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Customising Menus

Many of Photodesk's menus can be changed and expanded to include personal settings. This isn't very well explained in the manual, so here's a worked example.

The mechanics of creating a new menu entry apply to these parts of Photodesk, which all have user-definable menus:

• Photodesk:Create new image
• Image processing:Enhance
• Image processing:Gamma
• Image processing:Balance
• Photodesk:Calibrate>Ink setup...
• Photodesk:Calibrate>Separation setup...
• Photodesk:Calibrate>Monitor setup...

Some other menus are dynamically built from directory structures, and can easily be expanded by dropping a file in the appropriate place (usually the Find... menu option will open the correct directory):

• Palette
  Change the available palette files
• Named colours
  Change the available colour catalogues
• Drawing tools
  Change the paths available to the Stamp tool
• Tool styling
  Change the available textures (these are also used in the Image processing:Emboss section)
• Special effects:Texture>Explorer:Variations...
  Click on the large central texture to open a save box and the correct directory

New brushes can be added to the Airbrush and Paintbrush tools, and it's also possible, of course, to add to the Special effects available. But you need to be a programmer to do the latter.

We'll set up a useful new image size: a canvas suitable for making a CD cover insert.

• Click on the Photodesk iconbar icon to get the Create new image dialogue:

  

  The new image dialogue

• Look at the Preset icon in the Dimensions section, currently showing A6 Landscape, and open the associated menu:

  

  Image size presets

• Note the Remove 'A6 Landscape' entry at the bottom. Don't click it! If you did you would permanently remove the definition (see below for how to recover accidentally deleted menu options).
• Now to set up the new size. First open the Units menu and select Units>cm.
• Next change the Resolution setting. Use the nudge arrows to increase it to 180dpi, which is OK for printed work. Notice the Width and Height changing as you alter the Resolution - that's why we don't set the dimensions before changing the dpi value.
• CD inserts are, handily, 12cm square, so enter 12 into both Width and Height (use the nudge buttons or enter it directly).
• You should now have something like this:

  

  Setting up the resolution and size

• As soon as you changed the Width or Height values, the background of the A6 Landscape icon should have changed from grey to white, indicating that this field is now writeable. Click in it, delete the text and enter "CD cover".
• Now open the associated menu again. This should appear:

  

  The Preset menu after changing the size and name

• Now Add 'CD cover' has appeared at the bottom. Select this, and your new size will always be available from the menu.

The basic principle is that whenever a significant value changes in a dialogue, the icon showing the name of the effect concerned will change to white; it's now writeable. If you don't change the effect's name, Alter 'whatever' will appear at the bottom of the associated menu. Selecting this will update the definition. If you do change the name, you can add new entries.

These changes are stored on disc, so are remembered permanently.