Zoom and the focus check
At fit, the photograph fills the canvas. To judge focus you look closer. In Single that is a zoom about the pointer or the focus check; in Frames it is a loupe held under the pointer.
Zooming in Single
- Hold
⌘and scroll over the photograph, or pinch on a trackpad, to zoom about the pointer: the spot under the cursor stays put while the picture grows or shrinks around it, up to eight times the fitted size. A mouse wheel's click glides to the new size; a trackpad follows your hand exactly. - Drag to move around a zoomed picture. It stops at its own edges.
- Double-click to go between fit and twice fit, at the point you clicked.
- A zoomed picture has the whole canvas to use: a portrait that sits with space either side at fit spreads across that space as soon as it is wide enough.
Fit is one move away however you got here: double-click, click Fit image, or move to another frame — a zoom belongs to the frame it was opened on, and the next one arrives at fit.
Focus check
Focus check, in the row under the photograph, opens to twice fit about the centre. The button wears the key that does the same thing, and the moment the picture is zoomed by any means it turns orange and reads Fit image, which is the way back.
The key is Z, with two grips:
- Tap
Zto go to the focus check; tap again to come back to fit. - Hold
Zto peek: the picture zooms for as long as you hold the key and returns the instant you let go.
The same two are in the View menu as Zoom to 100% and Focus Check, the second a short flash, since a menu item cannot be held.
If the app misses the moment you let go of a held Z, the zoom stays on. A tap of Z puts the photograph back at fit.
The label in the corner
While the photograph is zoomed, a label sits at the bottom-left corner of the canvas: Focus check · 2.4× · 87% confidence. The middle term is the magnification relative to fit — not a percentage of the file, because what is on screen is not always the file's own pixels (see below). The last term is how sharp Vixlo measured this frame to be, said as a confidence rather than a verdict; a frame nothing has measured wears no confidence at all.
What you are looking at
At fit, every frame is drawn from a culling preview of 2048 pixels on its long edge. For an undeveloped RAW that is the JPEG the camera embedded; for a frame with any develop setting it is a render from the sensor with the settings on top.
Zoom past the preview's own pixels and Vixlo starts reading the full-size picture straight away, but shows it only once your hand has stopped — about a sixth of a second with no zoom movement — in place, at the same size, so nothing jumps under a moving hand. A RAW frame takes a second or two to arrive; until then the preview stays up. Once the sharp picture is on screen it stays sharp for the next notch, and the sharpness you judge is the sensor's own pixels. Twice fit is past the preview's pixels on a Retina display; on any other display the picture may need more zoom before it sharpens. A frame with a spot clean or a mask keeps the preview under the zoom, because rendering those at full size would take too long to be useful.
Faces
When the frame on the canvas has faces, the Groups pane opens with In this frame: a close-up of each face. Click one and the canvas zooms to that face, centred; click it again, or Fit image, to come back. In this frame covers it.
The loupe in Frames
Point at a cell in Frames and hold Z. A rounded square appears beside the pointer showing that frame's own pixels at the spot under it, at the full size of its culling preview, and, on a Retina display, sharpening to the full-size picture when the pointer rests. On any other display the loupe stays on the culling preview. It sits to the right of the pointer, flips to the left near the sheet's edge, and never covers the pointer itself. Move the pointer and it follows; cross into another cell and it shows that frame instead. Let go of Z and it is gone.
The loupe shows the photograph and nothing else — no marks, no badges — as it is developed, so a crop is the crop. Plain scrolling still scrolls the sheet under it and ⌘-scroll still resizes the rows. A tap of Z in Frames does nothing visible. There is no button for the loupe: the line under the sheet ends hold Z to magnify, and the Z row of Your keys reads Focus check · Frames: hold to magnify.