How to hide a bracket on either side of a horizontal break?
Using a horizontal break I was able to create this:
But how do I hide the LHS bracket (before the break)?
And how do I adjust the RHS bracket to lengthen it sufficiently to fully enclose the bottom staff (you can see it overlaps slightly)? I tried adding an extra measure before the break and added the staff change elements to restore the staff size to "full" there but it didn't help. I'm tempted to say it's just a bug?
Actually I did notice quite a few times that it didn't render correctly after removing measures etc. - saving and reloading the score would fix it though.
Comments
Did you study this?
https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/brackets
In reply to Did you study this? https:/… by Mr Fox
Can't see anything in there that explains how to solve my issues. Deleting gets rid of both brackets, and it won't let me extend the bottom of the bracket any further - unless there's some key you can hold down to override "snapping into position"?
Also looking at the mscx file it doesn't seem there's anyway you could specify that you wanted one bracket shown and another hidden, or to adjust the bottom coordinates.
Actually the problem's worse than that - it's wrong even when it's shown at the start of the next system too.
In reply to Can't see anything in there… by Dylan Nicholson1
Hah, finally managed to "fix" it, but boy that involved a lot of work arounds. And still can't hide the initial bracket.
![ranges.png]( "ranges.png")
Basically the staves themselves mustn't have the "small" flag set for the brackets to draw correctly, and if you put a staff change element at the beginning of the first measure and try to set that as "small" it has the same effect, so I had to add an invisible measure that's "full size", then place the staff change element on the 2nd measure in each staff.
Then to get the clef to show correctly I had to add a hidden rest before the notes indicating the ranges, and insert the clef after that rest in each staff.
In reply to Ok was able to "trick" it… by Dylan Nicholson1
Maybe more trouble than it's worth, but you might try what I did.
Create individual range measures and save each as an image. Open each in a photo editing software (Paint will do). Crop and adjust as needed. Save in a folder. In the score, delete the names of the staves ( soprano, alto, etc.) . Add two Horizontal frames (as per manual). In the second frame, add (as per manual) one of the images. Resize and drag where needed. In the first frame, add (in my case) Alto text (as per manual). Drag to needed position.
![range4-1.png]( "range4-1.png")
That's as far as I went. I don't know what happens to vocal names of staves on later pages.
In reply to Maybe more trouble than it's… by bobjp
A bitmap graphic is not going to look good when printed, and obviously if I later add notes/lyrics/etc. that increase the vertical spacing it will no longer line up - tbh using any sort of bitmap or even vector image would always be an absolute last resort.
In reply to A bitmap graphic is not… by Dylan Nicholson1
True. When I deleted the piano line above the alto just to test, the image and text no longer lined up. I just had to drag them back into place. Then I added 20 measures and several notes with no problem
When I printed the page on white paper, it looked as good as you see it above. Sure my image is not transparent and won't work on certain backgrounds.
I don't mess with this kind of stuff because I don't need it. You asked for a solution. Just for the fun of it, I did a little digging around in things I'd never used before. If nothing else, I learned something I may or may not use.
Your solution is less prone to problems with later changes. But it leaves you with an unwanted bracket.
My solution might require adjustment now and then. But it looks like what you want.
On further study, it can also be done within MuseScore without using a image editor. And the image is transparent.
Best I know is to cover the bracket with an opaque white graphic (easy enough to grab with the image capture tool). This came up a few months ago, and a feature request was submitted as a result of that discussion - see #320662: Request to be able to hide system brackets individually and the two forum threads listed at the top of that issue.
In reply to Best I know is to cover the… by Marc Sabatella
That's not a bad idea, but obviously still a clumsy sort of workaround. Would definitely think if it supports drawing multiple brackets horizontally you should be able to hide/show them individually.
In reply to That's not a bad idea, but… by Dylan Nicholson1
Agreed. It's a bit of a pain to manage properties for elements like brackets that are created on the fly during layout, which is why that capability is fairly limited where it exists at all, and tends to be buggy.
In reply to Agreed. It's a bit of a… by Marc Sabatella
Sure, to do it properly would really require that brackets become first class entities that can have a representation in the score, like barlines currently. I can't see any real reason that shouldn't be done though.
![brackets.png]( "brackets.png")
And scores like Grainger's The Warriors are littered with brackets between staves that occur not just mid-system but mid-measure! (on the first page, measure 3):
Interestingly they do have a different styling (no "tapering") to the ones at the start of the system though. But they're consistently used for the same purpose - to regroup staves that belong to one instrument/group of instruments. It's a very odd score though, I'd be curious if anyone's tried typesetting it in any modern notation software!
In reply to Sure, to do it properly… by Dylan Nicholson1
It's not just giving them first-class status, it's managing their properties when they no longer "exist". For example, take the default empty score and set the treble clef at the start of the second system invisible. Now delete the system break on measure 4. No more clef in bar 5, of course. But if you re-add the break, the clef comes back, invisible. That's because we keep this clef in the internal representation but mark it inactive (I think that's the term). However, now delete the break again and save / reload the score. Add the break, and the clef is visible again. That's because the inactive clef doesn't get written to the file.
There is a ton of special-casing in the code to deal with things like this, and some conscious choices to not bother in other cases and just let things get lost on save / reload. Brackets properties would just be another example of that. not saying it couldn't be done, just pointing out that there is more to it than meets the eye.