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In the above picture, Region within orange border that has the image is Image Canvas and the region outside orange border till blue border (between the orange border and the blue border) is Virtual Canvas. This virtual canvas does not have any real boundary. Annotations can be added anywhere on the display space in Draw mode.
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| Copy Image to Clipboard | Copy canvas to Clipboard |
In the following, image annotation support available in the application is covered in detail. (The following covers in detail, the image annotation functionality supported in the application).
Annotations helps to draw text and various shapes on the captured image. These annotations help to enhance the image content. For example, a part of the image can be boxed in a rectangle with a text description. Annotations are objects maintained separately from the main image. These objects can be manipulated and changed as required. Annotations can also be flattened onto image by pressing them onto the image. This will convert annotations to be part of the image. When images are exported, annotations are flattened by default resulting in an image with all annotations included.
There are two types of annotations. Single instance annotations and multi-instance annotations. Single instance annotations can be placed on image one at a time. Each time, corresponding annotation need to be selected for placing it on the screen. In the case of multi-instance annotation, multiple instances of annotation can be drawn onto image with one annotation shape selection. Any annotation selection can be cancelled by pressing escape. In the following (Below), annotation toolbox is detailed followed by examples for each of the annotations.
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Draw toolbox contains groups of shapes. In order to see the full list of all shapes in a group, click on the small arrow on the left side to open the associated shape list. See below for text shape expansion (descriptions):
Button Icon | Name | Description | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Cursor | Selects one or multiple objects, to move or resize the object. Cursor is selected to escape out from any current annotation selection. This is also useful for selecting any annotation and changing properties or moving/scaling it. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 | Text | Adds any text annotation on the image and canvas area. Text can be edited in all text annotations by double clicking on the shape. Context menu changes when the text is in edit mode as shown below. Press Escape to come out of the edit mode.
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| Arrow | Draws arrow on the image/canvas. All arrows are multi-instance types. Multiple arrows can be drawn with a selection.
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| Freehand Lines | Allows drawing freehand lines on an image. If the smart pencil option is enabled, application tries to convert drawn shapes into geometric shapes. For example, if a triangle shape is drawn with a pencil tool, application will convert into Triangle shape with sharp edges as shown on the right hand side below.
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 | Geometric Shapes | Allows drawing different geometric shapes on the image.
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| Highlight | Highlights a region on image. Highlight color can be selected from top toolbar or from the properties. See an example below with three different highlight colors.
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| Blur Rectangle | Blurs a portion of image. This is annotation and can be moved and resized as required. see an example below with number plate and headlights blurred.
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 | Eraser | Erases a part of the image with white color. Width of the eraser can be selected from the outline width in the top tool bar.
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 | Sticky Note | Adds a sticky note annotation (to provide comments). This annotation is usually used to include a note on the image, outside the image (outside the image) to provide comments (moved to the end of the first sentence, so not needed here).
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 | Counter Rectangle | Adds continuous numbering on the image/canvas. Option to reset the numbering is also available in the properties panel. Counter Circle: Adds a non-editable circular counter. Counter Rectangle: Adds an editable rectangular counter that has options like cut, copy and paste on right click.
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| Embed Image | Embeds an image in an annotation from a selected image file. Annotation can be resized as required. In the following, there are four embedded images on the screen. They can be resized and moved around.
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| Timestamp | Timestamp, Rubber stamp and Link annotations are grouped together. All these annotations are single instance annotations.
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| Clipart/Images | Displays a list of defined web URLs. Click on the links to open images in a browser. Drag and drop Clip art/Images from browser to the canvas. These images will be converted into embedded image annotations. They can also be dropped on toolbar to import and open as a new image in a tab.
Note that not all images available online can be dragged and dropped onto the application. Some images are disabled by authors for downloading. If the image is too large to convert into annotation, a warning message will be displayed. If the image is larger than 250KB, it is better to open it in a new tab by dragging and dropping onto the toolbar. Application will ask for confirmation for downloading the image and display it in a tab. Once confirmed, it will download the image from web and import it into application opening in a new tab (into a new tab). Some images are copyrighted and need to be verified for compatibility before downloading. Default links can be changed and additional links can be added to this list using User preferences→Clip preferences (Preferences)→Clip Art tab as shown below:
Url links can be re-ordered by moving them up or down as required. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Adds a selected vector icon on image and canvas. Recently selected icons along with a set of predefined icons are presented in a popup for the selection. These are font icons. In order to change the color of an icon, font color needs to be changed. It acts as foreground color for icons. Outline and fill color are same as other shapes.
Any icon can be selected and dropped on canvas. Icons can be duplicated using 'Control + D'. Most recently used icon will show-up on toolbox for selection. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Vector Icon browser | A large collection of vector icons, more than 5000, are displayed in an Icon browser. Icons can be copied or dragged and dropped to the image/canvas. MahApps Pack Icon browser is embedded into the application. ( A large collection of vector icons are displayed in the MahApps Pack Icon browser, which is embedded into the application. the application. These icons, which are more than 5000, can be copied or dragged and dropped to the image/canvas.) Various types of icons are displayed in tabs. (Different groups of icons are displayed in different tabs.) Free text search can also help to identify relevant icon. Icon browser is shown below:
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If a particular set of properties are appealing, they can be set as default. Next time, (when the) same shape is used, saved defaults are applied. In addition to using properties dialog to change annotation properties, additional quick help is provided from the toolbar. Top toolbar provides important annotation property change controls without requiring to open properties window. These cover most frequently changing annotation properties. The following shows the the (????? - No Picture???)
Arrange and Group Annotations
Annotations can be ordered (arranged) using the toolbar annotations order combo-box as shown below:
 |  | Bring Front:Moves selected annotations to front. |
 | Bring Forward: Moves selected annotations on top of other annotations. | |
 | Send Back: Moves selected annotations back. | |
 | Send Backward: Moves selected annotations last of other (behind all) other annotations. | |
 | (Un)Group: (Un)Groups selected annotations on canvas. | |
 | Group All: Groups all annotations on canvas. |
Align Annotations
Aligns multiple annotations in user selected format.
 | Align Left: Aligns selected annotations to left. |
 | Align Top: Aligns selected annotations to top. |
 | Align Right: Aligns selected annotations to right. |
 | Align Bottom: Aligns selected annotations to bottom. |
 | Align Horizontal Center: Aligns selected annotations at center horizontally. |
 | Align Vertical Center: Aligns selected annotations at center vertically. |
 | Distribute Horizontally: Annotations will be distributed horizontally. |
 | Distribute Vertically: Annotations will be distributed vertically. |
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All annotations are merged with the image. Canvas is expanded as required. The following picture shows , the flattening of all annotations on the canvas, for the above example.
Remove All Annotations (
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By default all annotations are editable on an image. Annotations can be made non-editable by clicking on View/Edit annotations icon button on the toolbar. This will help with (prevent) accidental annotations (annotation) changes when (while) viewing images.