Problem previewing effects.

[Miki Sakari]

New to the product, PaintShop Pro Ultimate. I was loving my first day. Did some work on a photo using effects yesterday. When I went into preview effects yesterday I could see the whole picture (selected section applying film and filter AND the entire background). Today I went to continue working on it using the original image to try out different filters. Today when I go to preview effect, object selected with the smart selection brush is the only thing I can see in preview, the rest of the picture is checker board ..transparent. I need to be able to see the entire photo to look at the changes to an object in the photo to know how the colors look next to each other. This is a PNG 600 DPI photo of a piece of original art work to be used for printing a book cover. Please help. I have tried searching the internet and can find nothing about settings in the preview window. Is there a settings somewhere in layers? I did not change any settings today since I was working yesterday. I’m stumped, help.

[flagpole]

So the preview shows the current selection on the current layer with the current effect applied.

[hartpaul]

Is this what you are getting:

This is the normal behaviour. You may not have Preview on image check box ticked .

[Miki Sakari]

Yes Hart, that is what I see now. In my case a foreground cut out from the sky. However on the first day that I worked on the project I was able to see the entire picture, both the sky and foreground in preview mode. The ability to compare slight color changes to the foreground in the context of the whole picture is critical. It is the only way possible to make exacting choices on very slight color changes and how those changes impact the picture as a whole.

I’m sure having the transparent background in preview mode works for some projects but not for this one. And since the entire first 8 hours of this project allowed me to see the entire picture in preview mode, I’m assuming there is some sort of setting or perhaps mode that I must have used the first day of the project. I’m sure hoping so.

[Miki Sakari]

Oh and yes, I have preview on image box checked.

[flagpole]

I'm completely convince you have an active selection or you're on the wrong layer.

What happens if you maximise the preview window?

[Miki Sakari]

Preview window is maxed. I am starting from square 1 with the original image. Selecting the foreground with the smart selection brush. Going to photo effects, selecting film and filters. Preview comes up and looks like the one posted above by Hart with everything checkerboard but the selected.
Yesterday when I started from the original and selected anything with the smart brush I was able to see the entire photo in preview, not just the selected area as shown above.
I shut down the computer and restated from scratch, again, same. I have not created any layers.
Was this some kind of glitch yesterday that allowed me to preview the entire image along with the selected area while making color changes to the selected area in the preview window?

[hartpaul]

Possibly a glitch, very strange and I have tried to duplicate it.
It occurs in all versions of PSP back to the Jasc version PSP8.
If you make a selection and apply an effect or adjustment , then the selected area only is shown the rest being transparent so that you can see the effect on the selected area only.

If you want to see the effect in situ (one original image ) then you tick the box preview on image. The advantage of this is that you can zoom in the original image and see it larger on the screen ans see the edge effects compared with observing it on a smaller preview window.
However if you get that glitch again I and others would probably be interested in seeing how you obtained it.

[Miki Sakari]

I wish I knew then that it was not the norm, I would have taken a pic. Since it was my first day in the program I assumed that was what preview should look like. I worked in it for hours that way. It sure was nice seeing the immediate effect of the changes to the selected area in respect to the photo as a whole.

The way it is now I have to make a change in preview, go out of preview, see if the choice works with the rest of the photo or not, and continually go in and out of preview to check. It will especially make it far more difficult with slight changes.

Since it was my first day in the program I did fiddle around quite a bit checking things out. I wonder if I inadvertently stumbled on something somewhere that allowed for that wonderful preview/adjustment pane. If anyone comes up with something please let me know, it will be greatly appreciated.

[hartpaul]

The way it is now I have to make a change in preview, go out of preview, see if the choice works with the rest of the photo or not, and continually go in and out of preview to check. It will especially make it far more difficult with slight changes

Not sure why you have to do that. My posting above shows the main image and the preview panel side by side as seen on the workspace .
In that case the preview panel does not cover any of the main image so you can check what is happening directly on the image even with "slight changes". I could also have used the mouse wheel to zoom in to the main image and show any part at a larger magnification before I apply the effect.
Or am I missing something. It would be good if you can post a simplified screenshot of what you are trying to do.

[Miki Sakari]

Yes, I see that is a work around. Was just easier when I was able to see them in full view in the Preview screen.

[hartpaul]

So a workaround would be to Restore down the preview window, don't max it out. That way you can see a larger main image and can drag the smaller preview window over to one side (you can change its size to suit by dragging the bottom corner.)
That way you can zoom in the main window to a part where you want to compare the changes much larger than in a maxed preview dialog (which given it shows a before and after pane can only have a maximum size about half your computer screen).
You can even scale that main image up to a close up at the pixel level if you want super fine control.