Button to hide / fade background image in the UV editor
Sometimes you just need to see the UVs and not the texture. A toggle button to fade the image could be quite handy
Sometimes you just need to see the UVs and not the texture. A toggle button to fade the image could be quite handy
13 Comments
@jason: I really don't understand how users can discuss about the usefulness of that feature. Of course there are use cases where you want to dim or fade out the image behind the UVs (It might not be a use-case YOU need, but show empathy). I would even argue that these use-cases are more important the switching between different Image changes (from the toolbar dropdown) or switching between different alpha channel blend modes (in the image tool side bar).
Why not just add an opacity slider to the Image-Tool-Panel?
Why not just disable the image from the image datablock?
* @Jason van Gumster * I don;t know what that means.
* @thinsoldier * In the UV Editor's header, there's a datablock that shows the image that's currently being displayed in the editor with the UVs. From this datablock, you can choose any other image in your .blend file or you can click the X button on the datablock to show no image at all.
* @Jason van Gumster * If you press the X button then it loses your UV aspect ratio (resets to square). I just want to be able to toggle the BG image on / off easily :)
* @John * UV coordinates are normalized from 0 to 1 anyway. They're always a square. When you unlink the image from the UV Editor, you're taking away the distortion and seeing the UVs in their most natural state.
To get what you want, I'd just make a placeholder image (Image-->New Image in the UV Editor) that have the same dimensions as your texture. Then you can quickly switch between that and your texture at will... and because that new texture is auto-generated, you can dynamically resize it or replace it with a pattern if you'd like.
* @Jason van Gumster * It would be a lot simpler to just toggle the BG on and off... I really don't want to have to make a placeholder image for every different ratio of texture I'm using. Also why would I want to see them in their natural state? If my texture is 1024x128 then it's not intuitive to lay the UVs out on a square image.
* @John * You don't have to make a new image for every texture. It's a generated image and can be dynamically resized at will.
I understand what you're getting at, but from a usability standpoint, I don't want to see an image datablock, but no image in the editor. That makes me think that the image is lost or poorly linked or corrupt. I already run into that when the Image Editor is set to display render output. It's a papercut, but it's bothersome and I personally don't want to see more of that while I'm working on a scene or a model.
* @Jason van Gumster * The image would be displayed by default... I really don't understand why you are fighting this so much
* @John * Use case with your feature enabled: I'm working on a model and editing the UVs. I turn off the image and save the file. I work on something else, either in a different workspace or on different file altogether. I come back to the file to work on UVs a bit more, but my image isn't there. It looks exactly like how Blender looks when a .blend file has a linked image, but that image is missing or corrupt. So I either have to double-check the image path to make sure it's there or (worse), I nuke the image from the .blend file without double-checking and, if it's a packed image like many painted textures are, it's gone after my next save/re-open.
* @Jason van Gumster * Or.. quickly glance at the button and see that the image is hidden? I guess we're not going to ever agree on this one. Honestly, didn't think this would be a big deal!
* @John * My point is that my first thought is that something is wrong, not that I hid something and forgot to unhide it. If there were a more clear distinction between a missing image and a hidden one, then this probably wouldn't be an issue.
* @John * Once upon a time experienced Blender users fought against having the ability to undo . Might explain why undo is slow and limited to this day.