JasperD

As brilliant features tend to extend, I am increasingly worrying about some ordering of menu list items. Right now, they are just added to the end of the list when imported. For instance, the items shown in attached screen prints could benefit from some sorting (at least for me). Something automagically alphabetic would already work better for me, but ideally, I´d just like to drag them where I´d like them to be, so a manual way of doing it would serve me quite well.
 
As an example, if you look at the long list for the pixel brushes for instance, I´d love to be able to drag all DAUB brushes to where I´d like them to be, all together close to the top but below the default ones coming with the product. Not only cosmetic AFAIC, it´s also that I just use some more than others.
 
Thank you for reading! 
 
 

As brilliant features tend to extend, I am increasingly worrying about some ordering of menu list items. Right now, they are just added to the end of the list when imported. For instance, the items shown in attached screen prints could benefit from some sorting (at least for me). Something automagically alphabetic would already work better for me, but ideally, I´d just like to drag them where I´d like them to be, so a manual way of doing it would serve me quite well.
 
As an example, if you look at the long list for the pixel brushes for instance, I´d love to be able to drag all DAUB brushes to where I´d like them to be, all together close to the top but below the default ones coming with the product. Not only cosmetic AFAIC, it´s also that I just use some more than others.
 
Thank you for reading! 
 
 

As brilliant features tend to extend, I am increasingly worrying about some ordering of menu list items. Right now, they are just added to the end of the list when imported. For instance, the items shown in attached screen prints could benefit from some sorting (at least for me). Something automagically alphabetic would already work better for me, but ideally, I´d just like to drag them where I´d like them to be, so a manual way of doing it would serve me quite well.
 
As an example, if you look at the long list for the pixel brushes for instance, I´d love to be able to drag all DAUB brushes to where I´d like them to be, all together close to the top but below the default ones coming with the product. Not only cosmetic AFAIC, it´s also that I just use some more than others.
 
Thank you for reading! 
 
 

As brilliant features tend to extend, I am increasingly worrying about some ordering of menu list items. Right now, they are just added to the end of the list when imported. For instance, the items shown in attached screen prints could benefit from some sorting (at least for me). Something automagically alphabetic would already work better for me, but ideally, I´d just like to drag them where I´d like them to be, so a manual way of doing it would serve me quite well.
 
As an example, if you look at the long list for the pixel brushes for instance, I´d love to be able to drag all DAUB brushes to where I´d like them to be, all together close to the top but below the default ones coming with the product. Not only cosmetic AFAIC, it´s also that I just use some more than others.
 
Thank you for reading! 
 
 

Hi everyone,
 
We just thought it would be helpful to offer a thread that explained why things may seem quiet at present with respect to Beta releases and new features...
 
 
We have two active code branches at present, one is the bug fix branch from the App Store version (this is where the current 1.4 Betas are built from), the other is our development branch that contains all the new features. At present we have to make sure that our launched Beta versions fix the issues that customers may be encountering, without introducing any other side-effects. This is so that we can be in a position where we know the App Store version is dependable and that customers will be getting a good experience.
 
As soon as we have tested the 1.4.2 Beta thoroughly it will be uploaded to the App Store and will become the 1.4.2 App Store version. We do not expect this to be a lengthy process, but it will not be immediate as it requires a certain amount of testing before we can responsibly push it as an update.
 
Once this has happened we will be able to start building from our development branch and produce a 1.5 Beta for you. The development branch contains a large number of new features already, but we won't make them visible until they have reached the standard you would expect, so we're not going to comment on what those features will be until we know we can share them with you.
 
We hope that makes sense and clears up any queries, if you have any comments then please feel free to post them.
 
Thanks,
Matt

Well... (update...)
 

 
A set of 6 simple stupid tools to vent your obsessive-compulsive disorder  :lol:
These brushes offer a ramp shaped to jitter hues and luminosity of the colour you're painting with.
Download here
 
Happy mosaic!

Hi!
I want to share this short tutorial which explains the technique I use to get a convincing watercolour effect.
It is very short because the source file is included at the end of the post (about 129MB) so you're free to experiment.
 
Let me know if you have any question about it!
Please forgive my spelling and grammar mistakes...  :P

In fairness, Linux has been "the future" for years - but it still isn't converting many people.  Mainly because most flavours of it have always been so impenetrable for anyone that is not a tech geek.  I think we can be sure that OSX is going to be around a while yet - while it may be Unix under the hood, the user experience is so much better.

I don´t know the answer to your question Joachim; I would like to see confirmation from a developer that this is the way as intended though. With the AppStore release, I use Adobe´s recommended ProPhoto RGB for all though - mainly because I´m sticking to PS at the moment - maybe try that?
 
I don´t have any success with Apple´s RAW engine though... Probably needless to say, but just in case: everything from PS CS6, via LR 4.4, Aperture 3.6, not to mention a few other quite heavy ones, all work perfectly OK (and a lot faster) on my older iMac. Really everything, as far as I am aware of it. Just not AP.

Purpose: Features / Improvements / Fixes
Status: Beta
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Photo
Mac App Store: Not Submitted
Download: Here
 
To use this beta, simply download the file from the link given above and double-click on the file to open the installer. Follow the instructions to install the beta version. The beta sits alongside the Mac App Store version and will not interfere with it.
 
Features / Improvements / Fixes
 
- Panorama UI improvements (including crop tool).
- Fix for document view having visible borders at different zoom levels and pan locations
- Fix for marching ants disappearing when the canvas is rotated
- Fix for text blurring on some buttons in the UI for retina screens - Export persona’s Slice panel now sets the exportable state for all items in the selection, not just the current item - Move Tool’s marquee drag is no longer hidden when the ‘Hide selection while dragging’ option is set - Canvas rotation now makes the grid rotate properly - Many PDF export and import improvements - Fix snapping marker rendering in the Node Tool - The performance cat has lost his ‘Miaow’ in the Preferences dialog (and we all mourn its loss)

Purpose: Features / Improvements / Fixes 
Status: Beta
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Designer
Mac App Store: Not Submitted
Download: Here
 
To use this beta, simply download the file from the link given above and double-click on the file to open the installer. Follow the instructions to install the beta version. The beta sits alongside the Mac App Store version and will not interfere with it. Please note that if you use features which are only present in the Beta version then save your document, it will no longer open in the Mac App Store version.
 
Features / Improvements / Fixes
 
- Pixel selections now honour the current artboard when selecting all / inverting the selection - Deleting the last artboard will not cause you to have a document of zero dimensions - Fix for marching ants disappearing when the canvas is rotated - Fix for text blurring on some buttons in the UI for retina screens - Export persona’s Slice panel now sets the exportable state for all items in the selection, not just the current item - Fix for objects placed on the spread in an artboard document disappearing when moved again - Move Tool’s marquee drag is no longer hidden when the ‘Hide selection while dragging’ option is set - Fix for marquee selection within artboards not working - Artboard documents without transparency should draw empty artboards with an opaque background - Canvas rotation now makes the grid rotate properly - Many PDF export and import improvements - Fix for many crashes seen after loading documents with saved history where an artboard has been used - Fix for document view having visible borders at different zoom levels and pan locations - Fix snapping marker rendering in the Node Tool - The performance cat has lost his ‘Miaow’ in the Preferences dialog (and Matt mourns its loss) - Artboard labels can now be clicked to select the artboard easily. We’ll make this draggable for next time so you can drag the artboard from here too.

> A preference setting ... would make people of all sorts happy
 
Indeed. It's here!

https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/14968-affinity-photo-customer-beta-1358
 
Preferences -> Tools -> Enable Canvas Rotation With Trackpad -> uncheck
 
-----
 
Edit: if there's a solved tag, it would be fitting for this thread.

Purpose: Improvements / Fixes 
Status: Beta
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Photo
Mac App Store: Not Submitted
Download: Here
 
To use this beta, simply download the file from the link given above and double-click on the file to open the installer. Follow the instructions to install the beta version. The beta sits alongside the Mac App Store version and will not interfere with it.
 
Improvements / Fixes 
 
- Panorama improvements
- Denoise in Develop extension - Improved reliability of Live Filter tools when switching between layers   - PDF import/export improvements, particularly in the area of bleed and trimboxes - Pantone/Global colour improvements. Application and Document palettes are now searchable - Added double-click to edit palette colours - Visual indication that documents are loading (in the application title bar) - Fix for non-retina drawing of UI in Layers panel - the disclosure triangle was drawn incorrectly - Added ‘Hide Selection’ option to context toolbar of some tools - use it to hide the tool drawing while dragging - Context toolbars changed to use icon instead of text ‘reset bounding box’ so that it occupies less space - Improved performance when complicated grids are visible - more to come though… - Improved printers marks - Changing paragraph indent now also changes the first line indent too - Fix for view appearing blurry at times when translated by a sub-pixel amount - Canvas rotation with the trackpad can now be disabled from Preferences - Increase font size for Japanese version - Paragraph panel fixes   Edit: This build currently only works on Yosemite and El Capitan.

Purpose: Features / Improvements / Fixes 
Status: Beta
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Designer
Mac App Store: Not Submitted
Download: Here
 
To use this beta, simply download the file from the link given above and double-click on the file to open the installer. Follow the instructions to install the beta version. The beta sits alongside the Mac App Store version and will not interfere with it. Please note that if you use features which are only present in the Beta version then save your document, it will no longer open in the Mac App Store version.
 
 
Notable changes:
- PDF import/export improvements, particularly in the area of bleed and trimboxes
- Pantone/Global colour improvements. Application and Document palettes are now searchable
- Artboards now have their own guides and snapping grids: These currently still need work.
- Disabled page resizing options when using artboards
- Fix for the ‘document’ artboard size making ever-larger artboards when used from the Artboard Tool’s context toolbar
- Added double-click to edit palette colours
- Visual indication that documents are loading (in the application title bar)
- Fix for non-retina drawing of UI in Layers panel - the disclosure triangle was drawn incorrectly
- Added ‘Hide Selection’ option to context toolbar of some tools - use it to hide the tool drawing while dragging
- Context toolbars changed to use icon instead of text ‘reset bounding box’ so that it occupies less space
- Improved performance when complicated grids are visible - more to come though…
- Improved printers marks
- Changing paragraph indent now also changes the first line indent too
- Fix for view appearing blurry at times when translated by a sub-pixel amount
- Canvas rotation with the trackpad can now be disabled from Preferences
- Increase font size for Japanese version
- Paragraph panel fixes
- Switching documents via Command+Tilda is now a customisable shortcut
 
Edit: This build currently only works on Yosemite and El Capitan.

New little set. Playing again.

Wood Styles.afstyles.zip

Purpose: Features / Improvements / Fixes 
Status: Beta
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Photo
Mac App Store: Not Submitted
Download: Here
 
To use this beta, simply download the file from the link given above and double-click on the file to open the installer. Follow the instructions to install the beta version. The beta sits alongside the Mac App Store version and will not interfere with it.
 
 
Notable changes:
- New Panorama Persona - available from File -> New Panorama.
- 5 new Photos extensions - Miniaturise, Monochrome, Liquify, Develop and Dehaze - 400% rendering performance improvement in most common situations. - Global colours. - Full support for P3 panels found in the new 5k iMac and 4k iMac. If you have one of these you can try making a new RGB8 document with ProPhoto profile and choosing RGB(255,0,0) or RGB(0,255,0) as the colour of your objects - they should look richer and more vivid than you are used to seeing.
- View points added to the Navigator. The Navigator has an advanced mode that lets you choose to create and swap between specific view zoom/position saved points.
- Font fixes. Specifically, a number of font-related crashes have been addressed
- Export/Import improvements - particularly PDF.
- Fix for Text tool failing to accept certain characters (those that were mapped to other shortcuts!)
- Snapping improved for Rotation Centre. Rotation Centre is available from the Move Tool's context toolbar.
- Pantone/named colour/tint improvements. Selecting an object which has a Pantone colour will automatically choose the tint options in the colour panel.
- Canvas rotation. The canvas can be rotated by using the touchpad's rotate gesture or by using the View menu items 'Rotate Left', 'Rotate Right' or 'Reset Rotation'.
- Fix for colour conversion issues exhibited with HSL colours in RGB document formats.
- Character & Paragraph panel improvements.
- Typography panel show visually the effects of different OpenType features. Select some text and go to the Typography panel - this will show you the available options for your current font and text selection. Try changing fonts for more options.
- Printer’s marks and bleed available for output. The export options for PDF now include these additional options, as does the Print dialog.
- Smart Tap feature. Toggle between the current zoom and 100% by double-tapping with two fingers on the trackpad. This is useful for designing up close and being able to easily refer to a 100% view and then back again.
- Updated splash screens. These are necessary as we need to include Pantone licensing information.
- Added Split-toning adjustment. This is available from the Layers panel's adjustments menu and the main Layers->Adjustments menu.
- Improvements to deform filter - you can now select and manipulate multiple pins at once.

Purpose: Features / Improvements / Fixes 
Status: Beta
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Designer
Mac App Store: Not Submitted
Download: Here
 
To use this beta, simply download the file from the link given above and double-click on the file to open the installer. Follow the instructions to install the beta version. The beta sits alongside the Mac App Store version and will not interfere with it.
 
 
Notable changes:
- Artboards. These are still work-in-progress and you can expect a few niggles, but at least you can see the direction we're heading. At present we still need to add auto-slice creation to Export Persona for artboards and we also show an occasional flicker when adding artboards: these will be fixed before the next update. We also need to move guide, grid and rulers to work per-artboard, so these are currently not as they will be in the final release and will be fixed asap.
- Global colours.
- Full support for P3 panels found in the new 5k iMac and 4k iMac. If you have one of these you can try making a new RGB8 document with ProPhoto profile and choosing RGB(255,0,0) or RGB(0,255,0) as the colour of your objects - they should look richer and more vivid than you are used to seeing.
- View points added to the Navigator. The Navigator has an advanced mode that lets you choose to create and swap between specific view zoom/position saved points.
- Font fixes. Specifically, a number of font-related crashes have been addressed
- Export/Import improvements - particularly PDF.
- Fix for Text tool failing to accept certain characters (those that were mapped to other shortcuts!)
- Snapping improved for Rotation Centre. Rotation Centre is available from the Move Tool's context toolbar.
- Pantone/named colour/tint improvements. Selecting an object which has a Pantone colour will automatically choose the tint options in the colour panel.
- Canvas rotation. The canvas can be rotated by using the touchpad's rotate gesture or by using the View menu items 'Rotate Left', 'Rotate Right' or 'Reset Rotation'.
- Fix for colour conversion issues exhibited with HSL colours in RGB document formats.
- Character & Paragraph panel improvements.
- Typography panel show visually the effects of different OpenType features. Select some text and go to the Typography panel - this will show you the available options for your current font and text selection. Try changing fonts for more options.
- Printer’s marks and bleed available for output. The export options for PDF now include these additional options, as does the Print dialog.
- Smart Tap feature. Toggle between the current zoom and 100% by double-tapping with two fingers on the trackpad. This is useful for designing up close and being able to easily refer to a 100% view and then back again.
- Updated splash screens. These are necessary as we need to include Pantone licensing information.
- Added Split-toning adjustment. This is available from the Layers panel's adjustments menu and the main Layers->Adjustments menu.
- Snapshots panel. This panel (disabled by default) allows you to take a snapshot of the document in the current state and refer back to it at later points.
- Added shortcuts for the different Personas. These can be customised by the user as desired.

@MEB:

Thanks for replying. The question wasn't about SVG though, and I see now that the post I linked you wasn't 100% clear on that and could have been interpreted as relating to SVG... Sorry :-(

The problem is the size of .afdesign files. Let's say I create a logo with *only* a few curves and layer effects. I and others have noticed that if we save it as .afdesign we get a file that is hundreds of kilobytes (seems to depend on document resolution used, and graphical complexity).
If we export it as as SVG we get just the vectors (maybe 1-2kb). That solves the filesize issue, but then we lose the ability to easily edit the file later.

Since .afdesign always adds hundreds of kilobytes of "fluff" to the filesize I suspect that it is saving an embedded Finder thumbnail jpeg?

With multiple .afdesign files stored in a Git repo (for revision tracking) it really balloons the repo filesize. Every revision of a file adds hundreds of kilobytes to the repo. I would happily skip the embedded thumbnail to make .afdesign files (with just vectors and layer FX settings) in the 1-5kb range instead.

I would love an advanced option for this, if you would consider it. There is already "File - Save history with document" to toggle undo history on/off. How about "File - Document setup - Advanced - Embed Finder document thumbnail"? If documents have no thumbnail, it would just show a default document icon for that file. For backwards compatibility with old versions of Affinity products it could embed a 1x1 pixel white jpeg, so that old Finder extensions/apps can still preview and open those files. So this is totally solvable, and I sincerely hope you will consider it.
 
Edit: PROOF! :)
Here is a document with *just* a single rectangle shape.
In one file, I set the fill to pure black and saved it as "blackrectangle.afdesign": 4,439 bytes Then I set the fill to a complex circular gradient: "gradients.afdesign": 166,142 bytes. Next, I exported them as SVG to see what happens: "blackrectangle.svg": 502 bytes. And "gradients.svg": 1,056 bytes. To think about this in context: SVG is a very verbose, text-based XML format which is extremely inefficient at saving designs, needing up to 10 bytes per vector coordinate. Meanwhile, .afdesign is a binary format with extreme efficiency. And yet the afdesign file for a black rectangle is 8.8x bigger than an SVG, and for the colored gradient rings it's 157x bigger than an SVG. This huge afdesign filesize is a problem for some of us (and a very big problem for me). Could we please disable the document preview thumbnail? It's making .afdesign filesizes massive for no worthwhile reason at all.  :( blackrectangle.afdesign
blackrectangle.svg
gradients.afdesign
gradients.svg

To save a search, the quick answer is just that we were going to use .afd and .afp, but then what do you have as the extension for Affinity Publisher? It's got to be .afp again so why not just make things really clear, abandon the 3 character extension logic that came from WAAAAY back in time and just go with something more obvious? :)
 
(The fact that we've got .afdesign and .afphoto nowadays is a good thing - a while ago we were using .affinitydesigner and .affinityphoto which was really annoying because it's quite long!) ;)

I have fond memories of my Commodore 64, especially the ´Still loading...´ message with the cassette reader. Also of the huge size of the floppy disk reader, once I thought I needed and purchased that.  :lol:

I have fond memories of my Commodore 64, especially the ´Still loading...´ message with the cassette reader. Also of the huge size of the floppy disk reader, once I thought I needed and purchased that.  :lol:

So, I'm using Affinity Designer on my Commodore 64, and I want to send a vector design to my friend, but even simple files with just some vectors and zero raster data are astronomically huge - in the 100-150kb range! It fills up almost an entire 170kb 5" floppy disk! This is simply too much time to transfer on my 300 baud (0.0375 kbytes/s) modem. Before I upgrade by adding another 128kb of RAM and a CPU with more megahurts and a 1200 baud modem to my Commodore 64, I thought I'd ask: Why are the files so freaking huge to just describe some vector X/Y coordinates and layer FX?  :D I bet I could design the same file format to take less than a kilobyte for that. Is it storing some sort of raster-based preview image or something? If so, can you please allow us to disable that? I need vector designs to be super small for steganography, since I work for a secret government that's so secret that you've never heard of it. 
 
 
Edit: Real info here: https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/14277-vector-files-massive/&p=65016

You have to activate it through the System Preferences Extensions (put a checkmark there):
 
  

I shoot and process RAW exclusively since 2006 (my first digital capable of that) and I don´t keep JPG ballast with them on my HDs. Professionals have reasons and workflows which are quite often time impact related methinks, but it has nothing to do with this. I also know lots of people doing everything exclusively with Lightroom or one of its competing flavours, nothing wrong with that either. To each her / his own, that´s perfectly fine with me.

Hi bellascwherdt,
 
to edit text you created with the artistic text tool, you can use different methods.
Simply double click with the Move Tool inside the bounding box (frame) of your art text object. The Art Text Tool will get selected and a blinking cursor will appear just where you clicked inside the text frame. Or use the Move Tool to select the bounding box (frame) of your art text object and select the Art Text Tool (type T). A blinking cursor will appear, usually to the left of the first letter of your text frame or at the last position where it was placed. Lastly, you can use the Art Text Tool directly. Just click within the (supposed) boundaries of your text frame. A blinking cursor will appear where you clicked. Please note that it is often difficult to get into text frames, when you zoomed out a lot. Zoom a bit in, and you will be able to perform one of the above mentioned actions with ease. And here’s another hint. Suppose a word or phrase is highlighted within your text. Then there is an hierarchy of actions regarding the Escape key.
Press the Escape key, and the word or phrase will get deselected, while the blinking cursor will remain within the text box at the end of the highlighted word or phrase Press the Escape key a second time, and the blinking cursor will leave the the text frame. Press the Escape key a third time, and the text box will get deselected. Hope that helps …  :)
Cheers, Alex