2D view

Background image

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You can overlay a different image on top of the currently displayed one. Press the Background Image button and you will be prompted to select an image file to use as an overlay.

Once the file is selected, a new toolbar appears with the following controls for the image overlay:

  close  the overlay controls toolbar and  disable  the background image overlay.

select  another image file  to use as an overlay.

sets the overlay image to  0%  opacity.

sets the overlay image to  100%  opacity.

sets the overlay image to  50%  opacity.

A slider gives you  manual control  over the opacity of the overlay image.

Export image

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The image currently displayed can be exported to an image file. Press the Save Image… button and you will be prompted to select an location, name and file format for the exported file.

While the image will be exported as its native resolution – which is displayed in the bottom left area of the viewport – the bit depth and color format will depend on the image format selected. For instance, 32-bit floating point precision images can only be exported at their full data range with image formats which support this precision, such as TIFF, EXR and HDR. If the image format does not support the data, clamping and/or color banding are likely to occur in the exported image.
In general, be mindful of which precision and features are offered by the image formats you intend to use – floating point support, ICC profiles, etc.

If either OCIO or Adobe ACE color management mode is currently used, and additional option is available to select the color space of the exported image.

Copy to clipboard

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The image currently displayed can be copied to the clipboard. Press the Copy Image to Clipboard button and the image will be ready to be pasted into any third party software, such as Adobe Photoshop.

The image will be copied as an 8-bit precision image at its native resolution, which is displayed in the bottom left area of the viewport.

Switch graph outputs

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If the image currently displayed is a graph output, you can quickly switch to any other graph output using the Select output button.

This feature is not available to other nodes, including nodes which have more than one output.

UV overlay

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If the Display UVs in 2D View option is enabled in the Scene menu of the 3D View dock, then the UV overlay feature is available in the 2D View.

You can enable it using the UV button. 

This displays the UVs of the mesh currently selected in the 3D View as a colored wireframe.

If material color information is available in the mesh file, then the material color is used as the color of the UV overlay.

If the mesh has multiple UV sets, the desired UVs can be selected in the drop-down checklist which can be opened by clicking the arrow next to the ‘UV’ label in the button.

Image information

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You can display the exact pixel values and coordinates in an image with the Information panel, which is enabled using the Image Information button. This is very helpful when inspecting HDR images, for instance, or making sure stepping between pixels follows the intended progression.

Colors are represented by RGBA and HSV values, and displayed depending on the precision of the image, as follows:

• 8-bit: 0-255 integer / 0.0-1.0 floating point

• 16-bit: 0-65532 integer / 0.0-1.0 floating point

• 16F (16-bit floating point): raw floating-point value

• 32F (32-bit floating point): raw floating-point value

Pixel coordinates are represented by X and Y values.

Histogram

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You can display the histogram of the image with the Histogram panel, which is enabled using the Display Histogram button.

The following histogram modes are available:

• Luminance

• Red

• Green

• Blue

• RGB

• Alpha

The following information is listed below the modes:

• Pixels: the number of pixels in the image

• Range: the entire value range available

• Used range: the value range from the lowest value pixel to the highest

Additionally, you can click LMB on the histogram, or hold LMB and drag across the histogram to select a specific portion of the data. The following information is then displayed for this selection:

• Selected pixels: the number of pixels which have the selected values

• Selected range: the value range of the selected portion

• Selected max: the highest number of pixels which have a value included in the selected portion

The selection can be cleared by clicking RMB on the histogram.

How some of the values above are represented depends on the precision selected in the lower section of the panel, as follows:

• 8 bits: 0-255 integer

• 16 bits: 0-65532 integer

• 32 bits: raw floating-point value

Some portions of the histogram may include very low pixel count values, and thus be challenging to read. In this case, you may enable the square root mode, using the Sqrt button, which uses the square root of the actual values to draw the histogram.