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JDW

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Everything posted by JDW

  1. JDW
    It's unfortunate we don't know the proper way to persuade Serif to "see the light" as we see it. Donation of a kidney? Buy someone an energy drink? Setup a scholarship in the name of their CEO? Promise that we in America will try not to re-elect Trump for a second term? Seriously, there simply MUST be some way to get development directed in the proper way. I think development is still happening. But it's clear they are working on things they feel are important, as opposed to work on things we who have years of experience with Adobe KNOW are important. It's very disconcerting.
  2. JDW
    I use the font on my late 2015 5K iMac running MacOS Sierra. I've used that font on Macs through many versions of OS X without problem. The font should work fine on any Mac. Keep in mind that it is a Japanese font though.
  3. JDW
    Could you please confirm you received my document and font and were able to reproduce the bug? Thanks.
  4. JDW
    We must ponder this logically in light of what people do normally. If linking to external files was completely unnecessary, why would Adobe support it in Illustrator? And why do so many people who use Illustrator to generate files use it to link rather than embed. So I hope Serif does not underestimate the need for this. It's critically important, which means we really need the feature sooner rather than later. It's just as important as CMYK.
  5. JDW
    The NEXT version, we hope! :)
  6. JDW
    Because I wanted to send you the font too, I put the Illustrator file and the font file in a ZIP and sent that to you via PM (Conversation). And yes, I would love to see the "replace missing fonts" feature added to your Feature Requests page! Thanks.
  7. JDW
    Within Affinity Designer 1.5.4, I opened an Illustrator CC (.ai) file that was saved with PDF content. Within the "PDF Options" dialog, at the bottom it said I had a missing font (a Japanese font). I clicked on the Replacement Family popup but could not find the font so I just clicked the Open button. The document opened with all text that used that "missing" font converted to a generic font. I then choose the Text tool and selected some of that text, and I then clicked on the Font popup in the upper left. Low and behold, there was my "missing" font within that popup. Selecting the font made the selected text look normal again, albeit with messed up kerning. So wouldn't you say this be a bug? For truly, if the font is really there (and since I proved that after opening the file), the very fact Affinity Designer said the font was missing seems like a bug to me. I now have a related question. In Illustrator whenever this sort of thing happens, after I open a document I can then easily click on the Type menu and choose "Find font..." That opens the Font Font dialog which gives me an at-a-glance overview of all the fonts in the document, showing me which is missing (if any). I can then quickly and easily choose a font to substitute from the bottom half of that dialog, and with a mere click of the "Change All" button, I can substitute my replacement font throughout the document. How does one accomplish that using Affinity Designer? Surely there must be an easy way to tell Affinity Design how to substitute fonts throughout a document? Thank you.
  8. JDW
    Ditto my July 2015 feature request for Linked Files. It's now January 2017. There's been ample time to implement this important feature. Please add it ASAP. Thanks.
  9. JDW
    MRP, don't hold your breath. Even my amazingly persuasive "PRETTY PLEASE" trick hasn't budged Serif on this important feature. The implementation delay on this is terribly unfortunate.
  10. JDW
    Some great updates have come out for the Affinity apps but mysteriously the excellent suggestions in this thread go unheeded. So please allow me to try a new technique on Serif that's sure to get our request in the NEXT update... PRETTY PLEASE? :wub:
  11. JDW
    Mark, thank you. Serif engineers, let us reason together. Should Affinity app lovers be forced to fiddle for one hour to create just the right curve to anti-alias text? Or should there not rather be a simple pull-down menu command that takes all of one second? Logic dictates the right answer to that question. Please address this important issue in the next update. Thank you.
  12. JDW
    Andy, thank you for going against your better judgment. You're truly a better man for it! (Doing my best celebration dance. Yippee!) Sincerely, James
  13. JDW
    I'm glad we agree, and thank you for the screenshot. There's much power in using OS X's Terminal too to accomplish various tasks in OS X, but arguably, it is a less intuitive and sometimes a slower approach that using the GUI. In like manner, fiddling with curves in AP only to eliminate text anti-aliasing is ridiculous. Serif, please add a text anti-aliasing pop up to AP at the earliest possible time. Thanks.
  14. JDW
    Thank you, but I'll stick with Photoshop until this is improved in AP. (I say this as someone who bought Affinity Photo and Designer, mind you.) This thread is all the proof Serif needs on why adding a Photoshop style text anti-aliasing pop up to Affinity Photo is a MUST. The existing functionality is fiddly and slow and you have to be trained to use it. No... Just NO. Serif, please just add a text anti-aliasing pop up quickly, and then let's move on to even more important improvements. Thanks.
  15. JDW
    I cannot accomplish that via the "Coverage Map" curve. The upper right handle only moves VERTICALLY. Ditto for the lower left handle. It is therefore impossible to get a vertical line in the center of the "Coverage Map" curve that I can see. And a Horizontal line only makes the text partly gray and partly black -- a mess. Our back-and-forth is also laughable for one big reason -- it emphasizes why we really need an easier method in Affinity Photo, something akin to what Photoshop has. More power is great unless it's impossible to figure out or time consuming to implement.
  16. JDW
    Not true, unfortunately, Matt. When you have time, please view the 2 screenshots in my previous post. That clarifies exactly what I was saying. To test it yourself, using the same font I mentioned, download the font here: http://www.dafont.com/bitdust-one.font
  17. JDW
    The answer lies earlier in this thread. But here it is more plainly, using steps: 1. New document, say 800x600 for Web. 2. Type sample text using "BitDust One" or similar bitmapped font that looks best with no anti-aliasing. Make it 60pt, for a test. 3. With your text selected, click the "Layers" tab at right. 4. Click the "cog" icon (inside the Layers tab). 5. Click "Coverage Map" in the upper right. 6. Drag the middle square tab all the way to the upper left. But this is still not the same as Photoshop for 2 reasons: A. Photoshop's text anti-aliasing settings are more readily accessible (faster to use) B. Photoshop's "None" anti-aliasing setting makes text look its best. If you have Photoshop and duplicate Steps 1-6 above (the equivalent of them), you will understand what I mean in point {B} above. More specifically, in Affinity Photo (AP), dragging the Coverage Map curve to the upper left makes the text a tad more bold than what it is in its optimized state. But more worrisome than that is that the dots (squares in the bitmap) don't line up perfectly in AP. They do in Photoshop. What I mean is, say you have 2 squares. You want to make them align with each other at 45°. So you put the top-right corner of the lower square up against the bottom-left corner of your upper square. That is perfect alignment. That is how your fonts look in Photoshop with no anti-aliasing. But in AP, you cannot achieve that via the "Coverage Map" curve. The bits (squares) are not in perfect alignment. You can make the text look bolder, but again, the alignment is not perfect. AP ScreenShot: http://cl.ly/0f2Q1n2u3h3G/Image%202016-03-11%20at%209.09.32%20AM.png PS ScreenShot: http://cl.ly/2x0l3w0o1r33/Image%202016-03-11%20at%209.12.13%20AM.png Also note how AP screws up the inside of the "O" in "ONE" in my screenshot. Bug? Or hopeless limitation of the Coverage Map feature? I don't know. Moreover, if you pull AP's "Coverage Map" curve to the bottom-right corner, the font will have a thinner look. But the caveat is that there will be GAPS between the corners of your bits (squares). That may not be desirable. I like the power that AP offers, but I also want the SAME TEXT ANTI-ALIASING SETTINGS as Photoshop. Once we have BOTH, then we will truly be all powerful! :-) Until then, I must continue to use Photoshop.
  18. JDW
    That would be all most of us need! :-) But no, I've not seen a comprehensive comparison on a single chart. I myself have just been trudging through the Affinity apps trying to compare what is what. Thankfully, some keyboard shortcuts are the same, but not all. Although I bought Designer and Photo, neither app is still an Illustrator and Photoshop replacement yet. I am hopeful that day will come and come soon though. And toward that end I am searching the apps to see what can be improved. We should all remember that Photoshop and Illustrator have been around FOR DECADES and are very refined apps. That makes the Affinity apps all the more surprising because they are really good after only 5 years of engineering. Perhaps in another year or two, if we all submit well thought out feature requests, we can retire Adobe for good in 2016 or 2017. Fingers crossed.
  19. JDW
    Fair enough about your reasons given not to rename it, but the fact remains that one of the two existing settings yields greater sharpness than the other. And the fact remains that in Photoshop, one similar setting is named "Sharper" because, well, it is. And that was and is the basis for what I wrote. If one setting is going to yield greater sharpness than another setting, then mentioning it (which is what Photoshop does), might be worthwhile. That is all I was saying.
  20. JDW
    Are you a designer or programmer? If the latter, you're in the wrong place. You are here among VISUAL DESIGNERS. That means we go with what we see, not with what theory or scientific data says to us. If something looks sharper to my graphically trained eye (with Photoshop and Illustrator experience that spans the entire life of those products), then IT IS SHARP. PERIOD.
  21. JDW
    Recent versions of Photoshop have such an "Automatic" setting. But an auto setting may be more difficult on Affinity Photo because AP has two types of Lanczos: Lanczos 3 (sharp) — roughly the same as Photoshop's Bicubic Sharper Lanczos 3 (sharper) — this setting is really sharp So if Serif did implement an AUTO setting, I would assume it should choose Lanczos 3 (sharp) rather than Lanczos 3 (sharper), or maybe such could be a preference setting?
  22. JDW
    I had used the Betas prior to my purchase, so I knew full well what I was getting into before I bought the Affinity apps. Canceling your Adobe subscription before you confirm you have all the replacement features in place is not a good idea. But it is easy to restart a subscription. All said, don't give up on Serif just because the lack a feature here and there. Go through the software with a fine toothed comb, report bugs and submit feature requests. Realistically, it may take another year before I myself see Affinity apps as true replacements for Adobe apps, but I know that day is approaching and I want to help them achieve that if I can. Hang in there!
  23. JDW
    Bug Report or Feature Request... Hmmm... Maybe someone from Serif will reply here to help me decide which is best. For now, I'd like to mention that I am experienced with Photoshop (PS) and now transitioning to Affinity Photo (AP). As you know, PS has a BACKGROUND layer that is created and locked by default. You really can't make an equivalent BACKGROUND layer in AP from what I can see. Meaning, if I have multiple layers and a BACKGROUND layer in PS, if I select the topmost layer in the stack and Send to Back, it will fall to the bottom of the layer stack BUT ABOVE the background layer. Not so in AP. So creating a true background pixel layer by default in AP seems logical to me, but perhaps that is because I am used to it in PS. Since AP does not do that, can someone from Serif explain the logic as to why not?
  24. JDW
    Do this: 1. Launch AP. 2. New document. 3. Choose the Paint Brush and a color. 4. >> Note it says: "The assistant has added a new raster layer" 5. Close without saving. 6. New document. 7. Choose the Flood Fill tool (paint bucket) and a color. 8. Click on the page. 9. >> NOTHING HAPPENS. It does not make logical sense to me why the Assistant would assist me in auto creating a pixel layer for the Paint Brush tool but refuse to create a pixel layer when I click the Flood Fill tool on the canvas. Can someone explain the logic to me? If there is no sound logic behind it, I am inclined to submit a new feature request. (Keep in mind I am comparing my experience to Photoshop, where I don't need an assistant to create a paintable layer because a paintable layer appears automatically in Photoshop.) Thanks.
  25. JDW
    Mike, you keep talking about "ratio" but I don't following why you are pounding on "ratio" so hard. I also disagree with your contention that "ratio of dimensions" can be different from "output size" when it comes to setting "Size" in that File > Export sheet. Or at least, you must be defining your terms differently than I am. So I will make my thinking more clear... Do this: 1. Launch Affinity Photo. 2. New document of Web > W:800 H:600 3. Paint the entire page purple so you can see it. 4. File > Export > PNG 5. Note that it says "Size: 800px LCK 600px" (It does NOT say "Ratio") 6. Click Export. 7. View your exported pic in Preview. Note the dimensions (OUTPUT SIZE) are 800x600. You can argue that File>Export>Size is also a RATIO, and it is, but it is the PIXEL DIMENSIONS of what you will export too. And that is what I have been talking about. In other words, it is INDEED the "output size" insofar as pixel dimensions are the output size (which is different from filesize). You say it is NOT the output size. But it IS the output size. Why? Because OUTPUT SIZE is the pixel dimensions of what you are Exporting. Again, if I click EXPORT with my 800x600 example, not having touched that lock, it will export an OUTPUT SIZE of 800x600 pixels. And although 800x600 is a 4:3 ratio, why are we talking in ratios? What is the point being made when speaking of "ratios"? How can one separate the RATIO of 4:3 from 800x600? You can't. You can export 200x600 if you like, but that would mean the ratio changes to 1:3. "Ratio" is inseparably locked to the OUTPUT SIZE (pixel dimensions) you export. I therefore do not see how your extensive talk on RATIO has any bearing on the primary point I was trying to make in my previous posts. To reiterate, if you export at an OUTPUT SIZE that matches your INPUT SIZE (or whatever you want to call "the size you defined when the document was opened"), no resampling occurs when you EXPORT. All I have been saying is that if RESAMPLE were contextual (i.e., the RESAMPLE setting itself becoming visible or non-grayed only when it is needed), it might make more logical sense to some users. That's my point in a nutshell. Why would it make more sense? Because if you don't click the LOCK (to unlock it and define new dimensions), whatever choice you have defined in that RESAMPLE popup is ignored because no resampling will take place. That's the entire point. To leave RESAMPLE perpetually in view when it is not needed means people who don't understand it may be choosing options that will have zero impact on the final output. Maybe that is hard to code in Affinity Photo or maybe some others would argue it should NOT contextually appear and disappear, and if some people feel that way I'd love to hear their thinking on what the status quo is better than changing it. But "contextual display of RESAMPLE" is all I have been saying in my 3 posts in this thread.
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