FerrumPix 0.9.12
This release brings object groups and multiple selection to the layer stack, an automatic image enhancement, sharpening that stays on the edges, another round of work on imported xmp presets — and saving that can no longer damage the file you are overwriting.
What's new
- Saving can no longer damage the file you are overwriting. The new version is written beside the old one and only put in place once it is complete. A full disk, a lost network drive or a crash mid-save now leaves your photo exactly as it was. The same goes for the collage export.
- Object groups and multiple selection. Pick several layers at once — Ctrl+click on the photo, drag a rectangle around them, or Ctrl+click and Shift+click in the layers panel — and they move, scale, rotate and flip as one. Ctrl+G makes a named group with its own row and visibility switch, Ctrl+Shift+G dissolves it. Layers can be dragged in and out, and each keeps its own visibility, so switching a group back on brings back exactly what was visible before. With a group picked, the panel on the right describes the whole selection instead of a single object.
- Automatic image enhancement. An Auto button measures the photo and sets exposure, contrast, highlights, shadows, black and white point, vibrance and white balance to values that suit it. The sliders stay editable afterwards, a photo that is already fine is left alone, and the reset button takes the automatic correction back out without touching what you adjusted yourself.
- Sharpening that stays on the edges. A Masking slider: the higher you go, the more the sharpening retreats to the edges and leaves smooth areas such as sky and skin quiet. Imported xmp presets bring their own masking value along.
- Black-and-white presets arrive in black and white. Presets that get their monochrome look from a camera profile alone used to come in as full colour, with nothing to hint that something was missing. They now convert properly, and xmp's black-and-white mixer comes along, so two of them no longer look alike.
- Corrections have a place in the stack. A selection or mask correction used to sit under everything you had placed on the photo. Now you can drag it up between your objects, where it works on everything below it. New ones still start at the bottom, where editing stays fastest.
- Layers can be locked. A locked layer or group can no longer be moved, resized, rotated or flipped, and it stays put when the group around it is transformed. Selecting, hiding, recolouring and deleting still work. A small padlock marks the locked rows.
Smaller things
- The move tool selects first: a click picks an object, and dragging only starts inside something already selected — so picking several objects no longer drags one of them along. Clicking next to a selection clears it, and clicking a correction layer switches to the selection tool so its mask can be edited right away.
- A failed action no longer takes the whole program down. Opening the viewer, printing, making a collage, working with Immich albums, dropping files onto the gallery — if something goes wrong, FerrumPix says so and stays open.
- Stars and favourites on Immich photos no longer pretend to be saved when the server refused them.
- Preset import got more faithful: presets set to As Shot white balance leave the white balance alone, local corrections that are switched off inside a preset are no longer imported as active layers, and a correction's overall strength is taken into account.
- A saved preset or LUT whose file has moved no longer does nothing at all — FerrumPix says which file is missing and offers to remove the entry.
- The filter list is a single row of buttons, with the strength slider below the filters it belongs to.
- An object's outline can stay out of the blend, so only the fill mixes with the background.
- An image dropped onto the canvas becomes a plain image object again, instead of inheriting outline, blend mode and rotation from whatever was selected.
- Dragging objects behaves: the resize handles no longer reach far into the object, a dragged object leaves no copy behind, and the alignment guides appear as soon as an edge comes close.
- The editor covers the same zoom range as the viewer, 5% to 2000%.
- Ctrl+R means image size everywhere, rotating moved to Ctrl+Left and Ctrl+Right, and Ctrl+G is now grouping. The shortcut list in the settings has one row per key and can be paged with Page Up and Page Down.
- Gallery tiles lost the empty strip under their caption, badges step aside on small tiles instead of covering the thumbnail, and deleting a photo selects the next one instead of jumping back to the first.
- The folder tree no longer scrolls away when you right-click a folder, and switching to another folder or album stops a running search instead of letting its results trickle into the new view.