Getting Started...
When Ristretto Image Viewer is first started, it shows an empty window with two toolbars.
Image-files can be opened using the Open button on the top toolbar, or the File menu.
Viewing an image
When an image is opened in ristretto, it might look like the image below. Notice how a thumbnail-bar appears showing the other images in the same folder as the one just opened.
Zooming
Showing an image like this is nice, but sometimes you want to zoom in on a detail, get a closer look. To do this Ristretto provides the ability to zoom in on a section of the image. There are several ways to do zoom in on an image,
The first way to zoom is via the zoom buttons on the side toolbar. It is possible to zoom in, out, to 100% or to make the image fit the screen. These buttons can also be reached from the View ▸ Zooming menu.
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A second way is using the scroll-wheel on the mouse, Moving the mouse-wheel forward zooms in on the image, moving the mouse-wheel backward will zoom out.
The zoom-direction of the mouse-wheel can be adjusted, see Preferences for more details.
The third, and last way to zoom on an image is using so-called BOX-ZOOM, or selection-zoom. Press Control+Click, and drag the mouse-cursor. This way a box appears, when the mouse-button is released, Ristretto will zoom in on the selected portion of the image.
Rotating
Sometimes, it is necessary to rotate an image because it is not positioned in the right orientation. To solve this, you can use the Rotate buttons on the toolbar.
Some digital cameras store the image-orientation inside the EXIF data. If this information is present, Ristretto reads this information and automatically rotates the image.
Ristretto does not provide a way to save the altered orientation back into the file. If you want to modify the image-data, this needs to be done with an image-editor, like The GIMP.
Switching between images
When an image is opened in Ristretto, it shows a list of images in the Thumbnailbar, these are the other images located inside the same folder as the currently opened image. The arrow-buttons on the navigation toolbar allow for easy switching between different images.
Also, using the scroll-wheel on the opened image, or on the Thumbnailbar will switch to the next or previous image. Allowing for fast and easy navigation between images.
Slideshow
To run a slideshow of all the opened images, all you need to do is press the Play button. This can be found on the Toolbar and the View menu.
The duration of the timeout before the next image is shown can be configured inside the Preferences dialog, by default it is set to 5 seconds.