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Managing Footage

This chapter is from the book 

Magnifying an Image

Sometimes, you'll want to magnify your footage view so that you can closely examine a detail of the image. Other times, you'll want to reduce magnification because viewing footage at 100 percent scale takes up too much screen space. After Effects lets you change the magnification ratio to suit your needs. However, keep in mind that this is for viewing purposes only: The actual scale of the footage doesn't change. You may be surprised to discover that no matter how much you magnify the image in the Footage panel, scroll bars don't appear. To view different parts of a magnified image, use the Hand tool instead.

To change the magnification of the Footage or Composition panel:

  • In the Footage panel, press and hold the Magnification Ratio pop-up menu to choose a magnification ( Figure 3.55 ).

    When you release the mouse button, the Footage panel uses the magnification ratio you selected ( Figure 3.56 ).

03_55_magnify.jpg

Figure 3.55 Choose a magnification from the pop-up menu.

03_56_magnified.jpg

Figure 3.56 The Footage panel displays the image at the magnification you specified.

To change the visible area of a magnified image in the Footage or Composition panel:

  1. Select the Hand tool by doing either of the following:
    • In the Tools panel, click the Hand tool tls_hand.jpg ( Figure 3.57 ).
    • With the Selection tool tls_selection.jpg active (the default tool), position the mouse pointer over the image in the Footage or Composition panel, and press the spacebar.
    03_57_handtool.jpg

    Figure 3.57 In the Tools panel, select the Hand tool…

    The mouse changes to the hand icon ( Figure 3.58 ).
    03_58_handonimage.jpg

    Figure 3.58 …or position the Selection tool over the image and press the spacebar to toggle it to the Hand tool.

  2. Drag the hand to change the visible area of the image ( Figure 3.59 ).
    03_59_draggedview.jpg

    Figure 3.59 Drag the image with the Hand tool to move other areas into view.

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