# Views

One of the most important things you need to know when working with a painting or image editing application, is how to adapt the view of your image to your (changing) needs. This chapter describes the various possibilities &chalk; offers.

## Zooming

By zooming, you can view your images at various levels of detail. Zooming out will show a larger part of the image, but with less detail. &chalk; offers a couple of options that affect which part of the image is shown:

Zooming in

- Zooming in allows you to see more details, but you will only see a smaller part of the image. You can zoom in by choosing the View Zoom in menu item, by clicking the Zoom in button on the toolbar, or by pressing the &Ctrl;+ keys. You can zoom in up to 1600% (a 16:1 ratio) via a number of fixed zoom levels.

Zooming out

- Zooming out allows you to see a larger part of the image while losing some detail. Zooming out can be done by choosing the View Zoom out menu item, by clicking the Zoom out button on the toolbar, or by pressing the &Ctrl;- keys. You can zoom out up to 0.2% (a 1:500 ratio) via a number of fixed zoom levels.

Going back to 100%

- As viewing your image at its real size is quite handy at times, you can do so via the View Actual pixels menu item or by pressing &Ctrl;0.

Zooming in and out from the Overview tab

- The Overview tab of the control box (usually found at the right hand side of the &chalk; window) also allows you to change the zoom level by using the slider or the spinbox. Slightly different zoom levels are available here, so if zooming in or out as described above does not produce a view you want, you can try using this option. The 1:1 button offers another way of getting back to a 100% zoom.

Special zooms

- There are two more special ways of zooming. The View Fit to Page menu item zooms your image such that it is as large as possible while remaining entirely visible. The View Full Screen Mode menu item (pressing &Ctrl;&Shift;F will also activate this mode) enlarges the &chalk; window to fill your entire screen, removing the title bar as well. Although this is not a real way of zooming, it can help you by showing just that little bit more of your image.

## Working with views

Apart from changing the zoom level of your view, you can also open different views for the same image. This way, you can for example look at two different parts of your image that would not fit on your screen together otherwise.

New view windows

- You can open a new &chalk; window for your image by choosing View New View Both windows are independent from each other (so you can select different tools, view different parts of your image, &etc;), but changes you make to the image in one window are immediately visible in the other. To close a window, use the normal window closing button. There is also an option View Close All Views, which closes all newly created views and leaves only the original window open.

Splitting views

- You can also split a window into two views. Like a new window, one view of a split window has its own settings for brushes, zoom levels and the like, but both views are shown in the same window. To split your window, choose View Split View. The viewing area of the &chalk; window will then be divided into two halves. You can switch between horizontal and vertical division with the View Splitter Orientation menu, and get back to one view by choosing View Remove View.

## Miscellaneous view options

&chalk; also offers two options that can help you with knowing where you are.

Rulers

- You can have &chalk; show rulers along the sides of your image, indicating x and y coordinates. To do so, choose View Show Rulers or press &Ctrl;R. The rulers will automatically adapt to your zoom level to show a proper amount of subdivisions. To remove the rulers, choose the same menu option (now called Hide Rulers) or press &Ctrl;R again.

Grid

- In order to see grid lines, choose View Show Grid. You can set the distance between grid lines with View Grid Spacing and you can choose different colours for the lines in the Settings Configure &chalk;... dialog (see the Grid section of the Settings chapter).