applesupportaccount26

Q: Photo book project - I can set a photo as the page background but can't see it to make edits

Hi everyone,

 

I'm making a photobook using the Projects functionality of the Photo software for Mac (Version 1.0.1 (215.65.0) running on operating system Yosemite (10.10.5 (14F1909).

 

On some pages, I want to have a single photo that doesn't reach the edges, and rather than just have a block colour as the background, I want to use a greyscale, high transparency version of the same image, zoomed to look nice, like an echo of the main photo. I am managing this by duplicating the photo and putting it into the project, then selecting the 'use image as background' option in the information pane on that page, and dragging the image into the page background area. So far so good.

 

The issue that I am facing is that the picture doesn't show up, so that I can use the controls to zoom and drag where the background sits, and adjust the transparency etc, but I can't see what I've done with each edit unless I click the back arrow in the top left and go back to the project overview, at which point I can then see the image as the background as I've intended, and check how the edit went.

 

With multiple pages that will be like this, and likely needing make multiple edits to get it to look right, it is very time consuming to have to go back to the overview each time to preview it! Is there another way of doing this? Is this a bug?

 

Has anyone else had a similar issue?

 

Thanks in advance!

 

Cheers,

Sarah

MacBook Air (11-inch Mid 2013), OS X Yosemite (10.10.5)

Posted on Jul 30, 2016 12:56 AM

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Q: Photo book project - I can set a photo as the page background but can't see it to make edits

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  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Jul 30, 2016 1:08 AM in response to applesupportaccount26
    Level 10 (105,731 points)
    iLife
    Jul 30, 2016 1:08 AM in response to applesupportaccount26

    Sarah, have you tried to crop the background photo to the correct aspect ratio of your book pages, before you add it to the book?

    Crop it to the format of the page layout 25x25,  32x25, or whatever book size you will be using, so the photo is showing the right section of your photo. Only then drag it to your book to use it as a background.  Now you only will need to adjust the opacity.

    For me, the background photos are showing in the single page view. I'm not sure, why you cannot see them. Have you tried to restart Photos and your MAc?

  • by applesupportaccount26,

    applesupportaccount26 applesupportaccount26 Jul 30, 2016 2:50 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (16 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Jul 30, 2016 2:50 AM in response to léonie

    Hi Leonie,

     

    Thanks for the quick reply!

     

    That's a good idea cropping the pic first. The issue is also that the photo(s) that are the primary focus of the page end at different spots depending on the layout of the page, and there are details in the background photo that I was hoping to have subtly showing at the edges which is hard to do without being able to see them overlaid directly.

     

    Good idea with the restart suggestion - gave that a go just now but to no avail. It's really weird - it's only the single page view that is doing it. I wonder if it could be because I haven't updated to El Capitain? I don't know whether the Software updater takes into consideration your OS before suggesting you update to versions of apps that might not be compatible.

     

    Anyway yeh, thanks for the suggestions but no luck yet!

     

    Cheers,

    Sarah

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Jul 30, 2016 2:56 AM in response to applesupportaccount26
    Level 10 (105,731 points)
    iLife
    Jul 30, 2016 2:56 AM in response to applesupportaccount26

    I don't know whether the Software updater takes into consideration your OS before suggesting you update to versions of apps that might not be compatible.

    Photos is not installed and updated separately, Sarah.  So your Photos version should be compatible to your current OS X version. Photos will be updated automatically, when you update OS X, since it is installed as part of the system.  But if you can, upgrade to El Capitan. Photos is much more versatile, and there have been many bug fixes.