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Contents |
Import
You can import photos from your hard drive or your camera. F-Spot uses GPhoto2 to access digital cameras, so check that site to see if your is listed. By default on import photos are copied from the original source to F-Spot's photodir, as set in preferences. Folder import or Drag'n'Drop allow you to manage images from their original location: just uncheck "Copy" option in import dialog, or D'n'D while holding "Shift" button. This function is appreciated by people who prefer to keep their own directory structure.
Photodir is F-Spot's own directory where pictures are stored at import. By default it is ~/Photos (translated accordingly to your locale setting). You can change it in Preferences dialog (Edit » Preferences).
If there is a tiny chance that some of your photos are already imported from the chosen source, you can use "Detect duplicates" option. In this case F-Spot will try to find out if this image is already present in the database and thus new copy of it should not be imported. The check is performed on image data only, so if the already imported picture has tags attached (so modified XMP) the duplicate will still be detected!
If all the photos you are importing at one time are from a particular event, or have some other characteristic in common, you can create a specific tag so you can later find them with ease. To do this, follow the instructions below to create a new tag, then when you are importing them, check the button for "Attach Tag" and choose the tag you created.
After an import, F-Spot will display the pictures of the latest import roll only. Read User_Guide/Enjoy_1#Search to learn how to deal with import rolls.
You can also import directly from Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird using Firefox and Thunderbird F-Spot importer extensions written by Pizzach.
Edit
If you double click or press enter on an image, you enter Edit mode, where you can do cool things to your photos like removing red-eye, crop, and adjust brightness and colours. Editors are available in the "Edit" sidebar (View » Sidebar).
Versions
When you edit your photos, a new copy (called a version) is created, so your original is never altered. After your first edit a photo, subsequent edits will modify the same version. If you want to create multiple versions of your photo, perhaps with different cropping or colouring, you can do that via the File » Create new version menu option.
Crop
Cropping an image is a great way to improve the quality of a photograph by changing how it is framed. You crop a photo by selecting the part of the photo you want to keep. If you want your photo to be the exact dimensions necessary for a certain print size, you can constrain the selection F-Spot will allow you to draw by choosing the appropriate size from the constraint drop down. See the Remove Red-Eye section above for details on making a selection on your photo.
Once you have made your crop selection, you must click the crop button to finalize the edit. If you are working with the original photo, cropping creates a new version your photo.
Straighten
Straighten effect is a tool to level a photo, quite helpful for landscapes taken without a tripod, when (imaginary) line of horizon is not at 0°. This tool rotates an image by a specified angle and automagically crops the resulted image, so that you always see a perfect rectangle.
Adjust Colors
To adjust the brightness, contrast, and colours of a photo, first click the "Adjust the photo colours" icon to open the adjustment dialog. Change then some settings and save them with 'OK'.
AutoColor
This effect automatically adjusts color levels to make a pretty balanced picture color-wise. It serves best for pictures taken with automatic white balance, when camera didn't manage to do the job well.
Desaturate
To make a colorful photo a black and white one, open a photo of choice and press Desaturate button.
Sepia
To make a colorful photo look like an old-style picture in sepia tones, open a photo of choice and press Sepia button.
Remove Red-Eye
To remove red eye from a photo, you need to select a zone containing the eyes. You may want to zoom in on the image to accurately select the eyes in the photo. You should be able to correct both eyes on the same person in one shot, or even the eyes from multiple people at once. If this doesn't work for you, or the selected zone contains some vivid red parts (lips, ...) you'll probably have to correct one red eye at a time.
To make your selection, click one corner of the rectangle that will be your selection, and drag your mouse to the diagonal corner and release it. You can resize your selection by dragging its edges, and you can move it by clicking in the middle of it and dragging it to where you want it.
Once you have selected a zone, you can remove the red from it by clicking the red-eye button in the sidebar.
Expert Tip: you can change the threshold for redeyes detection by changing the gconf key /apps/f-spot/edit/redeye_threshold
Soft Focus
In photography sharpening one region of a picture while blurring all the rest is a way to make an emphasis and grab attention. It is achieved by using a lens that allows shooting with a short distance in front of and beyond the subject that appears to be in focus. Soft focus effect is a way to emulate such a lens.
Click to choose central point of the area you want to be in focus and adjust amount of blurring, then click OK.
Sharpen
Out-of-focus photographs and most digitized images often need a sharpness correction. The Unsharp Mask effect sharpens edges of the elements without increasing noise or blemish. To sharpen a photo choose Edit » Sharpen... and specify the following values:
- Amount: strength of sharpening.
- Radius: how many pixels on either side of an edge will be affected by sharpening. High resolution images allow higher radius.
- Threshold: the minimum difference in pixel values that indicates an edge where sharpen must be applied. This helps avoiding creation of blemishes in face, sky or water surface.
Describe
You can also enter a description of the image by clicking on the text entry box below the image and typing.
Adjust Time
In both 'browse' or 'edit' modes, you can adjust the time of one or multiple pictures (Edit » Adjust Time). Adjusting the time of multiple pictures at once helps you shift all an import roll if, e.g. the time on your camera is badly set or if you forgot to change it according to DST.
Tag
A tag is a merely a label. F-Spot comes with default tags to get you started; you are free to change them and add new ones. For example, if you want to create a tag for a specific event, you can create a new tag named after that event under the Events tag.
There are many ways to tag photos:
- drag and drop the photo(s) onto the tag
- drag and drop the tag onto the photo(s)
- via the photo's right-click menu
- via the Tags and Edit menus
- by typing them in (press "t" to pop up the tag entry bar, enter comma-separated tags) - with tab completion!
The first photo you associate with a tag will be used for that tag's icon. You can always edit a tag's name, parent tag and icon by right clicking on it and choosing Edit tag.
You can change a tag's parent by dragging and dropping it where you like. Also, you can edit the name of a tag by selecting it and pressing F2. Lastly, if you have the tag tree focused (e.g. you just clicked on a tag), you can start typing the name of a tag, and all the expanded tags in the list will be searched for the typed text.
You can also change size of tag icons in the sidebar or even make tag icons invisible by selecting preferred option from View » Tag Icons menu.
Expert Tip: F-Spot can write tags as metadata fields into JPEG files. See Preferences for details.
