Boldlinedesign

@hokousai - yes like a live paint option - something easier than creating a whole new shape fill or deleting points.

One thing I liked in Illustrator was the ability to put a different color fill behind the shape with a negative space and then select both and press "merge" - or several other pathfinder options and have it "cookie-cutter" the back shape thereby creating a fill color that fits that negative space perfectly.

When I try this in Affinity Designer, it essentially deletes the foreground shape with the negative space and leaves the back fill shape as it was...

This ability to cookie-cutter a custom shape in illustrator using the pathfinder is used extensively in my work.
Not that I want Affinity to copy adobe, but is there a reason Affinity has not added this kind of workflow?

@Callum,
I think that Boldlinedesign is talking about a feature like LiveTrace that is found in Illustrator. To my knowledge that kind of function hasn't been added to Designer as of yet although I'm looking forward to it being added too. I don't need the ability to vectorize things but it would be great to be able to fill negative spaces without having to draw or use shapes (much like using the magic wand but with vectors). 
Best regards,
Hokusai

It does that already.
 
Currently it does select from hidden groups, locked groups and hidden locked groups.
 
This doesn't seem to be available at present.
 
Select Same -> Fill Color does work on gradients, including those with different angles but otherwise matching.  If you "Reverse" one of the gradients (using the Reverse button on the gradient editor) it won't find it, but rotating it all the way around still allows it to be matched.
 
Select Same -> Shape effectively does this.

The lack of warp and transform and mesh tools is one of the biggest reasons I can't fully move to Affinity designer as my go-to vector application and have to still hang on to an outdated OS to run my copy of Adobe CS6. I design t-shirts for a living and daily use the warping and transform functions to accomplish text effects. I agree that these features seem basic to any vector design app - but then again, so does a blob tool, a smooth tool, pure 100% vector brushes, select-same-as, and boolean operations that when merging objects, does not leave behind thousands of useless nodes, or make selections disappear, or freeze the app.
I love Affinity, but the years of waiting has been a real struggle with no explanations why

It was a bit of joke really if you see some of the comments to another post about a Windows only tool 😁 I'll deffo take a look if they come up with a windows version

@MCFC_4Heatons - the developer said he will be porting it over to windows after he releases the final release candidate for mac. I have no idea what his time frame will be for that.
I'm REALLY hoping warp and the like are a part of this 1.9 update....

@MattP - I'm so happy to see the 1.9 beta out for Designer. Ever since photo for ipad beta was released early, I check periodically for a Designer beta!   I use Designer day in and day out to design t-shirt designs and every added tool brings me closer to making Affinity my sole application set for my work.

Super impressive work on the select-same and contour tools. It's efficient, effective and professional and they do not get in the way of use.

I love the amount of real-time control I can have over the settings with the contour tool. I can make an inverse contour, change the corner styles, change the radius specifically by numerical input or visually with my cursor - so much better thought out and implemented than other vector apps I've used.

Select-same is great as well - I like the breakdown into two main sub-categories and then the numerous options for each. I don't know if it needs an "all text" selection option or not - I can see the benefit but also at what point do we have too many options to scroll through each time! lol

Glad to see the Divide boolean operation getting some love as well - that's a crucial part of my workflow.
Keep up the great work!

 

Status: Beta
Purpose: Features, Improvements, Fixes
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Photo
Mac App Store: Not submitted
Download ZIP: Download
Auto-update: Available
 
Hello,
We are pleased to announce the immediate availability of the second build of Affinity Photo 1.9.0 for macOS.
If this is your first time using a customer beta of an Affinity app, it’s worth noting that the beta will install as a separate app - alongside your store version. They will not interfere with each other at all and you can continue to use the store version for critical work without worry.
This beta is significantly different from the 1.8.4 version available for purchase - we strongly recommend that you do not use this beta for real work as data could be lost and the files you save are not guaranteed to open in previous / future versions of Affinity Photo.
Furthermore, massive behind the scenes work has been done to enable GPU acceleration for the Windows version of Affinity Photo in 1.9. In theory this should have no consequences for macOS / iOS users - but it’s likely that a couple of things will have become broken along the way. We are giving ourselves a longer beta period with 1.9 in order to find and fix those things.
This also means that the full complement of new features is not available yet in this 1.9 beta - more will be added over the coming weeks.
Thanks again for your continued support!
 
Affinity Photo Team  
 
Changes Since 1.9.0.195
 
- Text on a path is now available in Photo.
- More filters now work on masks / adjustments / spare channels (Add Noise, Perlin Noise, etc.).
- Improved Metal rendering performance (over 195).
- Improved experience when editing a spare channel (view artefacts, histogram and navigator).
- Setting a blend mode on a sub-brush will now work properly - paving the way for import of PSD dual-brushes in a future build.
- Attempted to fix startup crash on machines with no compatible Metal GPU.
- Fixed localisation issues affecting non-UK users.
- Fixed issues when attempting to add layers to a spare channel (!).
 
Cumulative Changes Since 1.8.4

- Improved “Serif Labs” RAW engine.
- You can now single click a spare channel in the Channels panel to edit it like a layer.
- The Curves adjustment now has numeric field controls for precise positioning.
- Studio presets are now available.
- A benchmarking tool has been added in the help menu. It will only become available when no documents are open.
- Blend modes now work on “alpha only” layers (masks, adjustments, live filters, etc.).
- Added a new “Divide” blend mode.
- Added “Create from centre” for the elliptical marquee tool.
- Allowed snapping to the bounds of the pixel selection.
- Added ability to create brushes from the current pixel selection with one click.
 
To be notified about all future macOS beta updates, please follow this notification thread 
To be notified when this Photo update comes out of beta and is fully released to all Affinity Photo on macOS customers, please follow this thread

@Frozen Death Knight - yes indeed! and now the beta for Designer is out as well.

Well, around the corner it sure was.
 
 

Just tested it. Select same and contour are now my new best friends!

Thanx a lot for Select Same, It's amazing!

this is huge 🤩
thank you so much for select same. Please release now 😂
 

Status: Beta
Purpose: Features, Improvements, Fixes
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Designer
Mac App Store: Not submitted
Download: Download
 
Auto-update: Not available
 
Hello,
We are pleased to announce the immediate availability of the first build of Affinity Designer 1.9.0 for macOS.
If this is your first time using a customer beta of an Affinity app, it’s worth noting that the beta will install as a separate app - alongside your store version. They will not interfere with each other at all and you can continue to use the store version for critical work without worry.
This beta is significantly different from the 1.8.4 version available for purchase - we strongly recommend that you do not use this beta for real work as data could be lost and the files you save are not guaranteed to open in previous / future versions of Affinity Designer.
Thanks again for your continued support!
Many thanks!
Matt
 
Changes Since 1.9.0
- Contour tool.
- Select Same / Select Object functionality. I'm happy to consider requests for extra options, so if you have a favourite, just say...
- Improved performance with large documents. I will aim to improve this further over time.
- Added a new “Divide” blend mode.
- Allowed snapping to the bounds of the pixel selection.
 
To be notified about all future Mac beta updates, please follow this beta notification thread 
To be notified when this update comes out of beta and is fully released to all Affinity Designer customers, please follow this release notification thread

Status: Beta
Purpose: Features, Improvements, Fixes
Requirements: Purchased Affinity Photo for iPad From App Store
App Store:  Not submitted
Download link: Download
 
Hello,
We are pleased to announce the immediate availability of the first build of Affinity Photo 1.9.0 for iPad.
If this is your first time using a customer beta of an Affinity app, it’s worth noting that the beta will install as a separate app - alongside your store version. They will not interfere with each other at all and you can continue to use the store version for critical work without worry.
This beta is significantly different from the 1.8.4 version available for purchase - we strongly recommend that you do not use this beta for real work as data could be lost and the files you save are not guaranteed to open in previous / future versions of Affinity Photo.
Furthermore, massive behind the scenes work has been done to enable GPU acceleration for the Windows version of Affinity Photo in 1.9. In theory this should have no consequences for macOS / iOS users - but it’s likely that a couple of things will have become broken along the way. We are giving ourselves a longer beta period with 1.9 in order to find and fix those things.
This also means that the full complement of new features is not available yet in this 1.9 beta - more will be added over the coming weeks.
Thanks again for your continued support!
 
Affinity Photo Team  
 
Changes Since 1.9.0
- The “Serif Labs” RAW engine is now available on iPad.
- Added external display support for iPad (in the navigator panel, once the external display is connected).
- You can now single tap a spare channel in the Channels panel to edit it like a layer.
- A benchmarking tool has been added in the preferences dialog.
- Blend modes now work on “alpha only” layers (masks, adjustments, live filters, etc.).
- Added a new “Divide” blend mode.
- Added “Create from centre” for the elliptical marquee tool.
- Allowed snapping to the bounds of the pixel selection.
- Added ability to create brushes from the current pixel selection with one click.

Hi @konstantnnn,
Tap the Document menu, select Assistant and change the RAW Engine dropdown (left column on bottom) to Serif Labs to use our engine instead of Apple (Core Image RAW) provided by Apple/iOS.

As far as I understand before this beta 1.9 they used the Apple RAW engine, now they use their own. Apple’s engine does not support compressed RAW, from 1.9 on Affinity will support this file format.

The lack of warp and transform and mesh tools is one of the biggest reasons I can't fully move to Affinity designer as my go-to vector application and have to still hang on to an outdated OS to run my copy of Adobe CS6. I design t-shirts for a living and daily use the warping and transform functions to accomplish text effects. I agree that these features seem basic to any vector design app - but then again, so does a blob tool, a smooth tool, pure 100% vector brushes, select-same-as, and boolean operations that when merging objects, does not leave behind thousands of useless nodes, or make selections disappear, or freeze the app.
I love Affinity, but the years of waiting has been a real struggle with no explanations why

Is there a way to preset the alignment panel before implementing an alignment option? It's always set automatically to a grayed out option until I choose an alignment first and that skews my selection across the entire page instead of what I usually prefer. Wouldn't it be easier if we have the selection made on our page, to be able to choose the align-to reference first?

The lack of warp and transform and mesh tools is one of the biggest reasons I can't fully move to Affinity designer as my go-to vector application and have to still hang on to an outdated OS to run my copy of Adobe CS6. I design t-shirts for a living and daily use the warping and transform functions to accomplish text effects. I agree that these features seem basic to any vector design app - but then again, so does a blob tool, a smooth tool, pure 100% vector brushes, select-same-as, and boolean operations that when merging objects, does not leave behind thousands of useless nodes, or make selections disappear, or freeze the app.
I love Affinity, but the years of waiting has been a real struggle with no explanations why

Thanks for sharing those @Frozen Death Knight I'll have to follow @Andy Somerfieldmore - he's more revealing of what is coming in 1.9 than those on the Designer side! Some of the things he mentioned I can see being applied to both Designer and Photo

Hi BoldLineDesign
Before I reply, i saw your art work. It’s killer! Nice work! I work in the apparel industry myself. Mostly High end color separations..
Color Separation AP will work on all three. IPad, Mac and Windows. I think I got carried away with the iPad talk when I realized I could do my simulated process and halftones on my iPad now. Rather than my outdated CS5.  
Color Separation AP does do an underbase as well as a highlight white. You can export your seps to individual files. And that’s how I’ve been doing it myself. I normally print all of the Photoshop channels to PDF and still do for some customers but a lot of times I can export to EPS straight from Affinity Photo or Design to my customers email. That also works well if my customer has a last minute sep change on one screen while the job is on the press and time is ticking. That’s handy.
Distribution wise, Etsy has worked better than I thought it would. I’ve been selling Photoshop and Corel add ons for about a year there. Slowly building it. Color Separation AP is the Second function available for Affinity Photo. The first being Blackline. Which makes line art from photos. More to come. I have several domains and when I get more time will likely Wordpress those up as well. I think Ebay will be another possibility.
Thanks for your kind words. Affinity Photo And Design have changed the way I work hugely for the better. I am missing my scripting, warping, custom indexing, sizing halftone by lpi, batch automation and a few other things but I’m able to use Affinity Photo 90% of my day. 
Thanks again BoldLineDesign

Hi Taustin,
This is Steve Yates, the creator of Color Separation AP (the color separator with the catchy name)  
Thanks for posting this link. If you have any questions please let me know I be happy to chime in.
Thanks again
Steve

I think this causes the biggest frustration..