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AuthorAuthor

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Posts posted by AuthorAuthor

  1. On 12/20/2017 at 11:26 AM, Ben said:

    Thought I'd give you a glimpse of some of the features that will be coming in 1.7

    - Place Image tool

    Does "place" mean to import a placeholder, a la Adobe's terminology, or actually embedding image in doc?
    Any chance Designer will get more drawing tools, specifically a Bezier tool for making smooth curves?

     

    TIA,

     

    Gary
     

     

     

    On 12/20/2017 at 11:26 AM, Ben said:

     

     

  2. 11 hours ago, InfoCentral said:

    I have that book...pages 4 & 5.  :22_stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

    Thank you for being one of the five people who can be called "readers" :D. Seriously, perhaps my advice wasn't spot on. MikeW knows his desktop publishing like no other, while I have a firm grasp of what a desktop is.

    It's a mistake to get into digital imaging without knowing the relevant difference between raster (bitmap) and vector graphics. And the difference between resizing and resampling. Vector graphics are resolution independent—this usually means you can print a vector graphic, and make a bitmap copy of it to any size you like, and there is no blurring or jagged edges. Bitmaps are resolution dependent. The size of the graphic measure in real world units (inches, mms ) is inversely proportional to an image's resolution (how many color unit make up the image per measurement unit).

    Small example: if you rescale (resize) a picture that's 4" × 4"  and is 300 pixels per inch—to twice its original size, the image will look exactly the same, except it will be exact;ly half its original perceived size.

    Better example: If you zoom in too much to an image in Affinity Photo, the pixels (the building blocks of the image) become painfully evident—unless you're really into 1970s video games. It's because bitmap images by their very construction, are dependent on the resolution to which they were created or resized.

     

     

    resolutiion dependent.jpg

  3. Hi MacCesar, and Mike—

     

    The problem is the way you're seeing an equation here, and it as to do with real world measurements. Let's say as per your example, you have a Designer document open. You're busted right there! How large is the document, in physical measurements? Remember in school that you can't solve for c,  without both a +b. I tend to live in the past, like 9th grade, sorry!

    Your measurement of resolution makes sense out of the other two units. Say you're bragging over a new car, "Oh, you wouldn't believe this Bad Boy: It goes from 0 to 140 in 5 seconds!"
    I'm not impressed because there is no value for the numerator Yeah, okay we might presume the idiot (for speeding!) was traveling 140 miles per hour, but you always need to be explicit in Math. Math is unforgiving. The non-presumptuous, but stupid friend might figure the car goes 140 inches per hour, or 3 furlongs, or it might go around the diameter of a fresh pizza in an hour.

    Okay, I've heard all kinds of fractional; terms from samples/inch—I'm an Ugly American and I use inches;  use ml or whatever is convenient for you— to dots per inch which is never the same as printed dots per inch so avoid this physical measurement.

    Bored yet? I thought so, so here comes "the real deal" that I couldn't possibly write into the forum! The book from which this chapter was pulled is not for sale anymore, therefore I don't collect royalties, therefore rights revert to the Author. Author contracts spell out this sort of stuff.

    Just click here, seeing as it's just a tinch too large—even optimized for the forum server to take it Next best thing is Dropbox

    here

     

    My Best,

    Gary

    watermelon vector.jpg

    watermelon pixel.jpg

  4. Just an uneducated thought. It's beyond me—literally; I'm not an engineer— how vector drawing programs such as Xara Designer and CorelDRAW, and Inkscape, too, can load about 3× as fast as other programs that use the same system fonts.

    Might the speed issue be because some programs don't read the metrics, but only the binary info, upon launch?

  5. Hi Make—

    Drops caps were just an example, not the best one, admittedly I find, after due deliberation and actually experimenting before complaining here (!) that the Assets palette fits the bill for adding re-occurring elements. For me, however, I will need to keep the UI Light under Preferences, because it's hard to see a saved element that is all black.

    Thanks again!

     

    Gary

    Too dark.png

  6. Well. Yeah. That's about as useful as a cup of decaf.
    Seriously, this isn't a new technology for drawing software. Even the Open Source Inkscape features a cube tool whose result can be set and reset at any perspective, and subsequent 3D boxes adhere to the same vanishing point as the first in the document. Which is hardly thrilling until you notice that they make a good template for text and other shapes.

    Bucket list? Please? Please?

    box tool.png

  7. I have a request that might be best for all products, including APub. CorelDRAW has had a Symbols Manager and an Insert Character palette for years, and like a pasteboard, it's a great way to quickly add an element that is reused a lot, somewhat like MS-Word's Insert Special.Example? You have copied an ornamental cap, and want to use it as a drop cap over and over again In DRAW, more or less, you drag the symbol off a palette to add it to, the document.

     

    If I've exlained this satisfactorily, is this do-able down the road?

     

    TIA,

     

    Gary

     

    clip tray.png

  8. On 1/30/2018 at 2:40 PM, Bri-Toon said:

    If I'm understanding this correctly, it would be nice if Designer were to have a perspective tool; that's what they call it in CorelDRAW and Xara, in any event. It cannot adjust a group of shapes across more than two dimensional planes, because everything you draw in Designer is a 2D plane But you can simulate the look, and it helps to have the target group bound to a rectangular shape, so you can use the shape to align the four sides of the target group, to say, a photo of a blank billboard.

    I would love to see such a feature, and I'm only pointing to programs that have a perspective feature—and an enveloping feature—to make quick work of putting something "inside" the background rather than on top of.  Ihope this is of some use! :)

     

     

     

    perpective 1.png

    perspective 2.png

  9. 1 hour ago, MEB said:

    Hi Gary,

    I've split/moved this post to its own thread in the Feature Requests section (the dev teams do look for suggestions/improvements here). This is a general improvement request that applies to all Affinity apps. It would be eventually lost/missed mixed in the original Affinity Publisher thread. We also have a Share your work section where everyone is welcome to share/post their work with Affinity apps. Please consider adding your work there instead.

    I'll do that, thanks! One of the worst things a new member can do is to post all over the place. Thanks again for the heads up!

  10. All right; let me get relevant here :) : This applies to Designer, Photo and APub when it eventually hits the streets. The right-click context menu is not contextual. It displays the same options when, let's say the Pen tool, and the Node tool are selected, as so:

    Here's a screen snag of the drawing program I've been using for the past 20 years:

    This just makes sense, doesn't it? Let's just suppose I'm working in APub right now, I've got the Text tool highlighting several words If I right-click, I'd love (expect) options for rEVERSE cASE, Title Case, lowercase, and so on. If I right-click on a ruler, I'd expect to be offered Units, Zeroing the ruler, Create Decimal tabs, not exactly what I'm suggest, but do you understand what I wish for? More power out of an existing feature.

    TIA & My Best,

    Gary Bouton
    [Author Author]

     

     

    AD's context menu.png

    X Context Menu.png

  11. I'd say if we are indeed off-topic: who cares? There are forums all around us that are graphics-oriented and they are waning. Seriously; tolerance and a sense of humour will make the Affinity boards thrive.

    And yes, magazines are published, and in a way diskettes contain data, similar to magazines, QED not off-topic!

    BTW, everyone: If you're a mom, Happy Mother's Day. And if you are the product of a mom, or have a mom, wish them a happy day. And because this forum contains carefully laid out content, I'm just self-publishing here...

    Happy Mother's Day tg.jpg

     

    I'm really stretching it, aren't I?

  12. Ah, I recall when they'd put a floppy in a magazine! I became a SharWare/FreeWare/VirusWare (!), and ShovelWare junkie!

    Then along came data CDs. I have a basement full of them. Someone at a tech forum suggested that they make reflective, shiny, really ugly Christmas tree ornaments.
    Let's see how long the thumb drive can hang in their before bleeding edge makes it a curiosity.
     

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