

When you need exact measurements, select the region and click to take a screenshot instead of dismissing the tool. However, it can be hard to position it exactly between the two points. There’s a little pixel counter next to the cursor while dragging. This method isn’t suited for counting the distance between two points on the screen in pixels. Graphic design tools probably has something like this built-in already, but it’s neat to be able to use the same method everywhere. This is a really neat feature when you need to quickly check if something is vertically and horizontally aligned in your web designs. First, you must enable the Use scroll gesture with modifier keys to zoom option in System Preferences: Accessibility: Zoom.Īfter enabling the option, you can zoom on your mouse cursor by holding the Control key pressed and scrolling (using the scroll wheel or a finger gesture.) The screenshot/selection tool and the zoom tool together allowing for some high-precision screen measurements. You can zoom in on a specific area of the screen if you need to take a closer look at something. The screenshot-measuring method also don’t have any of the issues the other apps have.
FREE RULER MAC APP FREE
Using the method I’ve described will work on any Mac out of the box and free of charge. These apps are priced at 22 euros on average in the Mac App Store. These don’t work in OS X’s full-screen mode, many cause problems with high-resolution Retina screens, and tend to be hard to use as they’ve too many features. There are a bunch of third-party dedicated screen ruler applications.
FREE RULER MAC APP DOWNLOAD
You can download the video in WebM or MPEG-4 format.

Your web browser can’t play the video directly. You can dismiss the screenshot/measuring tool without saving a potentially useless screenshot file on your desktop by pressing the Escape key. Release the mouse button to take a screenshot and save it to your desktop. You can see the pixel size of your selection and use it to measure things on the screen as long as you keep the mouse button pressed. You can select a region of the screen by pressing Command + Shift + 4 and then holding the left mouse button pressed while dragging the mouse cursor around on the screen. MacOS makes this very easy using nothing but the already built-in screenshot tool. I think I have an older copy of Amandine on my iMac I think I tried it before buying Affinity Designer (two, three years ago?), though I don't remember what the experience was like.Have you ever needed to measure distances in pixel on your Mac? Maybe you need to know how far apart to items are or how long something on the screen is. And it's irritating that the menus etc., are in a window within the app, but rather than in the actual menu bar, but I've managed to do what I need, if inelegantly. My last impression was that it looks like a good alternative to Illustrator for art needs, but not for tech drawing.Īs for Inkscape, I don't like having to use the Control key as a modifier key (again, it messes with muscle memory in being a Mac user since the '80s). In trying to duplicate some of the CAD-type tools or functions with Affinity Designer that I'd used in AI I often found that couldn't find a way to do so, so I went to the Affinity forums or emailed tech support and was told "yeah, you can't do that in Designer"-though at least, one of the tools I'd wanted, a Ruler, was finally added, but only when my need for it passed.Īctually, I haven't used AD for almost a year now, so maybe other tools have been added. I used to make patent applications drawings with AI ('cause I already owned it) and it did tech drawings pretty well. I was an Illustrator user years ago and a lot of my habits are built around it.
