Hide Tool

Click the Hide Tool icon or press X to activate.

StarSpikes Pro 4 makes every effort to put effects on only the stars in your image, but sometimes very bright places in your image that are not stars may be identified as stars and given effects, and you don't want them there.

After activating the Hide Tool, which is one of the Tools to the left of the Preview Viewport, the cursor is changed to an "X crosshair". This can be used to hide spike and flare effects you don't want showing. (e.g., over the center of a galaxy, cluster, or a bright knot in a nebula).

Hiding One Set of Effects

A single click on the very center of a set of spike/flare effects will hide the closest set of effects only.

Hiding Multiple Effects

If you click and drag you can select an entire area in which all effects will be hidden.

Note that until a Highlight Analysis has been performed, the Hide Tool will only affect highlights that have had effects added manually (if any).

Modifier Keys

• Holding down the Alt key while this tool is active reverses its function, changing it into an undo. Clicking on stars for which effects were previously hidden causes them to returned to their prior state. This is handy for bringing back any effects that you have inadvertently hidden. This works with both click and click/drag.
• Holding down the Control key will change the cursor to a magnifying glass with a "plus" symbol inside, allowing you to zoom in.
• Holding down the Control and Alt keys together will change the cursor to a magnifying glass with a "minus" symbol inside, allowing you to zoom out.
• Holding down the Space Bar changes the cursor to a "hand", allowing you to pan around the image by clicking and dragging.