Suspended in v5.0.0 through v5.5.4 due to conflicts with the new text engine, from v5.6.0, pictures may once again be inserted into the background of a map view as picture adornments. Note this restoration of the original method of making map picture adornments is temporary because it is likely to be replaced in the future by an updated method (to achieve the same aim).
Drag/drop from Finder windows was not originally supported, but from v5.9.0, Cmd+dragging an image from Finder into a Map view will create a picture adornment.
For an image to be available to paste as a picture adornment, the file's contents must be copied to the clipboard. Thus first open the file in Preview (or an image editor), 'select all', 'copy'; the content is now on the clipboard ready for pasting and image may be closed. Picture adornments can only be inserted via the Map view pop-up menu (a Cmd+V paste will not work).
In summary, there are two methods of creating a picture adornment:
- Pasting. Open the picture in an images editor/viewer - Preview app is adequate select all (Cmd+A) or make a custom selection of part of the picture and copy to the clipboard (Cmd+C). Switch to TB's Map view and right click the map's background and from the pop-up menu select 'Paste Picture'. The latter option is only available in Map view. Using instead either Edit menu -> Paste or shortcut Cmd+V will not paste a picture - you must use the 'Paste Picture' command.
- Dragging. Select a file of a supported image type in Finder and Cmd+drag it onto the background of a TB map view other views can't be used for this). A normal drag will create a note holding the image (see below).
Like text adornments, picture adornments don't show up in any other views, and don't affect the hierarchy or the links of any notes. Locked picture adornments are ignored from drag-selections of notes.
[Following may not hold true post v5.6.0] Images are inserted and displayed at 'actual size' (i.e. for current desktop resolution - normally 72 dpi). Resizing the picture's 'frame' won't zoom the image size but it will crop it if smaller than the image (since v5.6.0 the image simply appears to scale with the adornment frame; there is no method to restore 'normal size'). The image does scale if the whole map is zoomed in or out.
The image format must be a bitmap image (GIF/PNG/JPG/JPEG/BMP) and not vector-based (i.e. not CAD, AI or EPS).
Just as normal adornments aren't exported in HTML Export, neither are picture adornments.
From v5.9.0, picture adornments respect $Opacity and may have non rectangular shapes, just like normal adornments.
Resizing picture adornment in aspect ratio. There is no mechanism for this, but if making regular use of picture adornments, stamps can help along with a couple of user attributes. This workaround works on storing the original pixel width and height in Number type attributes - suggested names are $ImgWidth and $ImgHeight.The original pixel count can be obtained by opening the image in Preview and using the Inspector window to check width and height. Add 3 stamps:
Name: "Resize by Width". Code:$Height = $Width*($ImgHeight/$ImgWidth);
Name: "Resize by Height". Code:$Width = $Height*($ImgWidth/$ImgHeight);
Name: "Resize as original". Code:$Width=$ImgWidth/35.3;$Height= $ImgHeight/35.3;
The first two stamps work off the ratio of the original pixel height width. The first stamp keeps current $Width an adjusts $Height accordingly. The second stamp does the reverse, maintaining $Height and adjusting $Width.
The third stamp is an approximation as Tinderbox's mapping of pixels to map units varies slightly in scale. Ostensibly 32 pixels per unit, at normal map zoom scale a factor of 35.3 seems to work best; note that this may not work as well at different zoom scales - so change to normal zoom to use this stamp.