Stars on Preview window thumbnails are too prominent

[ajeffersxx]

I'm running Photo Mechanic Version 5.0, build 19695 (4a8c3fe) on OSX 10.13.6 and find the user interface of Photo Mechanic 5 a backward step compared to v4.

To cull images from weddings I select images to keep by applying stars using the Preview window with the thumbnails in a film strip below so I can see the next and previous surrounding images. In the current release it is not easy to see which thumbnail images have stars or not as the star symbol is black and prominent for all images. A 1 star image has a 1 and a star, whereas a non-starred image still has a visible star. I hope that makes sense.

I had to go back to PM V4 to see why this was causing me a problem. In v4 the non-starred thumbnail images do have a star but it is a lighter grey and much less visible which makes the images which are starred much more prominent.

Any chance of reverting to the V4 GUI or was there a good reason for making the star visible even for non-starred photos. You don't follow this logic in the Contact Sheet view for example, where non-starred images have no stars... :-)

Keep up the good work,

Adam

[Kirk Baker]

Adam,

To cull images from weddings I select images to keep by applying stars using the Preview window with the thumbnails in a film strip below so I can see the next and previous surrounding images. In the current release it is not easy to see which thumbnail images have stars or not as the star symbol is black and prominent for all images. A 1 star image has a 1 and a star, whereas a non-starred image still has a visible star. I hope that makes sense.

I'm sorry that you're having difficulty differentiating between images that do not have a star rating versus images that do have a star rating.  An image that has as star rating has a number next to the star and non-rated images have no number next to the star indicator.

I had to go back to PM V4 to see why this was causing me a problem. In v4 the non-starred thumbnail images do have a star but it is a lighter grey and much less visible which makes the images which are starred much more prominent.

In the six years since PM5 has come out, we have had no complaints about being able to differentiate between rated and unrated images.  (until now.)

Any chance of reverting to the V4 GUI or was there a good reason for making the star visible even for non-starred photos. You don't follow this logic in the Contact Sheet view for example, where non-starred images have no stars... :-)

True, but you can directly edit the stars in the Contact Sheet and you cannot edit them in the thumbstrip.

PM5 is essentially end of life and all development efforts are on the new PM6 version.  That said, I don't have plans to change the UI, much of which is inherited from PM5 unless there are a lot more complaints about this issue.

-Kirk

[ajeffersxx]

I appreciate the ultra fast response!

You are of course correct that the "starred" images have a number next to the star. My problem is that I have to look and focus on that detail to see which are the starred images coming up in the thumbnail time line, while concentrating on the main image.

With the V4 greyed out stars (image attached) I could notice a starred image coming up by glancing down (or out of the corner of the eye) while keeping the eye focused on the main image.

The first thing my colleague (who is still on V4) said to me when he saw me going through a wedding using V5 at the weekend said was "Why have you starred all those images?" so it is quite a noticeable change from V4.

Perhaps it is something you could consider some options for V6, perhaps restoring them to v4 greyed out style, or even removing the star completely for non-starred images, but that might be asking a bit much! :-)

Many thanks,

Adam

[FVlcek]

BTW, you can change the background colour in settings, but the star field background in the preview thumbstrip only does not honour that setting for me.