nielsh

Even the invert filter results in the same problem, even the same colors. That's wild.

Alright, I'll try some other solutions to hopefully get the desired result. Too bad though, it's very confusing that the Affinity apps give no indication whatsoever of the blend modes not being supported in CMYK PDF export, whilst still exporting the file resulting in wildly different results than expected. I also just tried the difference blend mode, which has the same problem, so it's not limited to the negate blend mode.

I'm running into a huge issue here: I can't get my PDF's to export like they should, not matter what PDF version or options I choose or which Affinity program I use for the export. The only thing that solves it is switching the export to RGB mode, which is simply not an option for print work. What it should look like: How it exports: The big text in the middle is the issue, with blending mode "negation". The other colors are fine, they just look dull because of the CMYK. The export settings (but like I said, no options outside of switching to RGB export solve the issue for me: Attached you'll also find a file with the isolated problem. pdfproblem.afdesign

Crazy. This works, thank you so much. I'm however absolutely gobsmacked that I've been experiencing this problem for a year now. It's a paid product. An app-breaking issue like this is unacceptable let alone for it to exist for more than a year...

Update: it did again occur during recording, find video attached. Unfortunately in the screen recording the cursor is not properly displayed, whenever you see me making circles using the cursor, it's "beachballed" and frozen. Screen Recording 2022-09-26 at 13.09.20.mp4

I'd like to revive this thread with an update: I now use a M1 Pro machine, and the problem is still not resolved. With all settings on default Affinity Photo is simply unusable, simple actions such as selecting a different tool beachball/freeze the program for 1 to 10 seconds. Heck, even opening a menu triggers it sometimes. It even got worse than last time I spoke about it: the program sometimes doesn't recover from the freeze and I need to force-close. Disabling the hardware acceleration also doesn't improve things. Interesting find: when screen recording (using the built in macOS function) the program does not freeze anymore. I'm not knowledgeable about the program's inner workings but seems to me like it has something to do with the GPU going idle, so affinity hangs when trying to invoke an idle GPU. Why? Because during screen recording the GPU is permanently active to capture the screen so the affinity apps can work with it without hesitation. I'm sad to say that I'm forced to resolve to Adobe for the time being.

Solved: apparently the linked text boxes got "Align to baseline grid" applied to them by default? So why does the Baseline Grid Manager not show that, but only the paragraph panel?

I have found the culprit without a way to solve it. I turned on show baseline grid... and to my surprise only the linked text boxes (so all except the first one) show the blue lines of baseline grid. Baseline grid manager does not say it is activated, neither does switching it on and off again fix it. See screenshot.

When I start a clean document the problem is not there. When I copy the content of the "bugged" document however, the problem is also introduced to the new document. You can have a look at my bugged document here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cc4yevtoiljhh6q/Tourneeboekje.afpub?dl=1

I ran into a program-breaking bug. I'm suprised no one else reported about this. In the main text frame I applied proper styling: line spacing, paragraph spacing etc. The overflowing text, in a linked text box made using the proper link tool, the paragraph spacing is way larger. Alright, might be a styling inherited from the word document, no biggie, but: it doesn't respond to any paragraph spacing changes. Line spacing also does not respond. This all works fine in the first text box, but all text in linked text boxes/overflowing text does not respond to spacing settings. I have tried pasting text without styling, resetting Text Styles, but it all doesn't change the problem I am describing. This is absolutely program-breaking as I can't properly format documents with long texts now. I attached pictures to show the difference in paragraph spacing between the original and the linked text box. All text has the same styling applied to it (Body) with identical line- and paragraph spacing settings. There's literally no difference between the text- and paragraph style settings whatsoever. Note that in the linked text box (with the red annotation) the paragraph brake is not a manual line break, this really is a paragraph break with no extra special characters inserted whatsoever.

I feel like it does a bit. It doesn't completely resolve the issue. Then again, making a problematic setting the default is not a great idea.

I trust there will be future updates that improve this. However, fact of the matter is: the programs are borderline unusable right now. I spend more time waiting for the beachball to pass than actually working (and I use these programs for my professional work). Affinity actually released an Apple Silicon version, this is not the rosetta one I'm working with. For a while the M1 was the only apple silicon available, which the program is specifically written for and tested on. It doesn't work. It freezes all the time, etc. I think that is unacceptable. (Apple silicon has been out for more than a year now, to make matters worse)

I will try that when I get home. If it works however, isn't that just a workaround for quite a big problem in the program's code?

I have made a screen recording of the problem. As you can see the program freezes whenever I try to do something. Anything. This is a 400px photo, a very light file. When I restart the program the problem just continues, regardless of the tool or action I am using. I can't work anymore. I have tried reinstalling macOS and I just tried deleting preference files again. I don't know what to do anymore. Screen Recording 2021-12-25 at 15.11.09.mp4

I really hope there will be some serious consideration of this problem. It doesn't seem widespread but I'm definitely not the only one (see embedded post), which is troubling because that thread also stopped at a reply from the user, not Affinity. Furthermore I have thus far experienced this problem on three separate computers but it seems to be exclusive to the macOS version of the programs. Just now I had to force quit Affinity Photo 8 times in a row because every time I restarted the program it opened the last edited document which made the program immediately freeze/beachball. Only after 8 times I managed to create a new document and close the problematic one – with every step of the way taking 20 seconds. I really don't want to go back to Adobe.