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paristo

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  1. When I heard Affinity Photo, it was years ago and it just for my luck was in -50% sale. It was no brainer to pict it up for 25 € price tag. Then when Affinity Designer was released, I waited some time and it came as well in sale for -50% and I picked it up. It is my least used Affinity app, as I prefer for many things in Inkscape. Then when Affinity Publisher was released, again picked up in -50% sale. It is great when you need to do in horry some PDF's, but many ways I still prefer Scribus for layout. But what I dislike overall in almost all PDF layout apps, is that they are not fully compatible with all features that Adobe push to PDF format. Like example interactive PDF creation is severely lacking various levels across alternatives to Adobe Acrobat. Anyways, I am going to upgrade all Affinity apps to v2.0 ASAP, just to show more support for Affinity, as I have benefitted so much using their software. And almost what ever they are going to release (or just announce) on 9th for new.... I likely get it. The Teaser video was very well made. Exactly what such should be about.
  2. Adding my voice here. I am currently making multi-page contract template and was shocked that we can't add a form field. A so simple thing as that is missing? Sure a Affinity Publisher can be argued to be for publishing as a print medium tool, but at this digital era end when printers and scanners are more and more being left far behind the digital document management and publishing should be a high in a priority list. But there are temporary solution for the problem many has. It is to use the well known Open Source publishing software "Scribus" that is as well available for OS X as for Windows. So you can at least create there the forms in it.
  3. No.... As "Acrobat I love to use" is for many not true. What most people need (they are not content creators etc) is very few things. 1) Open the PDF and have a proper layout/fonts and all that. This is where Serif production comes to play. You get proper viewing experience. Index system is a bonus. 2) If the PDF has forms, then you should be able to fill them. This is requirement on today digital world where you need to get even simple form filled and printed. People don't even anymore know how to use a pen as they are so custom to use keyboard. Those two are the main two basic things that needs to be there. What other "special features" does some people need? 3) Insert or Remove a pages from PDF file and resave it. 4) Annotate/highlight the document text, pictures etc. 5) Sign the PDF file with digital signature (this is legal requirement, and not so critical really...) Preview does the most common required things. That is why it exist there as Apple understands that this way they provide user the basics. You can fill the forms and save the document for later use. The preview even supports signature with touchpad or even digital one. You can write your signature on the piece of paper and Preview will use the webcam to capture it and you can add it properly to PDF signature field with automatic white background removal. And this brings the main benefit of this, the publicity. The marketing effort. Affinity is pretty unknown among majority of the people. They become familiar with the Adobe with the Adobe Reader that they need to get. Microsoft strikes back with excellent PDF support in the Edge, so they can get more users from Chrome. Having a simple standalone and installable PDF reader from Serif would be beneficial to get people more aware of the Affinity Photo, Designer and Publisher (and up coming DAM). Affinity already needs to produce all the PDF features, they have the code and all.
  4. Almost all of them don't have the basic features only and even when trying to offer more doesn't do it so well. As you have explained the options are very few. Idea is that Serif already needs to develop lot of things for the PDF support in all their products, especially the Publisher. I don't see need for any major PDF specific application as addition to Photo, Designer and Publisher to allow people work with the PDF files. Instead put all that effort to core elements in those three applications. So if someone needs to work a lot with printshops, then buy these primary three versions as required. But the simple PDF reader that can nicely show the files without requirement to load Affinity applications (and hence to own them) and this way get more marketing for their primary products when people would get use to simple lightweight PDF application to open files. This is as well reason why Adobe maintains their free reader as they want to get people custom to their products, then get them to monthly fee business etc. Majority of the work is already done by Serif for their other applications, question is more really about selecting good set of basic features and make a dedicated reader so one application less from others to have installed to read PDF files and to create them with other Affinity applications.
  5. The Affinity Designer and Affinity Publisher are coming nicely together for producing PDF files for publication, but I see now in the patch notes like in 1.9 release, that lots of features has been added to support more advanced PDF features for the import and export. That gave an idea, how about if Affinity would offer a free (yes, a FREE) PDF reader? There is always the free Adobe Acrobat Reader (Acrobat Pro DC) that is marketing their other Adobe products. And now the Acrobat can as well sign, edit and of course view the PDF files. And this is something that Windows is still really lacking, a great lightweight simple PDF reader. So I have the wish that Affinity could offer their core PDF reader features as free reader, with very minimal user interface, support just some very minimal things like example filling the forms and signing the document digitally. But otherwise be a "stepping stone" for people to get aware about Affinity Publisher and Affinity Designer etc as suite. I really see a market potential to have small, lightweight installer for "Affinity Reader" that would support better then the Affinity applications when needed to quickly find the proper PDF files etc. As the Affinity Publisher is already the "Create and Edit PDF's" but it is terrible PDF reader. And if the "Affinity Reader" could be even a standalone exe, that you can just copy with your files to be able present them elsewhere without other applications, it could be great feature. It could even actually be a "Affinity Viewer" that can read and show all the Affinity suite supported files, but no editing possibilities. But I would really like to see a PDF reader that is fast, lightweight and very simple. Something that not even a "Foxit Reader" can not offer anymore as those has become pretty complex.
  6. Even if it would be a option in settings, it would be better than nothing.
  7. Came to check that does the Affinity support DDS files and was sad that not yet. Well, maybe in the 2.x series in the future.... With all the layers and mipmaps and all....
  8. For videoeditor I use Kdenlive, as it offers all that is required in easy manner. For video clippings I use commandline (you can just copy-paste video stream data inside the container for a new file) as it is 100% lossless process unlike the media cutter files (unless you use a lossless format). For 3D animations I use blender, as it offers more than needed. For 2D animations I use Synfig or Pencil2D and considering now to use ENVE. And here comes the BUT.... I would love to have a way to make an short animated files. Nothing serious, be it just "each layer is a frame" kind. Sure it would be very nice to have a timeline so one can go in time/frames to given position and then make a path that something moves between keyframes or morph the shape from round to box etc. Just very simple and basic ones. It could be used in Affinity Photo to morph even pixel images with its Liquify Persona. We do not need full animation studio suite. That is something that requires completely own level of features. We do not need full video editor suite. Again that is so complex subject that no reasons. We do not either need 3D modeling software. Again so complex subject that just no go. So what we do need? I support idea that we need a very simple short animation feature that allows someone to get a layer to move around a given path at X seconds or make a few seconds vector changing etc. If it even would be exporting a series of image files so we can use other editors to do the actual animation, and it would be great. But the challenge really is to get some image data to be changing its form from A to B in time of X. Very simple animation, movement etc. Challenge really is that how quickly something becomes "I want more" and it is can of worms situation.
  9. I don't really see a requirement for the automatic updating. As I find the download option to be very simple. What I would take in other hand, is to avoid clicking "OK" for each time I launch app when I do not want to update it. So having just a "Help > Check Updates" option would be better for me. I as well love the function now that "Download" directs automatically to proper site and there is link to latest one as well the few previous ones. So I can download the proper file and perform the update as I want. While small automation are nice here and there, this is not one of those that requires it.
  10. In landscape photography you are same way in hurry as in wildlife photography and bracketing shots or taking high speed sequences. Sports and wildlife ain't only area that benefits from 60 FPS. So does as well macro photography. And street photography ain't only area where quick deciding moment goes in time of raising camera for shot, it happens as well in landscape photography, and even more in macro photography. Wildlife and sports photography can be done very effectively with a single frame and using manual focus, it just requires more skill and talent. But same thing is applied for landscape, macro etc. But one limitation many does have is that they set artificial restrictions by using some custom ratios, instead being free to compose by best of the content and situation, freely. When browsing old photographs, one can see that prints comes in all kind various sizes and formats when done byself in darkroom. But so many got stuck to these specific sizes in quick development and services as well now the displays. If there just would be a way to set parameter settings as default.... Right? All settings should have profiles to be saved in drop down list, and set one of them as default, as well having the factory default to ever get back to Affinity default.
  11. While related to designer, it would benefit from a simple layer based animation, where each layer is a frame. Of course timeline would be preferable by using snapshot or some other for each keyframe, but something to allow making animations with vectors (designer) and pixelmaps (photo) is needed. Export as GIF and even as MJPEG and APNG.
  12. Common keyboards US layout vs another layout dilemma. The challenge is that all these special shortcuts should be in standard letters, not behind special characters. And brush size and its other adjustments should be possible be done easily with mouse itself that is used to use it. So ctrl+drag or ctrl+alt+drag. No [ or ] buttons or similar special characters.
  13. Resolution = how many pixels in digital image width and height. Example 1920 x 1080, 800 x 600 or 3000 x 2000. Definition = how many pixels per physical area by viewing distance. Example 1280 x 720 or 1920 x 1080 viewed from 43", 50" or 55" television at 1,5 m, 2,2 or 3,1 meters. (eye limited.) Pixel density = In physical material dimensions that how many pixels are to be scanned or printed per area. Example 72 PPI, 180 PPI or 300 PPI. (pixels per inch.) Printing definition = how many ink dots (picoliters is another topic) used per area to print a single pixel. Example 300 ink dots used to print 72 pixels on inch, so 300 DPI (Dots Per Inch). (another discussion for printing) Scanning definition = how many pixels scanner reads per physical area from physical medium. Example 150 PPI, 300 PPI or 600 PPI. There is a big difference what people means with "resolution" as most do not know that digital image has no dimensions, only a resolution. And it is up to printer and scanner capabilities and settings to be used in conjuction with the physical measurements that creates a dilemma for many. And 72, 270, 300, 600 pixels/dots per inch is nothing more than a multiplier to be used with actual pixel resolution to translate physical dimensions or vice versa. And Adobe products started from movie industry where film was scanned and each frame was manipulated, and then re-exposed again for distribution to movie theaters. It as well got quickly to photoshops where printing was done. So print industry and scannin industry used it a lot, that lead to confusing use of "Resolution" and image size as physical dimensions. While image processing, storage etc is done without physical dimensions and with pure data as resolution, where individual pixel is smallest value digitally stored. In a nutshell, one works with either physical dimensions and needs to use a multiplier called "resolution" to translate between physical media, like "I scan this postcard (A6) of 148x105 mm at 300 PPI, and when I print it at 300 PPI, it will come out on paper as size of 146x105 mm. If I instead use 150 PPI then print size is A5 as it will be double in size, so dimensions are twice larger 210x148 mm and surface area is four times larger. And it will look as good so on twice further viewing distance. Why one might want to set a specific DPI/PPI value regardless physical dimensions but without changing resolution? Because they are taught to "300 DPI is high quality", but it is multiplier to resolution to inform what is input/output dimensions values.
  14. Your analogy just goes wrong, as nowhere it is discussion to port the Affinity from iOS to Windows, because that is already done. It is called Affinity Photo for Windows. The wish was about the interface, and the interface is not at all as complex as is the overall application like would be porting Affinity Photo for OS X to Windows (if that wouldn't have been already done). The Affinity Photo for iOS has own small features, but it is from its core the same code. If you have well done GUI, then you can port it cross different platforms. That example is the idea of the Qt and Java how you can fairly easily move apps across as you have one platform. The real limitation really is Windows touch functionality, it simply is terrible. But if it can be somewhat overcomed by the interface changes To make it simply better to be used touch (larger icons, functions how pop-up menus etc are shown, docked panels, new tool adjustment panels etc, there is no need to write new ways how you process image data, how filters and other functions work etc. It is after all mainly the graphical user interface change. If one has not used the iOS version, 9-to-5 mac site has fairly good presentation: https://9to5mac.com/2018/03/21/affinity-photo-for-ipad-guide-25-getting-started-tutorial-tips-video/
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