Show Detail With Magnifying Glass. William the Conqueror

You may want to read first Show Detail With Magnifying Glass: How-To

Here I used another, only slightly different method of putting an enlarged detail of a picture  inside a 'magnifying glass'.

Instead of masking the second image, use Image Fill option in the Graphic Inspector.


- First prepare the detail as a separate file. Make a screenshot: Command+Shift and type 4, then slide the crosshairs over  the detail. This will give you a light PNG file that is easy to upload. Alternatively, select the detail in Preview by dragging the cursor, copy and then choose File>New from clipboard.

- Next, in the Pages document, insert an Oval shape and in Graphics inspector choose Image Fill. Find the file with the detail in the dialogue window and click to open.

- Slide the oval over the magnifying glass and resize to fit 'inside' the glass.

A fine touch: did you notice how image gets blurred at the edges of the real magnifying glass? To achieve this effect choose Picture Frame in Graphics Inspector and select the one with blurred edge (see screenshot above right). Another way of doing this is to add a blurred edge effect to detail in iPhoto (picture below left) and then import the image in your Pages doc.

The picture is part of the Bayeux Tapestry, depicting the Norman conquest of England in 1066 AD and the detail shows William the Conqueror. The original Tapestry itself is now on display in Bayeux, a medieval town in Normandy, saved from destruction by the rapid advance of British and Canadian forces on D-Day in 1944. The tapestry at the time was stored in a vault in the Louvre. The nazis wanted to ship it to Germany as the Allies approached Paris, but by the time the snatch team arrived in the French capital the Louvre was already out of reach - the Resistance fighters controlled that part of the city. (Read more in 'D-Day: The Battle for Normandy' by Antony Beevor)

Tapestry image courtesy of the Normandy Tourist Board/CRT Normandie


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Show Detail With Magnifying Glass. How-to

Some readers just won't let me relax, do some photography in the garden or go for a run with my dogs. They write to ask for quick instructions... please, do write.

Here is the first method to show a detail of an image through 'magnifying glass'.

1. Drop the image into a Pages doc.

2. Import it again (or duplicate - Command+D). It should be on top of the first one.

3. Mask the second photo with oval. It's under the Format menu -  go to Mask with Shape.
- Now enlarge the photo. Click on it first, otherwise you will be changing the dimensions of the mask, not the photo.
- Make the detail inside the mask as big as you want it to be. If the photo goes over he edges of the document use Metrics Inspector to continue enlarging.
- Watch for pixellation - your image file should be large enough to allow considerable enlargement. Here I simply couldn't show the prophet's face, because it would have pixellated too much.

4. In the Graphic Inspector  choose colour and thickness for the edge of the mask (stroke) to make it look like the lupe.

5. Now, make the handle:
- Import a line (first choice under Shapes drop-down menu in the document  tool bar).
- In Graphic Inspector give it the same width and colour as the circle.
- Give it an endpoint, here it is a diamond.
- Extend it as you think proportionate to the 'glass', move around and rotate (to rotate: press and hold Command, then drag handles of the shape), so that the 'handle' links up with the 'glass.'

6. Finally, give both, the glass and the handle, a shadow. Offset the shadow enough to give the magnifying glass a 'floating above the image' effect.

Below I used the same method of masking and enlarging the second picture, but instead of making my own magnifying glass I used a public domain image from Wikimedia, removing the background with Instant Alfa (read here more on how to use this tool for striking design effects). The enlarged detail is then moved 'inside' the glass - in fact, you just slide it over.

Picture: 'The Sermon of Muhammed', around 1840s, by Prince Grigory Gagarin (1810-1893), from here.