe found a new bug.
hope this helps
regards
Brian
PS
I for one don’t like the dpi being taken into account by Freeway - I just
work with pixel dimensions. In practice I just pad and scale to fit - whilst
having my own sense of scale and rendering ratio.
Maybe someone could remind me of what the advantages are?
_savage said recently:
Thank you Brian.
Actually, none of hat worked. I dragged the graphics again, it went down to
about a handful of pixels width/height. I sized the graphics box to the
images original dimensions, with the image now squeezed into the upper left
corner. When I switched on “Preview Graphics”, nothing happened.
Double-clicking and resampling didn’t change the size either. When I then
exported into my browser, the image was indeed tiny and squeezed into the
upper left corner of a big empty area on my site.
Ok, here’s a little more background on the graphics itself. It’s a png file that I created with Photoshop CS3. Its dimensions are:
Pixel Height 300
Pixel Width 780
DPI Height 319.9892
DPI Width 319.9892
I just closed and shut down Freeway. The re-opened it, created an empty new project with 800x600 size, and then dropped the graphics into the empty site. Shrunk down to a tiny thumbnail again.
Now I noticed: when I right-click on the image, and select Graphic->Pixel Size, Freeway scales it up to the right dimension of 780x300 but the graphic itself becomes raw and blurry and pixelated. Just like what happens when you scale up a tiny image by 200-300%.
Ok, so I had a look at the generated source code and the files in Resources. The html itself builds the table and the column dimensions correctly. The cell is part of a colgroup and 780px wide, and then 300px high. It also displays an image of 780x300. But…
Freeway has converted the original 780x300 png file into a 780x300 jpg file, and the jpg file itself is mostly empty with a tiny thumbnail squeezed into the upper left corner. I edited the source to point to the original png file and everything works just fine.
So I would guess that something in the png-to-jpg conversion goes wrong?
If that indeed is a bug, how do I file that against Freeway?
Now I noticed: when I right-click on the image, and select Graphic-
Pixel Size, Freeway scales it up to the right dimension of 780x300
but the graphic itself becomes raw and blurry and pixelated. Just
like what happens when you scale up a tiny image by 200-300%.
I’ll bet it cleans up if you double-click the picture and choose
‘Resample’.
I sized the graphics box to the images original dimensions, with the
image now squeezed into the upper left corner.
Did you scale the image within the box after you made the box bigger?
Remember, the graphic container doesn’t dictate the scale of the
image inside it, just the crop…
On 11 Mar 2009, 5:38 pm, thatkeith wrote: Did you scale the image within the box after you made the box bigger? Remember, the graphic container doesn’t dictate the scale of the image inside it, just the crop…
Yes I scaled it, which gave me a really low-quality result. Just like what happens when you blow up a small picture by a few hundred percent.
Dear Jens
I am pretty sure you have been told all you need but haven’t gotten it.
importing any image into a Freeway graphic box that is greater than 72ppi
will result in a proportionately smaller rendition of that image in the
Freeway graphic Box.
Answer A. Import images saved at 72ppi.
Answer B. By various means you can scale, resize, and resample such an
import using simple keystrokes or mouseclicks.
I have copied your steps with an image set to the same parameters and
resampling simply restores the image from blockiness to a correct rendition.
If resampling doesn’t work for you then you are the first case of this I
have heard of in many years in using Freeway and you would do well to send
an example of this file along with the steps so that whatever is causing it
can be remedied.
hope this helps
regards
Brian
PS - By the way - anything you do in the source code of the published html
will be overwritten the next time you publish the Freeway document. I wasn’t
sure if you realized this from things you said.
_savage said recently:
On 11 Mar 2009, 5:38 pm, thatkeith wrote: Did you scale the image within the
box after you made the box bigger? Remember, the graphic container doesn’t
dictate the scale of the image inside it, just the crop…
Yes I scaled it, which gave me a really low-quality result. Just like what
happens when you blow up a small picture by a few hundred percent.
I’m curious to hear iwhether or not you can reproduce the effect! As I said: just create a new project (mine is 800x600) and drop the png file into it. In my case, that turns it into a 780x300 jpg which is mostly empty, except for the thumbnail of the original png that hovers in the upper left corner. Please let me know how it goes!
Yes, I’m aware that manual modifications will be overwritten each time I re-publish the site, but that’s ok. At least, for now, the website renders correctly.
Colin: What does your generated html say? Does it create a big enough table cell with the correct dimension? And how does your generated jpg file look like (i.e. does that have the black backgound…)?
Saved to desktop - imported into graphic box (Command-E) and it’s
fine, with transparency OK. Comes in small but can be scaled and
resampled as normal.
Colin
On 11 Mar 2009, at 20:29, Colin Alcock wrote:
Drags and drops at full size for me, scales and resamples - FWP
5.3.2 - but loses transparency/ gains black background. Now there’s
another puzzle!
Inserted version generates following, drop into a page with other
material (more realistic than isolated):
"
"
Looks perfect.
Im not a coder, more a point and click designer (actually a
copywriter, that’s why )so hope that helps.
I suggest you send a page to Softpress for them to have a look.
Colin
On 11 Mar 2009, at 20:36, _savage wrote:
Colin: What does your generated html say? Does it create a
big enough table cell with the correct dimension? And how does your
generated jpg file look like (i.e. does that have the black
backgound…)?
