Stephen_H

Ah-hah!
 
That is a nice feature. I often struggle with the bounding box handle colour – it's too similar to sky so changing the colour is very useful.
 
Putting that colour indication under the layer isn't obvious or intuitive because it doesn't look like an attribute of the layer above it, but rather the way the top layer interacts with the layer below.
 
A thin line at the end of the layer would've made more sense and be more obvious.
 
Like this screenshot:

Ah, I see. I thought that once it had been brought into that persona, it would be editable as an open Designer file – requiring saving again after inspection. If it's just a viewing persona only, then I can go with you on that one.

Hmm, a preflight persona is a good idea to avoid errors, but we really need to check the final exported PDF.
 
It's very easy to accidentally export a low resolution RGB PDF that won't print correctly, but since the whole document was designed using high resolution images and CMYK colours the Pre-flight persona wouldn't be psychic and know what silly PDF export setting you're going to use.
 
No, we need some way to check PDFs AFTER export, not before.
 
I'd buy a copy of that, in a heart beat.

Well people, I have done it. I've cancelled my Adobe CC subscription. Here's the proof. Anyone else packed it in with them?

(It's a bit off topic, but I can't find a general/misc category for posting my own news.)
 

Well people, I have done it. I've cancelled my Adobe CC subscription. Here's the proof. Anyone else packed it in with them?

(It's a bit off topic, but I can't find a general/misc category for posting my own news.)
 

Well people, I have done it. I've cancelled my Adobe CC subscription. Here's the proof. Anyone else packed it in with them?

(It's a bit off topic, but I can't find a general/misc category for posting my own news.)
 

I've just made an animated GIF to explain a comment in this forum and I realised how simple it is to do in PhotoShop. Unfortunately... I had to go to PhotoShop to do it.
 
I know animated GIFs probably fall into the animation category, but it would be great to able to export layers as frames in the same way Illustrator does when it exports an animated SVG. No massive feature set, just a few simple settings at export stage.

Master A layer was sitting in the middle of a group of layers. The moment I selected the group, I would automatically get that master layer.
I thing the true bug is that we can select & group the master layer with other object-layers. If they make it non-selectable and always at the bottom, bellow all the other layers, this wouldn't happen.

Here you go.
Select All.
Go to Master page.
Paste.
(All done as keyboard commands)
Full spectrum outlined.afpub

I've just made an animated GIF to explain a comment in this forum and I realised how simple it is to do in PhotoShop. Unfortunately... I had to go to PhotoShop to do it.
 
I know animated GIFs probably fall into the animation category, but it would be great to able to export layers as frames in the same way Illustrator does when it exports an animated SVG. No massive feature set, just a few simple settings at export stage.

I've just made an animated GIF to explain a comment in this forum and I realised how simple it is to do in PhotoShop. Unfortunately... I had to go to PhotoShop to do it.
 
I know animated GIFs probably fall into the animation category, but it would be great to able to export layers as frames in the same way Illustrator does when it exports an animated SVG. No massive feature set, just a few simple settings at export stage.

Noooooo, don't do it... please don't make a video editor. Keep focussed. Make your design/print/layout/photography apps the most awesome apps out there. You know what you're doing in those fields. Continue along your development path and own these fields. Video is a totally different beast, and I really doubt you could make something better than Final Cut Pro, anyway. Then what next? You'll have to add 3D modelling, motion graphics, color grading and sound editing to that video editor to be considered serious player in the video scene.
 
Also, Affinity apps are professional-level apps. You can't go into video with a consumer, or even pro-sumer level application. If you do, it will water down the current line up of apps.
 
If you think designers are critical about your software and its [currently missing] features, wait until you try win over the video editing industry. Have a look at the backlash Apple experienced when it launched Final Cut Pro X. It was missing a few features that I'd hardly considered critical, and yet they nearly lost the entire editing industry to Premier over night. They even had to return Final Cut Pro 7 to the app store to quell the anger. Only now, with v1.3, is FCPX finally clawing back its lost user base.
 
I have both Premier and FCPX on my Mac. I love using FCPX, but I keep having to go back to Premier just because of one missing feature – it can't export an OMF any more. This means I can't send my project to an audio engineer for a final mix. This oversight is simply criminal and reduces FCPX to my "fun to own" list of software, and not a pro tool I use for paying clients.
 
Don't be tempted to become Adobe and try shovel a tool for every industry onto your customers. Stick to what you're good at and continue to make it utterly brilliant.
 
Thanks Affinity.

Fantastic post. Thanks SrPx.

Well people, I have done it. I've cancelled my Adobe CC subscription. Here's the proof. Anyone else packed it in with them?

(It's a bit off topic, but I can't find a general/misc category for posting my own news.)
 

Well people, I have done it. I've cancelled my Adobe CC subscription. Here's the proof. Anyone else packed it in with them?

(It's a bit off topic, but I can't find a general/misc category for posting my own news.)
 

I know it's a long, heated discussion, but I have to agree with the OP. The icons are more like mini illustrations. I stare at them interpreting what they represent. Icons should be symbolic and immediately identifiable which I believe they are currently not.
 
The monochrome option doesn't solve the problem. In fact, I find it even worse – they actually need their color to be better recognized. When I design a company logo, I start on paper in black and white using a thick, clumsy marker knowing that I can always add color & detail later, but I can't always remove them. These tool icons feel like "show-n-tell" illustrations rather than universally recognized, iconic, symbols.
 
RonnyB created a sample set of flat, B&W icons and posted them here:  
They are phenomenal and exactly what I expect from a professional-grade application like Affinity's suite.
 
And to all those who say the features are more important that the interface, I have to say they need to go hand in hand. This is a basic principle of professional graphic design and the heart of marketing. When I launched both Affinity applications for the first time, I immediately created an initial impression on whether this was going to be a pro tool or a prosumer substitute. The illustrative tools told me prosumer, my efforts to drop Adobe made me stick around and dig deeper into the actual workings of the software.
 
Most of us using these apps are employed in some form of design or marketing. To say that the appearance of the software's interface is irrelevant, is a rejection of the core values of our industries and ourselves.
 
 

Well people, I have done it. I've cancelled my Adobe CC subscription. Here's the proof. Anyone else packed it in with them?

(It's a bit off topic, but I can't find a general/misc category for posting my own news.)
 

This a very important feature for me too. Handling the guides as an extra layer would be nice, Just move a shape to that layer and it is a guide.

Ahh... the "layer" not the "layer". Got it. 
(Maybe "Object" would've been a better term? This didn't cause confusion during internal brainstorms amongst team developers that might've hinted at our confusion later?) 

I notice the dark mode is easier to read than the light mode. The letter shapes are a bit blotchy and merge into each other reducing the legibility. I suspect 2 reasons for this:
1 - The font size. When I export a file from Designer, the system font in Apple looks perfect. It's a few points bigger which gives my screen a few extra pixels to render the letters. I think the fonts need to be the same size that Apple uses. (Large font in the preferences doesn't affect this – just panels etc.). If it's not the size, perhaps the font being used? maybe use Apple's system font, as is?
2 - The higher contrast in the light mode. Black text on a 10% grey BG has a 90% contrast difference. In dark mode, we get 20% grey on a 80% grey BG (figures are guessed) which results in a 60% contest difference. This lower contrast makes the fonts seem better aliased and more consistent. The think the black text needs to be a bit grayer to reduce the contrast. This goes for all the elements like ruler markings.
This is what I'm referring to. You can see the difference side-by-side:
:
 
Any thoughts on the topic? Am I being difficult? I like the light mode, but the dark mode seems a bit more refined.
 

However, I realise that using my own argument in another thread (view here), I shouldn't actually be using Designer to do a flyer layout – I should be using Publisher, so creating advanced guide layouts shouldn't really be a feature request at this stage.
 
Of course, if Publisher doesn't deliver advanced guides like I need, I'll repost my feature request.
 
;)

It's a very simple mistake to make... working in RGB when you should be in CMYK. Export your PDF and... whoops, the publication rejects your PDF because it's RGB instead of CMYK.
Please can you add the color mode of the document to the display somewhere. Just a bit of text in the file name (like illustrator does) would be sufficient. At the moment, we have to go digging into the document setup to find out. The odds are, if I am looking for the color mode, I haven't made this mistake. We need it displayed somewhere so it can raise a red flag when we're accidentally working in the wrong format.
Look at my screenshot. Can anyone tell me what color mode my document is in? I can't, but it's obvious in illustrator which gives me a nice, secure, safe feeling.

Surely this must be simple to implement...
(Or am I just missing a feature I need to turn on?)
 
 

I played with an updated color palette a while back as well. This was my contribution... just combine the wheel, the sliders and the swatches into one palette.

No difference. AD's global colors act like all other applications' global colors. Peter was just surprised to discover that Quark Xpress has had them all along. Maybe he thought they were introduced as a new feature or was surprised that it doesn't have different types of swatches? (I can't really speak for him here, but that was the message I got from his post)
For me, Quark Xpress 3.0 was the very first graphics application I ever learnt and it ONLY supports global swatches. Quark's global swatches is so ingrained in me that I find all other "regular" swatches unintuitive, frustrating and very risky to use.
As a side note... InDesign also only supports global swatches. I guess this speaks volumes about color management in professional layout applications and I expect this to be the default swatch usage in the soon-to-be-released Affinity Publisher as well. (Non-global swatches in Publisher will be a fail of epic proportions.)

I remember illustrator '88 coming out. I've used it since then. I'm an illustrator fanboy... but I prefer using Affinity Designer. I find it much quicker to work with. For me, Designer is dynamic and illustrator is static.
I recently had a timeline project where I needed to recreate 34 company logos as vector artwork. All I had for reference were some bad photocopies and the wayback machine (archive.org). Affinity Designer was a lot quicker to use for the creation of the logos - however I still had to defer to illustrator when I hit a wall in AD. I created all 34 logos in AD and effectively copied and pasted from Illustrator when I couldn't achieve what I wanted in Designer. To be honest, I probably could have worked out all of my hiccups but I didn't have the time.
This seems to be my current workflow. I'll do what I can in Designer and use illustrator when I get a bit stuck. I hope to eventually leave illustrator behind. Shame. I still like illustrator but I dislike Adobe and hate the idea of being locked out of my artwork when I stop subscribing. I work professionally in design. I have a 20+ years archive of work which I'll be locked out of when I stop subscribing. I know I'll probably never need to open any of my archived projects - but it's just knowing that I can't access them if I stop subscribing that annoys me.