Keyboard shortcuts

DxO PhotoLab Windows topics
1

Hello,
My observations are about keyboard shortcuts:

Help -> Keyboard shortcuts (generic shortcuts without much interest during development) and, above all, not exhaustive!

What is useful is to know the keyboard shortcuts for each tool to select it quickly and adjust it without using the mouse.

On LR, I can process a thousand photos in 2 hours because keyboard shortcuts allow me to act quickly. I will not succeed on Photolab because I spend my time with the mouse to click at the top, bottom, right, left to select the actions I want to do. I give up very quickly.

Showing the keyboard shortcuts after the tool name when the pointer is above would already be a progress.
How to select the Crop tool? How for to choice constraint or without constraint?
How to select the pipette?
ect.

Despite searching the Internet, I can not find all the answers to these questions.

I would also like to be able to display an exhaustive list of all keyboard shortcuts that can remain displayed in the corner of my screen without preventing me from working on the photos, unlike the one that currently exists: it is either the display of shortcuts, either the work on the photos. It’s necessary to choose.

Also, for a while I’ll keep visible the display of these shortcuts to give me time to memorize them.

I would therefore appreciate, when I work on a photo, having to select the tool, the action I want to achieve with a simple key press on my keyboard.

I therefore consider that the ergonomics is to improve because not intuitive.

I use very little Photolab but I would like to use it more because I find its exceptional performance. But the time I spend finding my bearings dissuades me. Losing my time moving my mouse in all directions to select this or that and that despairs me and slows me down.

Hoping to have been useful

Best regards

6 Likes
2

I support this simple request for improvement according to this complete description.
No keyboard shorcuts for functionnalities on Windows OS.
Hold CONTROL to an unconstraint crop.

Pascal

1 Like
3

This has my absolute approval. It is a pity that there is not even the possibility to call up the individual menu entries by using ALT and (for example) the first letter.

5

Yes. I know that. But I had to do some research to find this shortcut.

6

Yes. It’s thrue.

7

Hi RayBe,
Have you downloaded the User Manual for PhotoLab? If not, go to the support page, choose your software version, and click on User Manual.
There are 3 articles under the heading Menus & Key Shortcuts. Menus and preferences for PC, and one for Mac, then Keyboard shortcuts. The shortcuts list has PC and Mac on the same lines, such as Full-screen mode for PC is F11, and for Mac it is Cmd+ Shift+ F. They print out pretty nice, and printed mine using the two-sided method because I’m “cheep”! I cannot tell you at this time whether you can re-assign or create new keys strokes, but you probably can. I hope that helps. It has helped me, and in fact, I have all my shortcuts of my editors printed out for fast reference so I don’t have to use the real estate on my screen. Cheers!

3 Likes
8

I am fully behind this. More key commands for direct access to the basic tools is so important for workflow. Coming from Capture One there are so many shortcuts missing. I would have to think this to be pretty easy to add. But I am not a programmer.

4 Likes
9

I’d like to mention that, coming from Capture one, being able to execute a whole range of tools simply by pressing a key (Q), then finger across trackpad or scroll wheel, et voila! the exposure has gone up or down. So simple so elegant so easy to learn.

2 Likes
10

I agree, I have several times mentioned that the “speed Edit” of C1 would be a way forward, but for the moment nothing new…

11

For Windows there are tools available to create custom keyboard shortcuts for anything. I have only ever used AutoHotkey, which requires some coding. You don’t need to be a programmer, but at least have some understanding for how code is written.

The reason you have to understand it, is if you want to use pre-written scripts of the internet - then you have to know what they do when you look at the code.

AutoHotkey itself is just like a programming language - so anything bad from it, only comes from bad scripts(code)

There are also several tools with GUI that look like they’re really easy to use. Just do a web search for “create custom keyboard shortcuts windows”. Be sure you trust the source when you download a tool.

1 Like
12

I use Capture One (but am trying to convert to DxO) and use AutoHotKey, despite their extensive shortcut facility (their Windows F11 Full Screen preview is not, but their Mac equivalent is - go figure). Anyway, I have started looking at AHK in relation to PL6 and the problem is, the basic lack of shortcuts.

For example, CO’s Speedkeys have been mentioned, and are really, very good - I use them a great deal. I have not found a way to implement that in PL6 because the only ways to move the sliders require you to have the cursor near/at/on then click/drag or right-click above to increase or below to reduce. Whereas AHK can sense mouse position and respond appropriately, it can’t know that you have not moved the position of particular sliders. Then … shortcuts like C=Crop and B-Brush and E=Erase are simply not there so again, AHK has little to work with. I find I am often hitting C in PL6 and wondering why the crop tool does not appear!!

1 Like
13

Chakonari - your post prompted me to look again at AHK. I now have a working script that will click on the crop, straighten and zoom-to-fit icons on the top of the PL6 window and return the cursor to the start position. As they are all toggles, another press turns the feature off. My script is based on a 1920x1080 screen and assumes that PL6 is maximised with the tools in the standard position. You can see a flash of cursor so I need to see if I can hide that movement or speed it up.

#IfWinActive ahk_exe DxO.PhotoLab.exe

#IfWinActive ahk_exe DxO.PhotoLab.exe

;crop
c::
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseGetPos, StartX, StartY
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseClick, left, 994, 47
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseMove, StartX, StartY
Return

;zoom fit-to-screen
z::
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseGetPos, StartX, StartY
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseClick, left, 813, 47
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseMove, StartX, StartY
Return

;straighten
s::
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseGetPos, StartX, StartY
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseClick, left, 1057, 47
CoordMode, Mouse,
MouseMove, StartX, StartY
Return

#IfWinActive

14

That’s really cool roadcone. You also pointed out the issue of making universal ones - screen resolution AND layout. I had omitted that (unintentionally).

If you’re into that or use PL(or other media editing software) a lot, you might also want to consider a QMK capable keyboard… lots of possibilities.

From what I had read, hiding/showing cursor with AHK is possible - but sadly not simply a hide or show command.

You could see if ChatGPT has any solutions regarding modifying your script and probably also get it to code any other scripts you may need. Start by asking it to modify your script to hide the cursor in PL. (I’ll probably be doing the same later because I want to know :slight_smile: )

But yeah - shout out to DXO developers - please give us the option to customize keyboard shortcuts and add them wherever we want. Also please add a modifier key for fine tuning sliders with mouse-wheel or arrow keys. Surely it must be possible to add a function to right-click on a slider or Up/Down arrows for a context menu to add a keyboard shortcut and add a routine to check what is in use.

15

Chakonari,

Spent a little more time on it. Try the script below.

Active only when PL6 is running.

Tools: Hides the cursor movement when ‘scrolling’ to the tools at the top. Returns the cursor to the point it was at when the shortcut was activated, with the exception of Crop. First time it goes down to the crop selector drop-down and activates it; second time it does not (toggles two functions). Tools are toggles so shortcut enables … shortcut disables.

Local Adjustment: I’ve combined Local Adjustment enable ‘L’ with ‘Shift+x’ where x= existing PL6 shortcut for a particular local adjustment. Where possible, I’ve use Ctrl+x where x=the PL6 Shifted character for that feature – but in two cases that is not possible as Windows uses Ctrl+C (Copy) and Ctrl+A (Select All). Any of these can be changed in the code or the Ctrl tent ‘^’ changed for the Alt exclamation mark ‘!’. I’ve added a Shift+N to ensure that a new mask is always created. Of course, if you are already in Local Adjustment mode, you don’t need my shortcut – just use the standard PL6 ‘Shift+x’ for whichever one you want.

I’ve added Zoom to 100% and Zoom-to-fit using the Capture One shortcuts of ‘,’ and ‘.’.

As I indicated before, the script relies on the application being maximised on a 1920x1080 screen. Although the x,y co-ordinates can be modified for any screen and any position of the window on the screen, it will only work if that screen and position are not changed. For example, if you were to reduce the size of the window, even slightly, then the code may click on a useless bit of screen but it could click on another feature entirely (eg: C for crop would activate Straighten).

I expect this to be a work in progress, but if you (or others) have any you would like incorporating, let me know. But bear in mind that the basic framework needs to be within PL6 - so unless someone has a great idea, scrolling of individual adjustments using SpeedKeys is not likely to be possible.

Clive

#IfWinActive ahk_exe DxO.PhotoLab.exe

Settitlematchmode, 2
SetMouseDelay, -1
; — Auto Exec
; nothing

; — Hotkeys

;Crop
c::
toggle := !toggle
goto, % toggle ? “first” : “second”
return
;First
first:
ClickBack(994,47)
Sleep, 250
Click 774, 799, 1
Return
;Second
second:
ClickBack(994,47)
Return

;Straighten Horizon
s::
ClickBack(1057,47)
Sleep, 250
Return

;Zoom-to-fit
,::
ClickBack(813,47)
Sleep, 250
Return

;Zoom one-to-one
.::
ClickBack(850,47)
Sleep, 250
Return

;Retouch
h::
ClickBack(1229,47)
Sleep, 250
Return

;ReShape
z::
ClickBack(1195,47)
Sleep, 250
Return

;Local Adjustment - Brush
^b::
send l
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}n{shift up}
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}b{shift up}
Return

;Local Adjustment - Graduated Filter
^g::
send l
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}n{shift up}
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}g{shift up}
Return

;Local Adjustment - Control Point
^t::
send l
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}n{shift up}
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}c{shift up}
Return

;Local Adjustment - Control Line
^l::
send l
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}n{shift up}
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}l{shift up}
Return

;Local Adjustment - Auto Mask
^k::
send l
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}n{shift up}
Sleep, 100
send {shift down}a{shift up}

; — Functions
ClickBack(x,y,Clicks=1)
{
MouseGetPos Px, Py
Click, %x%, %y%, %Clicks%
Click %Px%, %Py%, 0
}

#IfWinActive

1 Like