What would be really nice to have in Shotcut, because it exists in every graphic design and illustration software I have ever used, is a constrain feature when you’re dragging an element on the screen whilst in the Size, Position & Rotate filter. With so many softwares you can hold down a certain key or key combination (often Ctrl or Shift or Alt) and you constrain the movement of drag to the Horizontal or Vertical axis. Similarly if you’re rotating, holding down the correct key whilst dragging constrains the rotation to, say, 45° segments.
This would be really useful to have, especially when using keyframes. I know there are ways to get round this limitation, but the above is the way many people work, and it would be great to be consistent with other softwares.
You may not be aware, but the on-screen rectangle has left, right, top, and bottom position handles that only change the size in that direction. However, those handles are disabled when the “Size mode” is “Fill” (which also happens to be the default). This effectively provides the H/V constraint you are requesting.
Also, when rotating, the rotation snaps to 0, 90, 180, and 270 degrees.
I have updated the documentation to explain these features.
I think what @BeretGascon means is constraining the movement of an object to vertical or horizontal directions. Not resizing.
Like in Photoshop for example. When using the move tool, if you press & hold Shift while dragging an image horizontally, it will only move left or right. Same if you want to move vertically. Hold Shift then start moving up or down and the movement will be constrained vertically.
Or like moving keyframes in Shotcut. While holding Alt the keyframe will only move left or right, and when holding Ctrl, the keyframe will only move up or down.
Good idea. I have made a change for the next release that holding the Shift key will constrain the movement to either horizontal or vertical depending on which direction the mouse has moved the most.
Also, thank you brian - this is exactly what I need. I would never have believed that I would be producing so many projects in 1080 x 1920 portrait. Most of it is produced from archive footage in the classic 16:9 format and I only need to slide horizontally while maintaining the vertical position and size. Here’s a sample of such a video for YT- https://youtube.com/shorts/YZ3_qm_qoQ0
This has been changed to the Ctrl since Shift is needed to allow dragging from anywhere within the rectangle. (Alt is used to suspend snapping.) These keys can be combined too to get multiple behaviors at the same time.
Ctrl works for me! You won’t believe what a boon that will be to my workflow. I’m too becoming a 1080 * 1920 junkie using fairly standard templates and being able constrain whilst dragging is going to be a blessing. Many thanks!
