[Request] Tool Outline Display Behaviour Review

Bug reports
1

DISCLAIMER: I didn’t post this on the GIT, because I think we should discuss this issue first despite being a bug (the tool not hiding below interface), I think it’s also a problem with the app design of Pencil2D. Once we’ve solved how to proceed I’ll post the issue on Github to keep track of it.

–Image Demo–

It was futile to record a video for this as the tool outline wouldn’t display in the broadcasting software when you’re too close. So I’ll link a picture I took. (The orange circle is my eraser outline)

–Steps to reproduce–

  1. Zoom-In until you see a square in the middle of the canvas (this is related to the question here: http://www.pencil2d.org/forums/topic/question-function-or-purpose-of-color-square-in-canvas/)

  2. Select the eraser tool

  3. Move your cursor to notice the outline.

–Expected Results / Request–

To see a tool “brush” outline on your screen that reflects the pixel size given by the user at all times, but such graphical representation should remain either independent of the zoom scaling factor or have a way to get the whole outline below the UI, when you’re too close.

–Notes–

When the user is drawing or erasing and they have a certain size set for their tools, although it is logical to have the tool size change according to the zoom factor, in Pencil2D right now it is largely unpractical.

If we review Krita, for example, when you zoom in to the maximum allowed percentage (9000%) The Brush outline being always transparent doesn’t bother, but more important it’s always below the UI. If I get over the UI windows in Pencil my tool dissapears like you’d expect to, but If i move it even 1 pixel inside the canvas the humongous orange circle returns for more.

Note that I’m NOT suggesting that the brush or eraser or any tool outline that is adjustable should paint at the exact same size of their representation independently on different zoom factors, like what happened with flash (which was horrible). But being rather difficult to paint with a large orange circle on your screen we should review what’s the best course of action for this behaviour.

–System Information–

Pencil2D Nightly Build 15 Jan 2016

Windows 7 64bits SP1

ATI Radeon HD 6770 1GB

AMD Phenom II X4 965 BE 3.4 GHZ

4 GB RAM

2

@feeef @derek_saif @jonasthomas @chchwy

I posted this around the time of the square thingy bug, what you guys think about this behaviour, how could we improve it?

3

why don’t we replace the orange thing with the dotted cursor that I added a while ago (Edit->Preferences->Dotted Cursor)

Right now it works for brush and similar tools. We could just as easily use it for the eraser.

4

Yeah, presentation and UI design aside though my other issue with that is how the tool display / function is zoom-dependant.

This is supposedly correct, since it work similar to other graphics software like Krita or Photoshop, but I was wondering if it should be left like that, or we should take the “Macromedia / Adobe Flash” route where the brush tool was zoom-independent, although it was annoying at times, there were some clear advantages particularly when working “from a distance” for roughing out your drawings.

I also wonder could a toggle between such states be plausible? without messing the entire app of course.

This is why I didn’t submit to the Github, somehow I feel most basic behaviour hasn’t been discussed properly since the inception of the original app even though it was right in their noses the whole time.