davidpwrmc

This [overprint colors issue] is a huge, glaring omission.
And one that I didn't realize existed. (Clearly, I haven't been using Affinity software for commercial printing.) For reference, I have been involved in print design for many years and have designed everything from newspaper ads to books with enormous print runs on offset, web and digital. I have traveled across the country on multi-day press checks.
My affinity for Affinity is, in part, due to my loathing for Adobe and their rental model. I imagine this is true for many of the folks here. I have happily supported and promoted Affinity/Serif for offering a "viable alternative" to Adobe. But I may have to rethink this as this alone makes the software non-viable for anyone involved in print. Having to create multiple versions of the same color to have it overprint is ludicrous makes for a completely unworkable workflow. Overprinting should always be available to set on the object level. Always. Period.
Serif/Affinity Team...
Please take this seriously. We are all rooting for you to be David in a Goliath industry. If you don't get these absolute basics right, you will never have the commercial success that you, and us, want you to have.

“Hi, my name is David and I’m a Macaholic!”    

 

My graphic design career has spanned the time when all graphics had to be produced manually as pasteups (started in 1974 with that mode of operation) to the present day when it is all digitally produced. 

 

My first Mac was an SE bought near the end of 1987 (or was it 1988?  Recall is fuzzy now on that), and my first major application that I purchased was Adobe Illustrator 88 (that was the version that came out just prior to Illustrator Ver. 3, I believe).  After that purchase, it wasn’t long till I also had obtained Photoshop (version 3, I believe it was) and PageMaker.  

 

Through the years I bought many upgrades to Adobe products (Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc.) as well as Adobe fonts and utilities such as Adobe Type Manager.  I graduated from PageMaker to QuarkXPress way back when.  Later, Adobe came out with their bundle called the Creative Suite.   I upgraded everytime that Adobe came out with an upgrade to the CS suite…. I still have disk sets for CS3, CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.  

 

Alas, that’s where it will end since Adobe has made its decision to do subscriptions only.   Their vision of a business model is unacceptable to me.  I do not like the idea of paying forever and then, if I stop paying, I have nothing to show for it application-wise, and I also then have no access to files made in the various Adobe proprietary formats. 

 

As I mentioned in another post on this site, with the way Adobe has things set up now, they are effectively proclaiming: 

 

“ALL YOUR BEZIERS ARE BELONG TO US.”   

 

And so, it is with great anticipation and hope that I now follow the development and, hopefully, deployment of the Affinity line of products.  I am VERY hopeful that this suite of applications will become a major player in the design industry and thereby provide a viable alternative to the Adobe hegemony. 

 

Contrary to what others have expressed, I think the choice of starting with a vector application (Designer) is a good choice.  There are currently no other viable, full-fledged and/or Mac-native vector drawing programs out there that I’m aware of, so it is good that Serif is starting with that one first. 

 

If Designer can prove to be a well thought out and viable product, then it will act as an introduction to Affinity products for design firms and thus allow a foothold to be gained in an otherwise Adobe-dominated world.  

 

So, I salute the people at Serif/Affinity and I wish the best for your development and product line!  I hope to be one of the first to buy Designer (and your other products) when they become available for purchase! 

 

All the best…..

 

   - David  

“Hi, my name is David and I’m a Macaholic!”    

 

My graphic design career has spanned the time when all graphics had to be produced manually as pasteups (started in 1974 with that mode of operation) to the present day when it is all digitally produced. 

 

My first Mac was an SE bought near the end of 1987 (or was it 1988?  Recall is fuzzy now on that), and my first major application that I purchased was Adobe Illustrator 88 (that was the version that came out just prior to Illustrator Ver. 3, I believe).  After that purchase, it wasn’t long till I also had obtained Photoshop (version 3, I believe it was) and PageMaker.  

 

Through the years I bought many upgrades to Adobe products (Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc.) as well as Adobe fonts and utilities such as Adobe Type Manager.  I graduated from PageMaker to QuarkXPress way back when.  Later, Adobe came out with their bundle called the Creative Suite.   I upgraded everytime that Adobe came out with an upgrade to the CS suite…. I still have disk sets for CS3, CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.  

 

Alas, that’s where it will end since Adobe has made its decision to do subscriptions only.   Their vision of a business model is unacceptable to me.  I do not like the idea of paying forever and then, if I stop paying, I have nothing to show for it application-wise, and I also then have no access to files made in the various Adobe proprietary formats. 

 

As I mentioned in another post on this site, with the way Adobe has things set up now, they are effectively proclaiming: 

 

“ALL YOUR BEZIERS ARE BELONG TO US.”   

 

And so, it is with great anticipation and hope that I now follow the development and, hopefully, deployment of the Affinity line of products.  I am VERY hopeful that this suite of applications will become a major player in the design industry and thereby provide a viable alternative to the Adobe hegemony. 

 

Contrary to what others have expressed, I think the choice of starting with a vector application (Designer) is a good choice.  There are currently no other viable, full-fledged and/or Mac-native vector drawing programs out there that I’m aware of, so it is good that Serif is starting with that one first. 

 

If Designer can prove to be a well thought out and viable product, then it will act as an introduction to Affinity products for design firms and thus allow a foothold to be gained in an otherwise Adobe-dominated world.  

 

So, I salute the people at Serif/Affinity and I wish the best for your development and product line!  I hope to be one of the first to buy Designer (and your other products) when they become available for purchase! 

 

All the best…..

 

   - David  

“Hi, my name is David and I’m a Macaholic!”    

 

My graphic design career has spanned the time when all graphics had to be produced manually as pasteups (started in 1974 with that mode of operation) to the present day when it is all digitally produced. 

 

My first Mac was an SE bought near the end of 1987 (or was it 1988?  Recall is fuzzy now on that), and my first major application that I purchased was Adobe Illustrator 88 (that was the version that came out just prior to Illustrator Ver. 3, I believe).  After that purchase, it wasn’t long till I also had obtained Photoshop (version 3, I believe it was) and PageMaker.  

 

Through the years I bought many upgrades to Adobe products (Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc.) as well as Adobe fonts and utilities such as Adobe Type Manager.  I graduated from PageMaker to QuarkXPress way back when.  Later, Adobe came out with their bundle called the Creative Suite.   I upgraded everytime that Adobe came out with an upgrade to the CS suite…. I still have disk sets for CS3, CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.  

 

Alas, that’s where it will end since Adobe has made its decision to do subscriptions only.   Their vision of a business model is unacceptable to me.  I do not like the idea of paying forever and then, if I stop paying, I have nothing to show for it application-wise, and I also then have no access to files made in the various Adobe proprietary formats. 

 

As I mentioned in another post on this site, with the way Adobe has things set up now, they are effectively proclaiming: 

 

“ALL YOUR BEZIERS ARE BELONG TO US.”   

 

And so, it is with great anticipation and hope that I now follow the development and, hopefully, deployment of the Affinity line of products.  I am VERY hopeful that this suite of applications will become a major player in the design industry and thereby provide a viable alternative to the Adobe hegemony. 

 

Contrary to what others have expressed, I think the choice of starting with a vector application (Designer) is a good choice.  There are currently no other viable, full-fledged and/or Mac-native vector drawing programs out there that I’m aware of, so it is good that Serif is starting with that one first. 

 

If Designer can prove to be a well thought out and viable product, then it will act as an introduction to Affinity products for design firms and thus allow a foothold to be gained in an otherwise Adobe-dominated world.  

 

So, I salute the people at Serif/Affinity and I wish the best for your development and product line!  I hope to be one of the first to buy Designer (and your other products) when they become available for purchase! 

 

All the best…..

 

   - David  

“Hi, my name is David and I’m a Macaholic!”    

 

My graphic design career has spanned the time when all graphics had to be produced manually as pasteups (started in 1974 with that mode of operation) to the present day when it is all digitally produced. 

 

My first Mac was an SE bought near the end of 1987 (or was it 1988?  Recall is fuzzy now on that), and my first major application that I purchased was Adobe Illustrator 88 (that was the version that came out just prior to Illustrator Ver. 3, I believe).  After that purchase, it wasn’t long till I also had obtained Photoshop (version 3, I believe it was) and PageMaker.  

 

Through the years I bought many upgrades to Adobe products (Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc.) as well as Adobe fonts and utilities such as Adobe Type Manager.  I graduated from PageMaker to QuarkXPress way back when.  Later, Adobe came out with their bundle called the Creative Suite.   I upgraded everytime that Adobe came out with an upgrade to the CS suite…. I still have disk sets for CS3, CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.  

 

Alas, that’s where it will end since Adobe has made its decision to do subscriptions only.   Their vision of a business model is unacceptable to me.  I do not like the idea of paying forever and then, if I stop paying, I have nothing to show for it application-wise, and I also then have no access to files made in the various Adobe proprietary formats. 

 

As I mentioned in another post on this site, with the way Adobe has things set up now, they are effectively proclaiming: 

 

“ALL YOUR BEZIERS ARE BELONG TO US.”   

 

And so, it is with great anticipation and hope that I now follow the development and, hopefully, deployment of the Affinity line of products.  I am VERY hopeful that this suite of applications will become a major player in the design industry and thereby provide a viable alternative to the Adobe hegemony. 

 

Contrary to what others have expressed, I think the choice of starting with a vector application (Designer) is a good choice.  There are currently no other viable, full-fledged and/or Mac-native vector drawing programs out there that I’m aware of, so it is good that Serif is starting with that one first. 

 

If Designer can prove to be a well thought out and viable product, then it will act as an introduction to Affinity products for design firms and thus allow a foothold to be gained in an otherwise Adobe-dominated world.  

 

So, I salute the people at Serif/Affinity and I wish the best for your development and product line!  I hope to be one of the first to buy Designer (and your other products) when they become available for purchase! 

 

All the best…..

 

   - David  

“Hi, my name is David and I’m a Macaholic!”    

 

My graphic design career has spanned the time when all graphics had to be produced manually as pasteups (started in 1974 with that mode of operation) to the present day when it is all digitally produced. 

 

My first Mac was an SE bought near the end of 1987 (or was it 1988?  Recall is fuzzy now on that), and my first major application that I purchased was Adobe Illustrator 88 (that was the version that came out just prior to Illustrator Ver. 3, I believe).  After that purchase, it wasn’t long till I also had obtained Photoshop (version 3, I believe it was) and PageMaker.  

 

Through the years I bought many upgrades to Adobe products (Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc.) as well as Adobe fonts and utilities such as Adobe Type Manager.  I graduated from PageMaker to QuarkXPress way back when.  Later, Adobe came out with their bundle called the Creative Suite.   I upgraded everytime that Adobe came out with an upgrade to the CS suite…. I still have disk sets for CS3, CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.  

 

Alas, that’s where it will end since Adobe has made its decision to do subscriptions only.   Their vision of a business model is unacceptable to me.  I do not like the idea of paying forever and then, if I stop paying, I have nothing to show for it application-wise, and I also then have no access to files made in the various Adobe proprietary formats. 

 

As I mentioned in another post on this site, with the way Adobe has things set up now, they are effectively proclaiming: 

 

“ALL YOUR BEZIERS ARE BELONG TO US.”   

 

And so, it is with great anticipation and hope that I now follow the development and, hopefully, deployment of the Affinity line of products.  I am VERY hopeful that this suite of applications will become a major player in the design industry and thereby provide a viable alternative to the Adobe hegemony. 

 

Contrary to what others have expressed, I think the choice of starting with a vector application (Designer) is a good choice.  There are currently no other viable, full-fledged and/or Mac-native vector drawing programs out there that I’m aware of, so it is good that Serif is starting with that one first. 

 

If Designer can prove to be a well thought out and viable product, then it will act as an introduction to Affinity products for design firms and thus allow a foothold to be gained in an otherwise Adobe-dominated world.  

 

So, I salute the people at Serif/Affinity and I wish the best for your development and product line!  I hope to be one of the first to buy Designer (and your other products) when they become available for purchase! 

 

All the best…..

 

   - David  

“Hi, my name is David and I’m a Macaholic!”    

 

My graphic design career has spanned the time when all graphics had to be produced manually as pasteups (started in 1974 with that mode of operation) to the present day when it is all digitally produced. 

 

My first Mac was an SE bought near the end of 1987 (or was it 1988?  Recall is fuzzy now on that), and my first major application that I purchased was Adobe Illustrator 88 (that was the version that came out just prior to Illustrator Ver. 3, I believe).  After that purchase, it wasn’t long till I also had obtained Photoshop (version 3, I believe it was) and PageMaker.  

 

Through the years I bought many upgrades to Adobe products (Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc.) as well as Adobe fonts and utilities such as Adobe Type Manager.  I graduated from PageMaker to QuarkXPress way back when.  Later, Adobe came out with their bundle called the Creative Suite.   I upgraded everytime that Adobe came out with an upgrade to the CS suite…. I still have disk sets for CS3, CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.  

 

Alas, that’s where it will end since Adobe has made its decision to do subscriptions only.   Their vision of a business model is unacceptable to me.  I do not like the idea of paying forever and then, if I stop paying, I have nothing to show for it application-wise, and I also then have no access to files made in the various Adobe proprietary formats. 

 

As I mentioned in another post on this site, with the way Adobe has things set up now, they are effectively proclaiming: 

 

“ALL YOUR BEZIERS ARE BELONG TO US.”   

 

And so, it is with great anticipation and hope that I now follow the development and, hopefully, deployment of the Affinity line of products.  I am VERY hopeful that this suite of applications will become a major player in the design industry and thereby provide a viable alternative to the Adobe hegemony. 

 

Contrary to what others have expressed, I think the choice of starting with a vector application (Designer) is a good choice.  There are currently no other viable, full-fledged and/or Mac-native vector drawing programs out there that I’m aware of, so it is good that Serif is starting with that one first. 

 

If Designer can prove to be a well thought out and viable product, then it will act as an introduction to Affinity products for design firms and thus allow a foothold to be gained in an otherwise Adobe-dominated world.  

 

So, I salute the people at Serif/Affinity and I wish the best for your development and product line!  I hope to be one of the first to buy Designer (and your other products) when they become available for purchase! 

 

All the best…..

 

   - David  

“Hi, my name is David and I’m a Macaholic!”    

 

My graphic design career has spanned the time when all graphics had to be produced manually as pasteups (started in 1974 with that mode of operation) to the present day when it is all digitally produced. 

 

My first Mac was an SE bought near the end of 1987 (or was it 1988?  Recall is fuzzy now on that), and my first major application that I purchased was Adobe Illustrator 88 (that was the version that came out just prior to Illustrator Ver. 3, I believe).  After that purchase, it wasn’t long till I also had obtained Photoshop (version 3, I believe it was) and PageMaker.  

 

Through the years I bought many upgrades to Adobe products (Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc.) as well as Adobe fonts and utilities such as Adobe Type Manager.  I graduated from PageMaker to QuarkXPress way back when.  Later, Adobe came out with their bundle called the Creative Suite.   I upgraded everytime that Adobe came out with an upgrade to the CS suite…. I still have disk sets for CS3, CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.  

 

Alas, that’s where it will end since Adobe has made its decision to do subscriptions only.   Their vision of a business model is unacceptable to me.  I do not like the idea of paying forever and then, if I stop paying, I have nothing to show for it application-wise, and I also then have no access to files made in the various Adobe proprietary formats. 

 

As I mentioned in another post on this site, with the way Adobe has things set up now, they are effectively proclaiming: 

 

“ALL YOUR BEZIERS ARE BELONG TO US.”   

 

And so, it is with great anticipation and hope that I now follow the development and, hopefully, deployment of the Affinity line of products.  I am VERY hopeful that this suite of applications will become a major player in the design industry and thereby provide a viable alternative to the Adobe hegemony. 

 

Contrary to what others have expressed, I think the choice of starting with a vector application (Designer) is a good choice.  There are currently no other viable, full-fledged and/or Mac-native vector drawing programs out there that I’m aware of, so it is good that Serif is starting with that one first. 

 

If Designer can prove to be a well thought out and viable product, then it will act as an introduction to Affinity products for design firms and thus allow a foothold to be gained in an otherwise Adobe-dominated world.  

 

So, I salute the people at Serif/Affinity and I wish the best for your development and product line!  I hope to be one of the first to buy Designer (and your other products) when they become available for purchase! 

 

All the best…..

 

   - David  

I can report that I just bought my copy of Affinity Photo a few minutes ago on the U.S. Mac App Store.
 
As they did back last October with Affinity Designer, Apple apparently jumped the gun and made Photo available for purchase from the Mac App Store around 11pm Eastern Time here in the U.S. 
 
I would imagine that if Apple is adhering to the idea of rolling out the product based on local time, then the Central, Mountain and Pacific Time zones will be able to get hold of their copies somewhere around 11pm local time (your mileage may vary). 
 
Anyway, I'm just glad to have my copy of Affinity Photo!  
 
Now, all we need is the 3rd member of the triad.....Affinity Publisher!    
 
 - David  

@CartoonMike.....
 
Definitely!  A "philosopher" in the form of a talking raccoon with a large weapon:     
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcKudHBKdPU
 
 
Why not?  Sounds good to me.      ;)
 
  - David 

@AndyS.... regarding why FreeHand would save files with no extension....my guess for that would be that FreeHand "grew up" in the time when MacOS did not require extensions on the ends of filenames and so that could be why the application didn't bother to save extensions on files by default. 
 
The original way that Mac files were set up meant that they had two forks:  a data fork....and a resource fork.  The guts of the file were contained in the data fork, while the resource fork contained other info including references as to what application the file belonged to.  Thus, when the Mac OS Finder was asked to open a file, it would simply take a look at the file's resource fork, find out what application the file was made in, and thus open the appropriate application.  As a result of this setup, MacOS files never did require an extension on the filename....unlike Windows, which expected a file extension on EVERY filename.  I am assuming that Windows files had ONLY a data fork and that was it. 
 
With the advent of Mac OS X, it seems that file extensions have become more prevalent and desired, but my understanding is that, even in OS X, the files still have those 2 forks.  So, files can still be able to be saved without an extension on the filename even under OS X. 
 
Anyway, that's my guess as to why FreeHand was doing what it was doing extension-wise.  When FreeHand was being developed, extensions on filenames were just not needed in MacOS.
 
   - David   

@AndyS.... regarding why FreeHand would save files with no extension....my guess for that would be that FreeHand "grew up" in the time when MacOS did not require extensions on the ends of filenames and so that could be why the application didn't bother to save extensions on files by default. 
 
The original way that Mac files were set up meant that they had two forks:  a data fork....and a resource fork.  The guts of the file were contained in the data fork, while the resource fork contained other info including references as to what application the file belonged to.  Thus, when the Mac OS Finder was asked to open a file, it would simply take a look at the file's resource fork, find out what application the file was made in, and thus open the appropriate application.  As a result of this setup, MacOS files never did require an extension on the filename....unlike Windows, which expected a file extension on EVERY filename.  I am assuming that Windows files had ONLY a data fork and that was it. 
 
With the advent of Mac OS X, it seems that file extensions have become more prevalent and desired, but my understanding is that, even in OS X, the files still have those 2 forks.  So, files can still be able to be saved without an extension on the filename even under OS X. 
 
Anyway, that's my guess as to why FreeHand was doing what it was doing extension-wise.  When FreeHand was being developed, extensions on filenames were just not needed in MacOS.
 
   - David   

Sometimes a file can get "locked" by the system and, if you then throw that file in the Trash and try to empty the Trash, said file will not be able to be deleted.  
 
If that is the case with your beta file, then you can try the following:  hold down the OPTION key and then choose EMPTY TRASH from the Finder menu.  Holding down the OPTION key will override any locked settings on the file that is in the Trash and thus allow that file to be deleted.  
 
So, give it a try.  If that approach does not work, then perhaps someone else has an idea of how to delete that file. 
 
  - David  

I am curious as to whether Affinity Designer will have the ability to "create outlines" (as AI does) from text and thus allow tweaking of individual bezier anchor points within any given character.  
 
On a different topic: I also want to echo another user's query regarding whether Affinity Designer will allow use of the pasteboard area for staging and working with items not in the active page area.  When using AI, I do that all the time.  It is very convenient for the way I work. 
 
I would like to take this moment to thank you for making this effort to develop a new vector drawing program to compete with AI.  Since Adobe's decision to strip users of choice and force them into paying forever is NOT something I wish to partake in, I am therefore actively searching for alternatives.  Your new vector program is one  I will be watching closely and I hope that you will have great success with it! 
 
- DavidPwrMc