Make pedal symbol bigger?
Hi,
We can change the sizes of symbols such as the Segno and Coda sign, which is excellent. However, is there a way to increase the size of the pedal marking? It seems rather small in relation to notes:
This is more what I've been used to:
(The difference would be clearer with music at normal size, but apparently the forum magnifies all the images we insert.)
Edwin is a gorgeous font, BTW—so this certainly isn't a complaint about it in general. 😊
Thanks!
Comments
See Format / Style / Text Styles / Pedal
In reply to See Format / Style / Text… by Marc Sabatella
Dang, Marc, it is in there, isn't it? I looked twice but didn't see it. Thanks!
I've bumped it up a point—which may seem trivial, but to me it seems more proportionate with the rest of the music:
For what it's worth, I'm sure I would've spotted "Pedal" in Text Styles if that l-o-n-g list of items had been alphabetized.
I know we've discussed this—and I yes, there's more than one valid way to look at it (e.g. grouping items by perceived similarity). I submit, though, that at least some of us are usually very clear on what we're looking for—and an alphabetization option would be fabulously quicker for us.
I'm sure that for long-time MS users, the non-alphabetized lists seem natural. But to those just starting with it, they can seem, well, chaotic, or at best, overlooked. (For what it's worth, I've never used any app, of any kind, that took such an approach.) Asking everyone to pick through long lists, searching for one item, every time they look for any item in them, could be considered counterproductive from a usability viewpoint.
Thus it'd be great if there were an option to sort the lists. Just an option, for those of us who were dead certain we'd work better that way.
Anyway, sorry for the topic drift. I don't know if there's any point in starting a new thread about it (I'm guessing: no). Just thought I'd touch on it, though, as this is another case where I wouldn't have had to ask about something if I'd been able to go right to it. Cheers!
In reply to See Format / Style / Text… by Marc Sabatella
😊
In reply to See Format / Style / Text… by Marc Sabatella
Aha! I figured out what happened. In the Styles window, I looked at the list that was already visible, and clicked "Pedal":
...and saw no options to change the symbol's point size—so I assumed it was determined by the staff size.
The pedal lines appear on the Lines and Keyboard palettes, not the Text palette. So why would one look for settings related to them in "Text Styles"?
Perhaps it'd be more intuitive to put all of such non-"text" objects' settings in one place, as in this mock-up:
In GUI design, "less is more"—so to further simplify, I've omitted:
• The "Font" setting (it actually uses Leland, right?, so I'm guessing it's irrelevant); and
• All those "Frame" options, as it seems very unlikely anyone will ever want to put a frame around a pedal line (though I'm willing to be wrong)
In reply to Aha! I figured out what… by Andy Fielding
There's been back and forth on this, and of course, there are some advantages in putting text controls on each individual type of element that happens to involve text. but, since the controls are identical for all text types, and because often when changing text styles you want to change lots of them at once (eg, to replace one font with another score-wide), there are also advantages to keeping all text-related settings together.
In reply to There's been back and forth… by Marc Sabatella
Don't get me wrong, Marc. I deeply appreciate your help here (especially considering we're not paying for support!). But I can't help noticing a certain defensiveness in many of the responses here—as though, rather than suggesting ways MS could work better for more people (again, at least optionally), we're expected to adapt how we work to how the software happened to be designed, because such decisions have been made for us.
With all due respect, that's contrary to the usual tech-support approach. It's fine to be sure someone with an "issue" is aware of the various ways something can be done. But once that's clear—and we still wish it could be done another way, based on our knowledge of how we work—you might consider looking into how that could be reasonably accommodated.
Coincidentally, that's also the idea behind democracy. It can be a fulfilling feeling, once you get past the initial annoyance. 😉
I also know for a fact that I'm hardly the first person to request alphabetized lists. A ten-item File or Edit menu is one thing; Style lists so long you must scroll through them is another. (The Preferences > Shortcuts list is alphabetized, isn't it—even though "Add B note to chord" is similar enough to "Enter B note" to justify grouping them, by your other standard?)
Anyway, the support approach you take here is clearly up to you. I can only make suggestions, based on my experience as a tech writer, GUI designer, usability consultant, and trainer (as well as musician—just can't keep a job, eh?). Cheers!
In reply to Don't get me wrong, Marc. I… by Andy Fielding
To be clear, my only goal here is to help. You have a problem you want to solve, I’m here to help you solve it. When there are suggestions for improvement, I also like to help people understand aspects of the problem they might not have thought of. This isn’t defensiveness, it’s simply providing the best assistance I can - help solving problems, and help understanding them.
So as I said, there are ways of solving the problem, and also, there are reasons the design is as it is. That’s not to say improvements aren’t possible. But I’m just doing my best to help.
And FWIW, the shortcuts list is in the process of being redesigned as well to make it more logical :-)