StuartRc

Infected
This is my first drawing using Affinity Designer 2.0 (A revamped version of the colourful Lena which I have not uploaded!)
It is really a test of the updates made to the Brush Dynamics in Affinity 2.0
Created a new set of inking brushes that makes use of interpolation and the new Distance options with the brush dynamics. I have found that the brushes are much smoother, faster and more responsive..I really like the ability of 'Distance' to allow for the tapering of the nozzle. Even though you have to adjust the direction of the graph!
Affinity Designer 2.0
original 400 x 400mm | 300dpi
Brushes inker | Comic Grunge and Concept Painter

Hi All,
Well, it’s been a pretty crazy week since the launch of V2!
This has been a real labour of love for us over the last year or so, and I can’t even begin to describe how hard the development team have worked on it. Not only getting the V2 apps launched, but also of course finally bringing Publisher to iPad. 
With this being our first paid-for upgrade there has understandably been a lot of feedback / questions around future updates and our pricing policies. I thought it was worth addressing / clarifying our position on some of these personally...
Updates to V2 moving forward
Buying V2 not only gets you all the new features you have seen, but we have various updates planned – including many more new features and improvements – which you will get for free. This will continue until such a time that V3 is released. We’re not sure exactly when V3 will be, but I can confirm we are not going to move to anything as regular as an annual upgrade cycle as has been speculated.
It’s worth saying too that V2 does include many under-the-hood changes to our underlying technology, and we have also been investing in several new areas of research recently. Some of these haven’t manifested themselves into new features yet, but overall V2 does give us a better platform to develop on moving forward and I’m sure you will be pleased with the updates V2 will receive.
Updates to V1 moving forward
While we did say on the FAQ that V1 would no longer receive any updates, I want to clarify that was about new feature updates. We will be updating V1 to fix any critical problems caused by operating system updates in the future. So if the next version of macOS breaks V1 we will endeavour to fix it. There will be a point in time when continuing to maintain V1 in this way will not be tenable, but certainly for the foreseeable future we will continue to patch. In fact, we have an update to V1 queued up for release very shortly with some fixes for Ventura and issues caused by a recent Windows security / quality update. 
We will update our FAQ shortly to make that clearer for everyone.
Offer period
In case you didn’t see, I’m pleased to confirm we have decided to run this initial launch offer until 14th December to give everyone the best chance possible to get it if they wish / have a decent amount of time to trial it. 
Upgrade pricing
It’s been really hard to see some of the comments about us not looking after our existing customers – we’re pretty devasted that anyone feels like that to be honest. But the fact is we felt our hands were tied somewhat with being able to offer upgrade pricing in a fair way. The main reason for this was App Store customers (which make up around 35% of our userbase). The problems with that are two-fold: firstly, we didn’t have a way from within V1 to validate an App Store purchase receipt to reliably ensure customers who were entitled to an upgrade could get one; and secondly, we could not find a good way for people to get that discount via the App Store. Us pushing upgrade customers to go exclusively via our own site (including customers who were previously acquired via the app stores) may also have put us in violation of App Store Ts & Cs which we were obviously concerned about.
I’m not saying that these issues were completely insurmountable, but any solutions we came up with would be messy, and most importantly could have resulted in some bona fide V1 customers struggling to get validated and claim their discount. We certainly don’t have the support resource here if we ended up needing to manually validate tens of thousands of receipts for example.
The only option we felt was safe to move forward with was a general launch offer, which would guarantee that every V1 customer could get the discount, whether they purchased directly through us or the App Stores. We knew a side effect of that would mean some new customers would end up receiving that same discount – but we felt that was a better option than V1 customers missing out. It’s also worth saying that while there has been some good press about V2, all our main marketing has been via email and through social media to our followers. In other words, we felt ok about it because we knew the vast majority of people who would find out about it or take advantage of the offer would be existing customers. I would be surprised if over the offer period customers upgrading from V1 didn’t make up more than 90% of our sales.
Overall I do believe us giving a 40% discount, along with the addition of the new Universal Licence of course, is offering fantastic value for money for those who want to upgrade. 
However, taking on board some of the feedback there is something extra we can do – we will offer a new free bundle of content exclusively for V1 customers upgrading to V2 as an extra thank you for your support. I’ve seen this suggested by a number of customers and it’s a great idea as it does remove the App Store conflict entirely. 
We’ll need a little time to put something together, but all customers who previously registered or purchased V1 and have since upgraded to V2 will receive a voucher code for this via email as soon as we can.
A comment on no subscription
I do want to say that some of the points above are exactly the reason why software companies move to subscription. Whatever you do with upgrade pricing, you still have the issue of customers who bought the previous version 3 months ago vs. those who have had it 2+ years. Offering perpetual licences also gives the additional overhead of needing to maintain the previous version longer than you would if everyone was on subscription / generally always on the latest version.
We are a small team so some of these complications are not ideal — all we really want to do is focus on developing our latest codebase, push out regular updates and continue with our mission to make great creative software accessible to everyone. 
But it does need to be funded somehow. We know you love our no-subscription model, but there also needs to be a level of appreciation that the alternative is having paid-for upgrades from time to time. That unfortunately comes with its own problems.
All of that said, I have to say we have been blown away with the response to V2 - around 3 times as many people have upgraded in the last week than we expected - and we really can't thank you enough for the support you have shown. More than anything the success of this upgrade puts us in a great place to continue investing heavily in development which is ultimately what it's all about, and we’re super excited to crack on with some great updates coming next year!
All the best,
Ash

Personally, I have no problem with dots to indicate Activity and Visibility, I would just suggest using solid and hollow dots to indicate ON and OFF status, not brightness of dots.

Solid/hollow dot is a visually understandable and unambiguous, and also saves space in the Layers panel (thanks for that).

Shot with a Sony A7 and a Samyang 14mm F2.8
 
1) File > Merge to HDR
2) Select your bracket
3) Uncheck Tonemap (you can do it later)
4) Edit in developer persona
 

I was asked to create a new visual persona for an indigenenous organisation in Cooktown in Far Nth. Queensland, Australia. I came up with this image as a metaphor for drawing from tradition to give to the community. I seem to spend all my time in Affinity Designer and now that V2 has arrived I feel confident to go exploring (and finishing artwork) in A Photo. These pieces could definitely have benefitted from the virtues of pixel art

Infected
This is my first drawing using Affinity Designer 2.0 (A revamped version of the colourful Lena which I have not uploaded!)
It is really a test of the updates made to the Brush Dynamics in Affinity 2.0
Created a new set of inking brushes that makes use of interpolation and the new Distance options with the brush dynamics. I have found that the brushes are much smoother, faster and more responsive..I really like the ability of 'Distance' to allow for the tapering of the nozzle. Even though you have to adjust the direction of the graph!
Affinity Designer 2.0
original 400 x 400mm | 300dpi
Brushes inker | Comic Grunge and Concept Painter

Have a look here I am sure you will find something you can use.
The outline brush is interesting:
There is also a working (WIP) brush set for alcohol brushes which can create this kind off effect. It has not been updated to V2 yet but it will still import!
Calligraphy: Project Brush 19: Inker Affinity 2.0 and 1.0
Textures :Dots | Splatter and Stipple : Project Brush 28 Ink Stipple Or Project Brush 03: Big T
Fur: An older set but still functional
 

I've always loved the design and scale of some of the crop circles. Who cares how they ended up in some poor farmer's field. It has been a hobby of mine to rejig the phenomenon in Affinity Designer. Now V2 is out I'm looking fwd to new versions. Let me know what you think

Absolutely!...couldn't agree more...'There is nothing you cannot do'.... I like that! .The real discussion should be about what you can learn and achieve.. especially with the newly added tools and features...not whether you not appreciate the colour of an icon or shape of a button.
Well said😀

Amen to that! I used to administrate and moderate some public MMO game fora with hundreds of thousands of members each for more than a decade.
Unfortunately, most forum users think a forum would represent the overall opinion among all users. But with just a tiny bit of common sense one would figure out that this can't be right.
Persons who are annoyed about something far quicker want to vent out their frustration in places like a public forum than the vast majority of users, who will never find their ways into the forum and/or comment something "Yeah, the apps just do what they should - working fine for me".

Once again, wonderful work!

Affinity Photo V2 with a little help from GMIC plugin.

LOL!  Wow, I can't believe some of the petty complaints here.  I'm very happy with it so far, especially the non-destructive raw editing.

@R C-R and @carl123
 
I  can only completely agree with both of you. When I bought the Affinity Suite years ago (I have two licences), I received a nice discount for one of them for which I am grateful. I find the hugh 40% discount for everybody very generous and fair from Serif.
Am I more important with my 2 licences than somebody with 1 licence? Definatelly not! When I look around on this community, I see people helping people voluntarily to a great extend, I see astonishing artwork created and shared by members here. That are the people who earn even a much greater discount than myself.
The discount is a true bargain for everybody. And above all, people receive new features and tools which makes their workflow easier and faster. Instead of whining, people should explore these new tools, see how much they can push them to the limits, start creating and earning money! That is the only way to go to let Affinity pays itself back.
Creativity is the answer to succes, not the discount you received. Even at full price, Affinity will pay itself back for me.
I want to close this subject by telling to people who feel disappointed because others receive the same discount:
"be happy and gratefull for the nice discount you receive and grant other people the same joy!".
Be happy and positive!
Chris

When Serif first released APhoto I was offered a discounted price to buy it. I was certainly not an existing or loyal user at the time.
I took up their offer and have used the software ever since to do my work and make loads of money over the years.
Now they are offering me and new users 40% off for the next Version of their software.
That seems to me that Serif are rewarding their existing customers and allowing the next generation of users to get the same opportunities and earnings potential that I got many years ago

Why should new users not also be given the same opportunity I had, many years ago, to get the software at a discounted price?
If your sole argument is that you should have got a better discount than new users you are shooting yourself in the foot.
The bigger discount Serif offers to new users the more will purchase it and Serif can grow quicker and thus implement all the fixes and new features we all want

"Be careful what you wish for" and "Don't cut off your nose to smite your face" are two phrases that spring to mind

If you claim to be loyal customers then you should be supporting anything that helps Serif grow not whinging on like a 12 year old child that believes he should get better/bigger Christmas presents than his 10 year old brother because he was the first born.
Some people need to grow up and see the bigger picture

Thank you for your comments! I totally agree!.. been a bit frustrating reading comments that are dominating the Forum at the moment.. So a few things to consider...
1. Version 2.0 is, overall a fantastic new release with so many useful features helping to improve workflow and offering some significant new creative solutions. many of them have been asked (or demanded!) for on this forum for years!.. I am already using it to update brushes and create some new ink drawings. It is smoother faster, more efficient and is reasonably stable!.  I personally find it a complete pleasure to work with.. but I will certainly will have to adopt my workflow to consider the array of new options.

2. When there are new releases in Apps | Software there are issues. this release is no exception. There is no way software can be developed that will work on all devices and installation configurations instantly from the moment it is released so patience would be a good option to consider.
I am completely confident that many of the emphasised issues will be resolved quickly with patch updates and version updates. 
3. The Serif team deserve congratulations and support for the release of version 2.0 I am sure it has been a lot of hard work

4. Yes! There are features that could added.. their is certainly a lot of scope for future development.. which is great!. I will be looking forward to new feature additions.
This is Version 2.0., you can easily predict that there will be 2.1, 2.2 ,2.3 +patches, etc just as there was with version 1.0. 
5. Development is not free.. it costs time, money, organisation and creative thought... something people should accept!. 
There are a lot of new features in this latest offering.. Some of which I have certainly not explored yet. Affinity 2.0 is not a little update ..but just to recap...if people take the time to watch to launch the videos and explore the apps in more detail I think you might find that the features detailed are only the 'tip of the iceberg'
In Designer (which is my favourite!😀) There are loads of new features and improvements... I don't know how many as it would take me a while to list them but!......

Some of the new features in Designer
UI mods | Document re-design and organisation | New layers Panel | Content Linking | Vector Warp | Drawing scales | New Tools: Shape Builder | Knife Tool| Measure & area Tools | Style Picker | New Selection options | Stroke Controllers | Updated Booleans | Node tool Enhancements | New options for placed content | Brush | Improvements | More Import | Export options | Multiple layer Effects

These are some of some of my favourites under the hood!:
Allow Selections to consider items inside a group | Split vector curve at midpoint | save and edit templates directly | reorder brush nozzles | List last used brushes on layers | New Distance Controller | X-ray mode | Isolation mode | Style Picker | Knife tool | Fill Holes | Remove Inner Curves |  Add a vector inside pixel layer | Flood fill reference layer |  Warp tools | Close line with Pencil
 
and once again..
Big thanks to Serif and the team for all your hard work.. much appreciated!😀



 

Odd I couldn't get it to work either well not as before
But on PC I noticed there are icons in the customize toolbar dialog for:
Merge curves | separate curves | Fill Holes | Remove Inner Curves | Cut Curves with key object

Textured Pencils
Added a set of 30 Textured Pencil Raster Brushes to Resources
Sample set as displayed
Updated for Affinity 2 but retained version 1 brush set
Affinity 01
Affinity 01: Original Brush set (Sample sheet removed)
Affinity 02
Affinity 02: Updated version 2 set with adjustment to dynamics to include Distance and Interpolate (Sample sheet as below). Replaced Linear Paint 01 with better nozzles! 

These Brushes are a bit different from my usual offering.
1. They are small
2. Rely largely on setting the blend mode to Average (something I learnt from Sketchbook Pro!)
3. Resize as you wish
4. Updated to consider Affinity 02 Brush Dynamics
5. Included samples of Base Textures
Sample Sheet


Enjoy!
Affinity 01
Project Brush - Textured Pencil.zip
Affinity 02
PB 15 - Textured Pencils A2.zip
Ink Sketch Brushes
Added a new set to supplement these brushes from the Project Brush 13:Ink Painter Set  (which is now complete)..a bit out of sync as I started them quite a while ago!
A set of 35 Ink Sketching Raster Brushes to Resources
Sample set as displayed
1. These are essentially the same as the Pencil Brushes but with adjustments to the brush dynamics and less texture..There are 2 other sets that supplement these in the InkPainter Project set (Ink & Linear)
2. Similar to brushes produced by Jake Parker for initial Inktober Project 2016
3. If you need textures/Patterns There is a set available Camouflage assets (here) ...which is also out of sync...and maybe in the wrong place!
Sample Sheet


Affinity 01
inkPainter - Sketching.zip
Affinity 02
PB 15 - Textured INK A2.zip 
 
 
 

Just for fun. Trying AP v.2.

Yeah I know, I'm lazy but that's all I'm doing (probably), it's fiddly. I wanted to see how her face would turn out. She recognised it, so that's something!

A long time!😀
Depends on what I am trying to create.. A single Inktober Drawing (which  I am still working on [Trip | Nest | Match are partially complete] )  usually is 500 x 500 mm square. I work on other sizes sometimes. It can take anything from a couple of days to a week to complete the inking and colour the background.. Which I why I never complete the challenge. Colouring can be time-consuming as well as I tend to have to paint to the edge of the raster.

The Untamed sets can take longer but tend to work on single objects and construct the image from these. The  original drawings are much larger! Like the Membrane tree is a raster drawing (black Ink) and a vector fill (initially). This helps be build assets as the images are constructed. Vectoring the base with pen creates a template you can use to draw (inking) around to create other assets. They are also scalable. So you can work on a layout pretty quickly once you have the assets.
The brush sets help a lot...finally have sets that are more efficient a lot not on the forum!. I am liking the new changes to the dynamics. You can achieve much greater fluidity in the brush.. Seems to have speeded things up lots.
I think the process is sorted now...taken some time to evolve but essentially.
a. Idea + Sketch
b. Redraw (important to do this as it will change and improve (Usually!))
c. Ink
d. Create Base Flats (essential if layering objects)
e. paint or vector inserts
...repeat

Create vector assets from drawings (which I have 1000's)

Once you have the assets, whether it is raster object or pure vector it is pretty easy to build something else.. The comic Toolkit is still W.I.P but the sample pages I just uploaded were completed in a couple of hours.. I just asset stripped the original drawings; re-sized (don't need to worry about print for this exercise!); Used masks to re-paint; blend some areas (shadows and tints) and save out to fit panel area in publisher.
 
 

Affinity Designer Image Construction
2 separate image samples reconstructed in AD 2.0 using existing assets (raster and vector elements)

Thank you Stuart

Comic Book Toolkit
It is really about building a comic Toolkit rather than Template in Publisher. Just wanted to see how feasible it is... Used images from Inktober and Untamed as they are a mix of vector and raster images + can create pages  | panels in AD and just place!
Still some work to do yet but it is getting there! Still a lot of assets to add

The test template (below) was built in Publisher but a lot of the layouts could also be constructed in Designer. 
Mask Overlay Assets (Orange)

Layout pages


Panel and Tier inserts