Crop Tool Issues

Hello Everyone,
I've just started using Photoshop to work on my photos and one thing I was getting into was cropping them down with the crop tool.
It was working fine for the past couple of days, but all of a sudden now when I go to crop something it crops down to almost nothing - all that's left is a little grey pixel! I can set the area that I want to crop and adjust it and everything, but then when I press enter it goes to the small grey pixel rather than cropping to the size that I've selected.
I tried reopening the document, trying it on another document, and restarting Photoshop and my computer but nothings working.
Anyone have any ideas about this? Thank in advance for any input!
-Des

When you have the Crop tool selected, are there any numbers in the size or resolution fields in the Options bar across the top of your monitor?
That could be the issue. If so, then choose the Clear button to the right of those. That should restore it to normal function.

Similar Messages

Crop Tool Issue with Vista

Hi,
Every time I use the crop tool I get a tiny image as a result, the image resolution changes automatically to 9999px, if I set it back to 300px the image is crappy, and can't get around this.
I can only asume this is a Vista compatibility issue, as this is at my job's computer, and at home I have XP, and don't have this issue.
Anybody with the same issue? Is there a patch available? HELP!
Thanks in advance

9999px is not a tiny image; it is huge if you mean 9999 x 9999 pixels.
1) As an experiment, try leaving all of the inputs blank when using the crop tool.
If this works then read up on the crop tool input settings, especially the resolution setting. I always leave this resolution setting blank since I do not want to resample my image when I crop my image.
I also never set my h and w to pixels, because I dont like the way this setting works with pixels selected. It is very non-intuitive and not very useful.
If I want to crop to a set number of pixels, I use the marquee select tool and fixed size in pixels. Then Image/crop from the menu bar. This works the way I think the crop tool should work with pixels, but does not.
Good Luck
Ed

Crop Tool issue in Acrobat 9.5.2...help needed!

When using the crop tool in Acrobat 9.5.2 it now appears to draw the crop box as if was snapping to invisible guides (similar to those guides used in Quark or Indesign layouts for example.) I need to be able to draw a freehand crop box on my PDF files....have I changed a setting or preference somewhere that I am not aware of?

Found it...actually in the VIEW menu there is a selection for Snap to Grid which was checked. It was nothing in the preferences box. Thanks for your help.

PS CS6 issue with crop tool: graphic glitches

I am using Photoshop CS6 v13.1.2 and I'm experiencing an issue with the crop tool. Whenever I use the crop tool, move the frame around and then zoom in on the image, the image becomes noisy, pixelated or has other 'graphic glitches'. I changed the PS preferences to not use the GPU and then rebooted the computer. Still the same issue without the GPU.
Running on Mac OS 10.8.3, iMac 2011 with AMD Radeon HD 6970M.
Is there another workaround to use this tool until it might get fixed? Thank you.

I've seen the same issue from time to time on windows 13.01.1 usually only on rather large pixel dimension documents.
Does it make a difference if you flatten the image before using the crop tool?
Also, using the classic mode for the crop tool doesn't seem to have that glitch.

My Elements 9 cropping tool just stopped working...crops the entire photo.

My Elements 9 cropping tool just started cropping the entire image away today. Just got an Adobe air update last night. This is nothing I have done. All that's left after using my crop tool is a .jpg symbol. Please help.

First try resetting the tool. If that doesn't work delete the settings file by holding down Ctrl+Alt+Shift as you start PSE and answering the prompt to delete.
Cheers,
Neale
Insanity is hereditary, you get it from your children
If this post or another user's post resolves the original issue, please mark the posts as correct and/or helpful accordingly. This helps other users with similar trouble get answers to their questions quicker. Thanks.

PhotoShop Elements 9 Crop Tool is a total failure!

I do a fair amount of work that involves a lot of croping, mainly for animation sequencing. The Crop tool Custom Height and Width settings do NOT WORK.
I usually have a test image of the exact size that I work in. Example: 500 x100 pixels. This converts to 13.23cm x 2.65 cm at 96dpi. When I type these Crop Size requirements into the Crop tool settings box, I get a crop size way outside the size of the image that I want to crop. There is no way to set that size up yourself by using a test image as a template. In fact there is no way to set up custom sizes in the menu at all! I find this to be very upsetting as I have only just purchased this product. This limitation is something that I would expext to find in freeware, but not in a program like PhotoShop Elements 9. I have tried every conceivable way to try to get the Crop Tool to work to a Pre Set size with no success.
Why is it that a graphics program will not allow you to put in a pixel x pixel measurement? That is pure stupidity on the part of the programmers and very poor work on the part of the testing team. No wonder the program itself crashes from time to time. It just stops running - ppffft! I have a state of the art 64 bit system running Win 7 with plenty of RAM and a High end Graphics Card, so I know that my system is not at fault - it's PhotoShop 9. I cannot believe the primative workspace and the lack of the ability to custom predefine tools. All in all I'm extremely unhappy with PE9.
If anyone has had this or similar issues and has found a solution please tell me what it is.

In answer to your remark I will go through the whole process again at a later date and re-post. It does not make any difference to the resultant Crop size whether you input cm or pixels. Here's a point for you though since you mentioned it. Check out the Ruler - does it look like the Crop is anywhere near 500cm x 100cm? Maybe you were so busy trying to find fault that you failed to see the forest for the trees?
I only find fault where it exists - not where it doesn't. As far as Forums go, I am a member of a few Forums and have not had this sort of problem with answers before where the reply posts tend toward trying to pretend a problem doesn't exist or trying to prove fault with the poster. Hmmm. Again I wonder how many of these reply's are from people with some affiliation with Adobe?
I will finish by saying that just for you I will go through the whole pointless exercise again and make sure that the Pixels are indeed input.
1. Opening File
2. File Open.
3. Resetting Crop Tool.
4. Crop Tool reset and Measurement Boxes clear.
5.First Measurement Input. PLEASE NOTE 500 Pixels Input!
6. Second Measurement Input. PLEASE NOTE 100 Pixels Input!
7. Third Criteria Input. PLEASE NOTE 96dpi Input!
8. All Input Data correct and ready to Crop to preset Width/Height/Dpi restrictions.
9. OH DEAR IT DOESN'T WORK! Again it fails to give me a simple 500x100 pixel at 96dpi Crop Box!
After this reply post you may just get some idea of the frustration I am experiencing. As you can plainly see the Crop Box drawn goes to the very edges of the Image to be Cropped. Can you see the problem now? Maybe I should just go with my friend's suggestions and take a video of the process and post it on YouTube? Then go to my local Consumer Affairs Department! If you can find what I am supposedly doing wrong - please elucidate as I have followed both the prescribed steps in the somewhat Shoddy Online Help and also the suggested remedies posted on the Forum. All to no avail. It just Won't Work!

Crop tool shows background color unless I switch to "Classic" mode

I'm not sold on the "latest" Photoshop being the best. I've seen more bugs now that I've subscribed to the "CC" version than ever before. Here's my latest issue..
When I activate the crop tool (I realize it's been rewritten.. not sure why), I see my current background color in place of what is visible in my current workspace. Ultimately, completing the crop command, it crops as expected, and the background color vanishes. What benefit is this? It adds confusion and makes me a bit confused as to what the final crop result will be. Why was this changed? Why am I seeing my current background color? It makes no sense. I've been using Photoshop for nearly 20 years and this is just dumb. Can anyone explain?
Thanks!
- Sean

Yeah, that was pretty vague. I was in a creative mode and was rudely interrupted by this weird change, so I wasn't focused on a clear post. The lack of direct email support to Adobe frustrated me also. Alas..
Bascially, I have a layer with some image data, and transparent regions:
I select the crop tool, and select a region just inside the outside edge, containing the portion of the image I care about:
The background switched from being transparent to my current background color selection. I had this green chosen for some completely unrelated task. I can't find anywhere that this can be disabled. The settings I have are what I believe to be the defaults:
And, when I change the crop settings to "Use Classic Mode", the behavior is the more sensible (in my opinion) current background:
I hope that clears up the confusion. I can't imagine any use case where replacing the current visible background with the current background color makes sense. If it's a feature, I can't find any documentation, official or otherwise, that explains why this is happening.
Yes, I like the latest versions of software, but since I made the jump from CS4 to CC, I've hit more bugs than ever before. I've had to kill Photoshop a couple times in the past two months, whereas before, it never froze up or crashed on me. This feels like a bug, but if it's a feature, I'd love to know how to use the new crop tool's background settings properly.
Cheers!
- Sean

What is wrong with the crop tool in Photoshop CS6? (picture included)

Ever since I upgraded to Photoshop CS6 and started to use the new crop tool, I get this quite interesting visual error and some artifacting.
I didn't have the problem with the crop tool in the previous versions of Photoshop.
What can be the issue?

Seems like a GPU problem. Can you try going into Photoshop Preferences, disable GPU acceleration and try if that fixes it?

Why is Lightroom 5 Crop tool so slow?

Having this problem all the time. Sluggish crop tool making it impossible to make fine adjustments. Sole solution is to NOT use the 2nd monitor view. It seems this is causing the problem.
Except I WANT to use the 2nd monitor-option as a part of my workflow.
Using a Macbook Pro Retina 2,3 i7 with 8gb Ram, NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M 1024 MB and OSX 10.9 latest version. Surely this config is strong enough?
Secondary monitor is a Lacie324 hooked to the MBP through Apple-HDMI cable.
Help wanted! This is driving me crazy.

Hi John,
Sorry but no. Still having the problem. Just installed CUDA driver for Mac. Hope this will help. Don't know if LR really takes advantage of this driver though.
Read somewhere to uncheck the "dynamic switching between Graphics Cards" - box in "Systemprefs>energy saving options". But still haven't seen improvements in performance.
Had no response to the issue by anybody else so it's difficult to come up with a solution.
Peter

LR 5.x crop tool bug: selection jumping on activation

Hi,
I did not see this reported, but I'd be rather surprised if nobody had noticed the issue before.
I'm seeing this behavior since I upgraded from LR 4 to LR 5. I think I did the upgrade with 5.3, but at 5.6 I still have the following problem:
After setting a cropping rectangle (usually with rotation), then change some settings (e.g. exposure, shadows, blacks, etc.) and then activate the cropping tool again, the displayed image jumps to the original frame size for half a second and then back to the previously set crop.
Since I usually go back to cropping only for small changes in rotation, this is especially annoying, because it irritates the eye in a way that I'm sometimes not even sure if I'm seeing my previous setting again. And then I have forgotten how I actually wanted to adjust the setting
This seems to me like a bug introduced in LR5. I'm using Lightroom since version 2 and never had this behavior until the upgrade to LR5.
I'm using Windows 7 Pro 64-bit, nvidia Graphics.
Steps to reproduce:
1) Open an image in the development module (I'm using Canon CR2 raws)
2) Set a cropping window
3) change some image settings, e.g. exposure
4) activate the cropping tool
Please fix this behavior.
Thanks,
Karsten

Thanks for the clarification. Too bad that the fix did not make it into LR 5.6.
I'm new here, so please apologize my beginners question: Is there a place where I can find bug reports that were accepted as known bugs? I tried the community search on cropping tool and did not find any related bugs.
Thanks,
Karsten

Aperture 3.0.3 Adjustments & Cropping Tool Bugs

I don't know if 3.0.3 actually did any good, but it did some harm for sure. Many times when I go to make adjustments, the entire adjustment pane is blank. Restarting Aperture brings it back, but this is rather annoying since it never happened before. Also, the crop tool has bugs. Sometimes when I crop an image, the entire image disappears from my project. Again, when I restart Aperture the image comes back. Another issue I'm having with crop is if I set it to say 8x10 and pull on a corner, it allows free movement like "custom" used to, and will not stay 8x10. At the same time, "custom" only pulls symmetrically and does not allow custom cropping unless I enter numerical values. Now that I've just shot a large family reunion and have hundreds of images to process, this is a real PITA. Thanks again Apple for a real half-assed update.

Thank God experienced users are having this problem! I have only just upgraded from iPhoto straight to Aperture 3 in the last fortnight and I thought I was doing something wrong with the crop function?! Also why isn't there a 'done' or 'apply' button for crop??? Is simply closing the crop box the applying?
Totally Confused Newbie
PS also app goes into a loop when I try to import from iPhoto, won't let me stop import or quit or even quit Aperture.
PPS why are a lot of my imported (from installation I automatically imported my iPhoto library) pics upside down???
not happy

Cropping Tool in iMovie 10.0

After updating to the latest version of iMovie the cropping tool stays grayed out no matter what kind of file I import. Can anyone offer any advice on this issue?

Do you have Projects and Events form an earlier version of iMovie?
Matt

Crop tool precision - can it snap to whole pixels?

One thing that drives myself and every other designer I know crazy in Photoshop are tools that do not allow precisie snapping to the edges of whole pixels This is not such a problem with printed media and there are valid reasons to allow certain tools to snap to the midpoint of a pixel and it is nice to have the option to turn that on and off. However as a web designer I have a problem that has been getting on my nerves for several years and maybe there is another way I could approach this I am not thinking of.
Aside from templates where I can spend the time to create slices and export them as such, most often I am working on graphics that require me to select an area and crop / save for web on the fly.
Here is the problem.
The Crop Tool does not snap to whole pixels, or guides, or document bounds very precisely at all. Compare snapping to guides with a standard marquee box vs the crop tool and you will see what I mean. The marquee snaps with gusto, while you never really know if the crop tool is sitting halfway across a pixel without zooming far in (and even then I am not sure). The marquee ALWAYS selects whole pixels and cannot select a "half pixel" regardless of how much you try.
Because of this, I am forced to use the Marquee tool to select my area for cropping and using the "crop" command from the menu since it is the only way to crop with the marquee. However, the problem with THIS method is that photoshop does not preserve your layered content outside of those bounds. Therefore any Layer Effects (especially shadows) are changed drastically to the point where shadows do not line up across multiple slices (if individually exporting them this way).
Sometimes I am re-adjusting an ad layout to another size, and need to crop without losing the content outside of those bounds. Sometimes I just need to keep shadows etc intact. Sometimes I need that content outside the bounds for motion graphics purposes etc.
This is all just a bunch of hot air to essentially say I cannot find a way to EASILY crop, snapping to precise pixels AND keep the content outside of the new document bounds intact for further manipulation in a layered document.
Is there a way to do this I am not thinking about? Can you make the crop tool snap to whole pixels and/or force the crop command in the menu to follow the same preference setting you gave the crop tool in terms of keeping the content outside of your new bounds from being deleted?
I'd appreciate any suggestions on this.
If Adobe actually reads this stuff, I can assure that EVERY SINGLE photoshop artist I have ever talked to about this has the exact same complaint. I know hundreds of people who hate this (even the non-web designers who don't need as much pixel precision).

It never really hampers my productivity but this morning I had to crop an ad down to a smaller size and just started thinking of this...
I always drag a marquee selection out (box) when I need to add a guide to my document to ensure that my guides snap to the pixel edge.
One thing I just did that seemed to work with the crop tool well was setting the grid settings to a gridline every 10px with 10 subdivisions in preferences and then turning on the grid when using the crop tool. It does not seem to snap unless you are actually viewing the grid but the tool snaps to individual pixels.
Typically in my normal work flow when I am in the zone and just doing things without thinking, I drag a marquee around to set my guides for cropping, then draw a marquee box snapping to those guides, flatten image to make sure layer effects stay intact, crop, save, use history window to go back to un-flattened state, move on...
It would be cool to be able to use the crop command after drawing the marquee without destroying the layer content outside the new bounds, even a seperate command that adjusts the "canvas size" to the marquee bounds would be fine.
Its not something I consider to be broken but honestly when I deal with designers who are not web developers, one of the major issues I get with PSDs that need to be chopped up for a web site is pixels not being precicise and boxes being drawn with half-pixels and guides sitting in the middle of pixels. It is indicitave of something that could be improved for my own productivity sake AND to help designers keep things snappy and tight in their comps.
I've had to re-build countless nav-bars, and other elements because of blurry pixels, non-precisely measured spacings, etc etc to ever count. But at the same time it is good to have something to be paid for LOL.

My crop tool in element 10 no longer functions. All the layer boxes go blank.

When I try to crop a photomerge image all the layer boxes go blank, the box that should have the cropped image has a teeny paint brush overlaying a teeny canvas, no image.

You might have some small values entered in the height, width or resolution boxes.
See if resetting the Crop Tool solves the issue.
With the Crop Tool selected click on the small downturned arrow and choose Reset Tool
After you crop can you see the cropped image on the screen or is it in the layers panel your talking about?

CS6 PS Cropping Tool has many problems for working professionals...

Ok, I understand that the kids at Adobe would like to change things around in "upgrade versions" of Photoshop. However for working photographers and professionals that crop A LOT of images in the course of their work, the new cropping tool is a DISASTER! A few may like the new tool... however, there are many that don't. http://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/photoshop_6_crop_tool?utm_content=re ply_link&utm_medium=email&utm_source=reply_notification#reply_10280572
To the point, here's how to fix the problem. Adobe, you have the CS5 PS cropping tool code... please put that code EXACTLY as it is in CS5 into the "Classic" option for CS6 PS. This way, those who WORK with Photoshop and PAY to use the software can get their work done using the excellent crop tool as was in CS5 (which I have downgraded to so I can get work done) and those who are giddy about the new crop tool can play to their hearts content.
Adobe, you are upsetting a lot of paying clients with your new crop tool and the "faux" classic tool option. You might want to address this issue soon!

Ken, I have to say that I too chose to go back to CS5. I feel like I got nailed with being an "early adopter", you know the guys that get to do the bug testing for a company because they didn't know how to do it or were too cheap.
That is something that Noel (How you doing Noel? You probably don't remember me from back in the Macromedia user group days, but thought I'd say hi anyhow) either doesn't understand or isn't acknowledging so far.
I am judging by his like 19k+ posts that he's either a rep on behalf of Photoshop or an avid user. I appreciate what he is trying to do, but on the other hand, just admit the tool is a pain. It isn't intuitive. It does take WAY too long to figure out to use.
I have NEVER had this much problem with any tool in Photoshop. This tool represents the biggest pain I have EVER experienced with a Photoshop tool and I've used it since '93. I adore Photoshop. I am a power user. Those words aren't the words of a flippant newbie.
I know if I use it for 8 hours a day like you Noel, that I will get used to it, but that isn't the point.
The point is that I feel like I was hit with a poorly thought out tool, with a poorly implemented "Classic" mode that feels buggy, to say the least. It's usability doesn't "flow" because for example what genius thought of hitting the P key to go into Classic mode, when that conflicts with the Pen/Paths tool? Really? My deeper concern is that Photoshop is slipping on it's usability standards like Apple is on it's iPhones. In the words of usability guru, Steve Krug "Don't make me think."
What I chose to do is this:
1)Grudgingly use CS6 for the things it does really really well. Can I just say I love the new Raw interface, and love "Clarity" for example? Great job guys. I watched a tutorial and got it almost instantly.
2)Continue to use CS5 for cropping lot's of images, something I also do a lot of. Cross my fingers that whoever dropped the ball on this gets their act together and makes this tool truly usable and intuitive. At the very least they will make the Classic mode work properly. For example, why do I keep popping out of Classic mode? Why doesn't the preference stick consistently? There shouldn't be a learning curve this steep on a crop tool. I'm really surprised this didn't come up in usability testing.
I hate being the first adopter, because they get to work out all the kinks for the people who failed to do their job in the first place. That's what feels like happened here. If users don't complain and give feedback, Adobe will never fix the problem, right?
Now before somebody freaks out and calls this a flame, it isn't. No emotion is to be read into this that isn't expressly stated. I'm not being sarcastic, sardonic or unfriendly. Whatever tone is being read into this is a projection of your own mind.

Crop Tool Issues

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for