The StainedGlass Collage Layout Applet allows you to easily modify your collage, changing the included photos, their size, position, and other aspects. Only a portion of each of your photos will be visible in the collage. This window into your photo is called a viewport.
StainedGlass will determine an initial region of interest for each photo. This region will be visible in the viewport in most cases. How much of the photo is visible will depend on how many photos are included in the collage, its dimensions, and the size of the regions of interest in the photos. Based on these factors, occasionally StainedGlass won't be able to fill the entire area with photos, leaving gaps at the margins. In general, a small number of photos or large regions of interest will result in less satisfactory layouts. We'll tell you how to improve these situations below.
Most people will want to put their personal touches on their collages. You may want to rearrange the photos inside the collage or change the region of interest or the relative size of the photo. You may want to remove or add a photo. You can also change the dimensions of the collage, change the orientation to landscape or portrait or choose to have a colored border. You cannot change the viewport for a photo directly.
To understand how your changes will affect the collage, think of it as rows of photos. If you move a photo to another position, it will be removed from its current position and inserted into the new one. The photos may shift their positions in the rows to fill them out, much as text changes position in a word processor when you add or delete words. Unlike a word processor, however, StainedGlass can also adjust the photos so that their viewports show more or less of the photo. Other adjustments you make could also change the photo viewports or even change the row of some photos.
Once you start making changes in the Layout Applet, you may not be able to return to your original collage. If you are changing an existing collage and want to keep the original version, make a copy and edit that one.
| What you can do | How to do it |
|---|---|
| Change the position of one image | Drag an image to a new position in the collage and drop it. If you drop the image on top of another image, it will be placed after that image. If you drop it to the end of a row, it may be placed at the beginning of the next row, if there is one. |
| Randomly rearrange the images in the collage | Click on Shuffle. By shuffling your photos in the collage, you may find an arrangement that you like better. Shuffling is also useful when your photos don't fit well within the collage dimensions. |
| Add an image to the collage | To add an image to the collage, you will have to exit the Layout Applet. Before you do so, you should undo any actions you don't want t o keep. If you want to keep this version of your collage, click on the Gallery tab and create a copy first. Then click on Compose to add and delete photos from your collage. |
| Remove an image from the collage | Drag and drop the image to the trash. This will delete the image from your collage only, not from your StainedGlass album or other collages. |
| Change the region of interest for a photo | Click on the photo. You should see a red rectangle with handles showing the current region of interest. The region inside the box is normal; outside the box is grayed out. Grab and drag a handle to resize the region of interest. You can also grab the region and move it around. For the best results, select the smallest region that includes what you want to have in the collage. You may have to make several changes to get the region you want. The collage will adjust between each change. Once your changes are made, the collage will slowly return to normal. Click inside the red rectangle or outside the whole collage to return immediately to normal. |
| Change the relative size of the photo | Click on the photo. You should see a red rectangle with handles showing the current region of interest. The region inside the box is normal; outside the box is grayed out. The triangle on the right in the region of interest shows you the relative size by the position of the black crossbar. Grab the crossbar and drag it up to enlarge the photo, down to reduce it. For the best results, try to keep the region of interest small. Once you release the crossbar, the collage will adjust and then slowly return to normal. Click outside the collage to return immediately to normal. |
| Change the orientation of the collage | Check the box next to Landscape for a Landscape orientation. Uncheck it for Portrait orientation. |
| Change the size of the collage | You can specify the units for the collage size using the pulldown menu in the upper right corner of the Applet window. The choices are pixel, inches and centimeters. If you select pixels, you will have the most flexibilty. Just enter the number of pixels for the width and height. If you specify inches, your choices will be 6X6, 4X6, 5X7 or 8X10. For centimeters, your collage can be 20X20, 10X15 or 20X30. |
| Change the borders | You will always have a border outlining the viewports of your photos. You can use the pulldown menu to change its width (thin, medium, thick). You can also change the color of the border. Click on the color button and use the tool to choose a color, then click Okay. The tool will allow you to choose among three color models (swatches, HSB and RGB). You can also click on the box for Outside border if you want one. |
| Save a collage | Save the current collage and leave the Layout Applet. There is also an autosave so if you forget to save before you leave the Layout Applet, you should have your changes saved. |
| Cancel | Same as pressing the undo button as many times as possible and saving. |
| Undo or redo an action | You can undo the last action in the Layout Applet by clicking on Undo. By clicking on Undo again, you can undo the action before it. You can also redo an action you have previously undone. You can use control-Z to undo an action; control-Y will redo an action. |