Photoshop: Free Transform - ability to set Maintain Aspect Ratio as default

Hallelujah!  Thank you for making this change!  I'm on my way to China on business--will download the update as soon as it becomes available.  Just in time for our new catalog!  Thank you Adobe!

Brilliant! Took a while but it'll be a nice fix for an annoying little issue. Thanks Adobe.

Meh, I preferred it the other way. I've been using photoshop for 20 years, I don't think changing default behaviors at version 20 is making your software easier to use.

Some behaviours they were not bugs that were present for so long shouldn't be changed from release to release so drastically ie. without giving choise the method we want to use them - the more we were used to do that other that after end could be more convinient for us.

Personally that one change doesn't matter for me, it's even better, however I have to see it in practise, so maybe not... but there are some other that annoyed me we have nothing to say about:

https://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/digital-imaging-october-max-2018-release-note...

I can't stand it, myself. Holding "Shift" while something is selected has always been the universal way to "constrain proportions." It's even how you continue to constrain proportions in other parts of photoshop, like cropping. Now we have to "unlearn" this skill for one item—free transform. Because holding "Shift" there does the OPPOSITE of what it does everywhere else. It "un sets" constrain proportion. Isn't there a way to set this default for Free Transform back to what it was before for those of us who use graphics software as pros and know to hold down "Shift?"

Not only some bugs I waited months were fixed yet, so we have to live with this 'little' change :(

People were waiting YEARS for this fix. Professionals requested it because no pro wants a distorted logo or image by default. Anyway, if you don't like it, you can revert back easily enough:


How do I turn off the new proportional scaling by default behavior while transforming layers?

To revert to the legacy transform behavior, do the following:

1. Use Notepad (Windows) or a text editor on Mac OS to create a plain text file (.txt).
2. Type the text below in the text file:
   
   TransformProportionalScale 0
   
   
3. Save the file as "PSUserConfig.txt" to your Photoshop settings folder:
   • Windows: [Installation Drive]:\Users\[User Name]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CC 2019\Adobe Photoshop CC 2019 Settings\
   • macOS: //Users/[User Name]/Library/Preferences/Adobe Photoshop CC 2019 Settings/

KY,

Thank you! This is great and just what I needed.

I did see in the thread above—and was somewhat surprised—how people had been asking for this for years, and, I agree, that a logo or image shouldn't be distorted when scaled. But, again, to me, that is why we all know to hold down Shift in this situation.

But there are lots of times where you're scaling a box or a background or something that doesn't have to have the proportions constrained. So, it seemed counter intuitive, to me, to unlearn that Shift trick, especially since it was just for this one Free Transform task.

Either way, it's a moot point, since you have provided me a way to have it the way I like. Now the people who have been waiting for it can do it the new way, and those of us who liked it before can keep it as it was. Win-win for all.

Thanks again!

Honestly I saw few times other users suggesting to use PSUserConfig.txt with some content, but that never was something I needed so I forgot about it. It's first time that a can make use of it! Thanks for sharing it. Btw can you tell us how you know what to type in that .txt file?

Ps. still that would be good to have it in preferentions.

It was in the "What's New..." link.
https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/whats-new.html#

Too bad that is extendable so although I read that earlier I missed the hidden content.

While I do appreciate having this be a default, it feels like a partial fix employed by someone that doesn't fully understand the problem it's fixing.

It should be a preference that you can toggle in settings; not a default behavior whether you like it or not.So you can set it according to your workflow preferences.

Personally, I use Photoshop 90% of the time for my job, and 99% of the time when I scale things I need them to be proportionate.

Holding shift mostly worked, except if I watched the numerical percentage in the top bar I would see that it didn't actually always scale proportionally; unless I toggled the lock before scaling.

With the new version, it's working like I want it to, however if I drag an object from my Adobe Library and I enter a manual number in the field, I still have to toggle the lock to get it to scale both horizontally and vertically. If I drag it from the corner, and ignore the fields, it scales correctly.

Steve and others that don't like the change ... I don't know what the new behavior is like (I'm still using CS6), but what we were originally looking for is to have proportional scaling by default or locked into memory when using numeric free transform via the toolbar, not when dragging. I'm happy to hear a change has been made. Maybe now I'll upgrade :)

Collin, really?! Then no, it hasn't been fixed. Did someone change the title of this post/idea somewhere along the way? The URL is:

photoshop_numeric_free_transform_maintain_aspect_ratio_button

Which is what we've been asking for.

The title says:
Free Transform - ability to set Maintain Aspect Ratio as default

Hannah/Adobe, please don't mark this topic as implemented and change the title to what it originally was.

Hi Hannah!
How can we uncheck this in preferences so that proportional transform would not be a default behavior?
On groups or on texts it proportionally transforms without shift key, but on vector layers, it doesn`t. So this not be an overall behavior in PS, does more harm than good, especially, if we work on PS for years and using shortcut keys became second nature for us.
Can we simply toggle this off in Preferences, please?

Hello again! :D
I found the FIX on Adobe website:

To revert to the legacy transform behavior, do the following:

1. Use Notepad (Windows) or a text editor on Mac OS to create a plain text file (.txt).
2. Type the text below in the text file:
   
   TransformProportionalScale 0
   
   
3. Save the file as "PSUserConfig.txt" to your Photoshop settings folder:
   • Windows: [Installation Drive]:\Users\[User Name]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CC 2019\Adobe Photoshop CC 2019 Settings\
   • macOS: //Users/[User Name]/Library/Preferences/Adobe Photoshop CC 2019 Settings/

If that default behaviour doesn't behave the same for vector layers so I agree it makes confusion as it's not consitent then. And that one situation you found seems to be bug.

Iulian Art  you're my hero! =) Thank you, the fix works!

The solution you found is posted also in the same subtheard, but few posts higher ;)

If you look at few posts back, you'll see the real hero is: KY

@Kukurykus the confusion goes even further, because we all are using more than PS from Adobe Suite, so it should be some consistency across all apps, for instance in AI, layers do not transform proportionally.
Moreover, for God`s sake, this menu itself is called "Free Transform" and not "Proportionally Transform" to justify the default lock behavior.
Yet another bug about this: after you engage the "Free Transform" tool on a text, for example, and you unclick the lock aspect ratio icon from toolbar menu, it doesn`t obey the command.

You're right, Iulian Art. It's all those things. It messes with the "Shift Constrains Proportions" thing that has been consistent across all graphics software forever. And, like you and others have pointed out, having the constrain proportions be default is not only inconsistent with what we have always known, but it also is inconsistent with the other Adobe apps and within the Photoshop itself in other areas.
Again, the good news is that with that text file, we can get things back to the way they used to be. For those who need this, check out earlier in this thread and you'll see how to set it up how you like it.

As Collin said above, "It should be a preference that you can toggle in settings; not a default behavior whether you like it or not.So you can set it according to your workflow preferences." So, although there is an extra step or two involved beyond just setting it in your preferences through the application itself, at least we can set that preference to our liking.

It's quite amazing how much something small like that can disrupt one's workflow, so it's important to have as must customization to one's work habits as is possible.

You're right, Iulian Art. It's all those things. It messes with the "Shift Constrains Proportions" thing that has been consistent across all graphics software forever. And, like you and others have pointed out, having the constrain proportions be default is not only inconsistent with what we have always known, but it also is inconsistent with the other Adobe apps and within the Photoshop itself in other areas.
Again, the good news is that with that text file, we can get things back to the way they used to be. For those who need this, check out earlier in this thread and you'll see how to set it up how you like it.

As Collin said above, "It should be a preference that you can toggle in settings; not a default behavior whether you like it or not.So you can set it according to your workflow preferences." So, although there is an extra step or two involved beyond just setting it in your preferences through the application itself, at least we can set that preference to our liking.

It's quite amazing how much something small like that can disrupt one's workflow, so it's important to have as must customization to one's work habits as is possible.

Perhaps they are going to do same behaviour throughout all applications in their new releases. But like you and some others I don't like it, the more you found it's inconsistent for vector layers and now also for text layer.

That's not everything I found more to our collection of bugs that shows it works old way in more cases than current one. When you add a path item and make 'Free Transorm Path', it's going to behave like in previous release.

So even if people get used for new way of 'Proportional Transform' it's still confusing, as you never can't remember when to use one and when second shift way to get the same result within the same application for the same behaviour, just on different objects!

The name as you pointed makes it even worse to understand. If that is 'Proportional Transform' why to keep the old name 'Free Transform'.

Nothing changed from last relese about one thing - they test on us, unconsisious beta users new stuff. That's really bad. They should test it on their own instead of making the bad name of company known for unprofessional aproach to users.

how can i come back to the "legacy" transform?
Not wvrione want "proportional transform as a default behavior"
it should just use the last used... not have a default 

It's unbelievable how this got past QA. Why would you change a default that has been in place 20+ years? This needs a toggle, at the very least a warning.
Disappointing that my money goes towards decisions like this.

Hi Tim and Anderson,
for us it's very useful, despite it's not perfect  executed for everybodies needs (I have read about the missing toggle option  and not consistent behaviour for EPS). When the transform just would remember and keeps the state, if "proportionally" is switched on or off, and the shift key temporarily toggles the current state, in my opinion it would be good.
But to ask, "why things were changed after 20+ years" really can't be the right question!
Any kind of improvement means changing things, maybe sometimes with trial & error, and if you wish everything like 20 years ago, I wish you good luck with Photoshop 2.0.
It would be probably smart, when Adobe invites different beta-testers. I wonder myself, how different people can see the realization of a "small improvement" ;-)
And Tim, the answer is already twice given above, with a simple script... please read before posting.

You can't come back to legacy transform other way than doing it by PSUserConfig.txt file you can read in earlier posts how to use it. What's bad you have then to relaunch Photoshop.

Hannah - Did you guys not test this? Try this -

1) Import a logo - percentages are not equal - you have to hit the lock button
2) Do something on another layer, then go back to adjust the logo - percentages are not equal - you have to hit the lock button again
...and so on. 

Having to hit that button over and over again was the major complaint, and issue that we want resolved.

Reversing the dragging functionality is illogical. You could have made corners the proportional drag and the sides and top non-proportional, which is another standard I’ve used, but reversing it is annoying to most of your users.

So back to the drawing board, I think this is even worse than it was to begin with.

Edit - right after I did the above test the Photoshop tools would not allow me to do anything, so I had to relaunch  - now it *seems* to be holding the proportion selection.

IAH1 you're completely missing the point. Of course I can mess around with a config file.
It doesn't change the fact that the majority of users are negatively affected by this change. They should have added a toggle. They should have done a better job at notifying people. It's that simple. Not sure what you're failing to understand here. Please read before posting.

Why should scaling vector graphics be different than raster elements? And why didn't you just implement the toggle as we requested? This is really not what we asked for, but at least a step in the right direction.

I don't really agree with the many who think that shift needs to be held down to maintain aspect ratio just because that's what we've always done. I have used PS since version 1 and I believe I can break that habit and feel good about freeing up the finger that holds down the shift key. But for those that feel strongly about it, the toggle would have been the answer for everyone! Was the toggle just too hard to code? What was the thinking on this?

But why leave vector objects out of the new behavior? I scale a lot of vector objects, so different behaviors for different objects will be a problem. I will thank you though for saving me from clicking on the "maintain aspect ratio" icon way less! I am also thankful that you included smart objects in the new behavior, that will save me a LOT of time!

I do agree with the suggestion of the corner dragging being proportional and the sides/tops being non-proportional. That somehow seems logical to me. People would figure that out in short order without any instruction. That would solve the toggle and make most people happy I believe.

Thanks for finally addressing this issue! It's very, very close to solved, and half solved is much better than not solved at all!

I personally preferred the traditional way of holding shift to lock proportions across the board, it was consistent and what we've been doing since the very beginning. I'm pretty confident in saying that many of us professionals feel this way. It's also a universal standard across many programs from many different developers, why change this?

However I'm here to point out that this behavior is currently very inconsistent. Smart Objects also still transforms traditionally along with the vector objects you mentioned, requiring the shift to lock proportions. Make it one way or another, this is just messy and confused right now.

It might be trivial to hobbyist but workflow efficiency and consistency is everything for us professionals. This change has amateur written all over it, on both the implementation and the reason behind it.

I'm one of the people who requested this, but the implementation is shoddy and hard to fathom.  I had assumed that Adobe would implement it either with a toggle to set your preference or with a "last used" manner, similar to masks where, if you set the rectangular marquee as additive it stays that way unless you change it.

And I agree... it needs to be consistent behaviour across all aspects of the program.  If don't need to hold shift to lock proportions, then I should NEVER require shift to lock proportions.  What Adobe has provided seems like something they just stuck in at the last minute.

I should say that the reason I asked for this change is because 99% of the time I want the proportions locked and losing the need to press the shift key, while minor, would make my process faster and require less thought.  Now it requires more thought as I have to remember that for this object I don't need to hold down the shift, but for this other one I do.  Even though I asked for this change I will be patching the config file to ensure the program has consistency throughout.

Let's try this one again, Adobe.  This update doesn't satisfy anyone.

Nobody wanted this. Give us the ability to toggle. Problem solved.

Nobody wanted this. Give us the ability to toggle. Problem solved.

That's what Rocky suggested in the first place when they made the request...

"...it would be nice when "free transforming" a layer that the "maintain aspect ratio" lock button would maintain the previous setting..."

Turn it on, PS it remembers, turn it off, PS remembers. Easy. What's not to like?

But as usual Adobe, waits ages to do anything - 7 years!? - and then implements the worst of the numerous possible ways of delivering a feature that everyone could use as per their personal preferences.

Loll - now we're going to wait next 7 years they restore original behaviour - since that seems to be better than anything one wished to have (by just a little tweak)! Perhaps that was better to ask in this case of too many, to get (un)predictably less :D

Please please give the user the ability to turn this on or off in preferences. The change to default on is totally against what I want. The standard in graphics used to be shift for contain otherwise it is free from constraint. Please follow well established conventions. The way it has been reset is counter intuitive for experienced professionals.

Argggh! It's the same mess with the Skew tool. I use skew and Transform A LOT. Please revert to standard constrain (SHIFT to constrain, Option to 'counter constrain' etc)

Me too!

I was Ok staying with Photoshop and paying the subscription but with changes like this I will be considering my options.

Now in  Transform holding option constrains the aspect ratio, Who the heck decided to change this convention?? It's nuts and against everything we've learned. PLEASE REVERT to SHIFT constrains. PLEASE!!!!!!

It's been a few months now that this feature is implemented but I can not get used to this new mode by default. My brain has been conditioned for years to use the shift key, this is so frustrating.
Plus, you still have to use shift to transform vector shapes proportionally and not for the rest, that is so inconsistant... Please offer a setting to revert back to previous behaviour.

Nicolas

With the 20.0.5 update, there is now a user facing preference under Preferences > General... and check "Use Legacy Free Transform"


https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/fixed-issues.html

Still using 20.0.4
It's time for an upgrade ... :-)
Thanks @Rosa

You're very welcome :)

Then you'd have the opposite problem.

Look. This isn't a problem. The problem is that the user is forgetful or too lazy to click the lock.

Look, this is a problem. The problem is not that the user is lazy or forgetful, but that the UI forces the user to repeatedly select the same action again and again. That's the problem, and simply put: that's poor UI design.

We're asking the UI accomodate a user preference, not force a predetermined setting. If you would never use it, it would not affect you and you probably don't get why it would be useful. But if you have been feeling the pain, like myself and others who have commented on this thread, then having a preference setting (whether global or sticky) would be a huge relief.

Use the shift+alt key!

Read the past thread as to why this won't work!

Dear Mister Smarty Pants, first of all, shift+alt key doesn't even work. Whenever you try to do a free transform, the percentage at the top is never equal to each other even using shift+alt. It's always off by either a 1% and sometimes that's can distort logos and icons that are very small. The only way to resolve that problem is by clicking the chain.

I ask you to try this yourself and if by miracle you can get the H & W the same exact percentage without hitting the chain, I will come to your house and lick your fingers for magical essence. Because there's zero way you are helping this forum by commenting silly known solutions, than understanding the problem.

Sorry Len Goforth, please get better out of this thread, if you are not interested. It's just making angry to listen to your unconsideted comments. If you haven't the experience right now to understand what's going on in many peoples practice, you will not get it here by long explanations. I'm deep in photoshop since 1994 and there's nothing new you could tell me... shift Key... LOL...

p.s. The transform has also a bug since 20 years(!): If you come too close to the borders of the canvas the transforming frame starts rapidly increasing itself and destroys your adjustment process... I think everybody knows this issue, but seems not to be worth to fix it for adobe...

The OP referred to a »Numeric Free Transform«, what good is the shift-key there?

If you are dragging, then you can use the shift key to maintain the aspect ratio. The button is mostly needed when entering the transform sizes numerically.

And many transformation do not preserve the aspect ratio of the original object.

Since you have a CS background, you know the difference between implementation semantics and usability. That is, you can build something a number of difference ways, all of which provide the same functionality. But, some implementations are inherently more user-friendly than others.

By the same token, highlighting additional steps to access a feature is an argument based on pure semantic equivalence and ignores usability. The request in this thread is to eliminate these additional steps. Adding a global preference would significantly improve usability, especially for those of us that are asking for it.

Also, given that the cost of implementation should be minimal, there's really no good argument against this.

I was responding to specific points by Suzanne.

You may also notice that at no point did I say "no", or "that's not a good idea", or any other phrase that might in any way indicate that I don't agree with the request. I simply responded to a few issues in Suzanne's post.

Also, you really don't know my background. So setting up a straw man argument based on bad assumptions of my background really doesn't help.

(also, your prior assumptions on the complexity of code needed to implement this - are pretty far off)

It would be far more helpful to describe why you need such a feature, and how it would save time/effort. That would make it much easier for me to justify to the product managers while I'm trying to figure out how to implement it with appropriate UI and without a lot of hassle.

Dear Chris,

I'm not trying to be belligerent, but I think the reasons for why we are asking for this feature are adequately documented in this thread already. Just look at Suzanne's post, the essence of which is repeated throughout the thread. While it is true that you did not deliberately call it a bad idea, your response of using the shift-modifier has been offered a few times in the thread already. It gets a little frustrating when the nature of the request keeps getting ignored.

Since you ask for detail, I will offer you how it affects me... I use Photoshop a lot for layout tasks, and that frequently involves placing all sorts of elements (pictures, text, etc) and resizing them. 100% of the time, "resizing" means "maintain aspect ratio." My pictures are product images, which I've photographed. But the photographs typically have one item and usually are done at different times (as new product is released), so the camera setup is always different. That means I have to size-correct my images as part of doing layout, so all the items in one series that are 10" tall are actually the same final size. Similarly, other items on the page that are smaller/larger need to be proportionally adjusted. The free-transform drag to resize just doesn't work for me--I need the precision of pixels. And, yes, it is a pain to always have to check the same "maintain aspect ratio" box every time I select one of the 30-40 images on my page (multiply this by 30+ pages in my case). I can only imagine that the other commentators in this thread also find themselves constantly going back to check this box, hence their frustration.

My request is for a global preference, but you say that this is significant work. You're right that I don't know the Photoshop code base. Another poster suggested just keeping this box checked once selected, similar to how one can change the scaling from "%" to "px" and this is retained between selecting other layers. Both of these suggestions would solve the problem, which is that I have to check this same box repeatedly and often. If you can find another solution, that would be great, but let's leave shift-drag aside as it just won't do.

Feel free to contact me directly if you have any questions.

Thx.

-ml

Suzanne's post is similar to others here that are lacking in the needed details. I responded to start a conversation in order to get details.

Thank you for providing more details about your work. Yes, a photo layout workflow would involve more aspect ratio preservation than, say, a web or phone design workflow (which is more about arbitrary sized rectangles and rounded rectangles). And if you don't have preset grids/guides to follow, you would need to use numeric entry to scale the photos to all match in size.

Having the aspect ratio button sticky (like units and other items) might work - but I actually do have to take all the common workflows into consideration before making such a change. So the more we know about the workflows, the better.

Web design is arbitrary?

In my workflow, I use it all the time and the two main reasons are 1) to consistently resize things; 2) I often place a large image on a small canvas and use the numeric transform to resize (usually with the arrow keys and not numbers).

Agree with jod-z regarding web-design... I don't touch it as often, but essentially the same pain-points exist, especially when placing a large source image to a smaller canvas (typical when doing web stuff). Bottom line is that resizing almost always involves preserving the aspect ratio. The only time I do not need it is when I try to adapt backgrounds between different size media, like developing a web-banner using the background graphics from our catalog. That's really the 1% of the time I need to stretch and distort. The other 99% of the time, I always need to preserve aspect ratio.

Also, on my layout workflow, ascribing the fundamental issue to a lack of guides misses the point. Firstly, I use plenty of guides as-is. Secondly, (a) my product sizes vary between items; (b) overall sizes vary between pages; (c) grid-style layout is boring; therefore, creating a guide grid is usually not practical. Thirdly, even if I use guides, I still have to either manually check the "preserve aspect ratio" box or use the shift-modifier. The ask is that I don't have to repeatedly do this with every object I select, guides or no guides.

Thx.

-ml

The reference point is a different issue, not directly related to this topic.

That's ok, most people don't include that sort of info we need to justify features to management. I think I understand the needs, but don't know for sure - so try to get some conversation going to get the info and make sure we do understand everyone's needs.

Hmm, yeah, packaging design with signature logos, photos, and product shots is something that really, really needs to preserve aspect ratio most of the time. Yep, makes perfect sense.

No, not MOST of the time but ALL of the time. When have you ever had a client ask you to distort their logo or product?!? This is the MOST frustrating issue with Photoshop and would make me the most happy if it changed. Please make it STICKY!