[Lack of robust bézier handling tools]

This is a proposal for an alternative way of interacting with Béziers that is lacking in the consumer vector design program space, though most of these have existed for years or decades with font design tools. I wrote it up to outline some key problems with vector handling in Affinity Designer and suggest a potential solution.

1. Diagnosis: "robust"

Currently Affinity Designer has a flimsiness problem with its current bezier tools. What I mean is that once a change to curvature must be made, it is difficult to make it consistently and parametrically. A "robust" set of tools is one in which the behaviours are consistent, expectable, and where as many transformations as possible can be done incrementally (i.e. without relying on the mouse motion to drag things into place). It should be possible to access basic transformations (translate, scale, rotate, skew) on any parts of the curvature (segments, anchors, BCPs, whole objects) in any combination, independantly of one another, with no unnecessary steps.

We can move anchor points and their BCPs ('handles', Bezier Control Points) with the mouse pointer, and we can snap them, but we can only use the anchors themselves to apply transformations or shift them with arrow keys. We also have no good way of applying transformations to even the anchors themselves if the group we wish to transform belongs to more than 1 vector layer. What this inevitably means is that for relatively simple transformations of curvature, if one does not settle for changing handle positions individually, they are required to set up elaborate grids, relying on the snapping mechanics of anchors and BCPs, which does work to achieve a final goal, but is not good for exploring a range of possibilities. If the same transformation has to be made to another part of the curvature (let alone one at an angle relative to the original), that necessitates extensive re-positioning. There are also many lacking aspects of managing curvature, such as no good ways of adding BCPs to straight line segments, inconsistent results in converting between smooth and sharp anchors, and no way to move an anchor point between its BCPs.

2. Applicability

Though I will propose many features found in e.g. font design software, this is not an attempt to turn Affinity Designer into a makeshift font editor or anything of the like. Since the software is relatively specialised and I imagine not many users of the Affinity suite have experience with it, I am bringing the lack of its features to light because I think anyone who uses Béziers would find them useful in their process, but it is impossible to desire what one doesn't know to exist. More robust Bézier tools touch on every aspect of vector work and make significantly easier the processes of, for example, editing expanded typography, designing ornaments, designing frames, creating precise logos or icons, digitising raster drawings, ensuring consistency in curvature (+ removing 'sharp points'), fine-tuning masks, creating consistent shapes not covered by the shape tools, working on anything technical where things like G-continuity and/or consistency of curvature make a significant impact, or even reliably editing meshes, which at the moment is extremely labourious. Currently Illustrator has the same problem; often editing a mesh for a specific purpose is more trouble than it's worth, given that the end result is not even guaranteed to be good and may need to be adjusted later.

3. Examples of robust vector tools

Most good examples of good vector handling are common within font tools, which is not very suprising given that their premise is precise vector output. For that reason I think Designer could pick up a few things common in font tools. The absence of these features in regular vector design programs could be partly because they create a lot of visual complexity with even a small number of elements. However, as I will propose later down the line, Designer already has a solution to allowing different types of editing and hiding their visual clutter which would make it possible to isolate selected objects and allow editing them comprehensively. Below are some examples of what I outlined before and a brief summary.

In Glyphs, BCPs can be selected independantly from their anchors and are given their own bounding box. They may be nudged by arrows or transformed by scaling or rotating by dragging or with precise parameters. Option-clicking on a straight line segment places both missing BCPs on the line segment. Double-clicking on an anchor point or pressing 'return' with any number of anchors selected turns them from a corner points (blue) to a smooth points (orange) — meaning the BCPs on their sides are always aligned. Being able to toggle between these two options is extremely useful, especially if it is possible to ensure only one BCP realigns (currently affinity designer displays smooth anchors as round but with the same colour which should be editable separately, and when converting from sharp to smooth, both BCPs change position. I think there should be an option to have a more predictable behaviour in that place) Also notice how despite being two separate objects, all the BCPs and anchors can be selected and transformed together.

There was already a post that suggested the option to view curvature combs. I will not reiterate their usefulness, only specify that the option to display them is in my view a useful tool to model Béziers with precision.
On the right of the image is a use case of having clearly defined corner and smooth points in curvature; the BCP on the right of the orange point always aligns with the line that leads into the point, thus moving it around always generates a straight line that curves downwards without performing any additional steps. This is not a call for 'that specific feature.' Rather I am attempting to demonstrate that some simple shifts in how the curves are handled can be very powerful for editing and exploring within the program. I believe many font tools are at the current 'apex' of the power the user has by virtue of nothing other than just their handling of Bézier curves.    

There area also more specific vector tools that make mundane tasks much easier. The I-disconnector, for instance, is similar to the knife tool, except it also allows a specified amount of overlap to be generated. The disconnectors in general are useful for breaking down more complicated shapes with minimal effort. I could understand such things never making their way to the program. I put them into this post only to demonstrate how many core vector features are possible (but largely unexplored) within software like Designer or Ai for simplifying mundane daily tasks that consume a long time when they must be done.

Brief list of integral features for precise editing of vector paths:

1. Independently selectable anchor points and BCPs (independent of one another and the selected object in the layers window)
2. A convenient way to rotate and scale from an anchor point. The current behaviour of having to manually drag the anchor point from the centre of selection each time is too slow. This feature is good for layers because they remember where their anchor point is, but for more temporary selections another solution should exist.
3. More consistent conversion between smooth and corner anchors and possibility to display the distinction clearer
4. Curvature combs
5. On hold of [whatever key modifier] and arrow keys, the selected BCP moves along side an extension of its original 'line' from its anchor point (this already happens with shift-dragging) and on hold of [the same modifier] the smooth anchor point is moved between its BCPs and the corner point is moved independently of its BCPs, such that in both cases only the anchor is moved and the BCPs stay in place (both with arrows and with mouse dragging).

Below are some of the sources of features and potential sources of additional features that would benefit Affinity Designer in my view. The reason I list them is to show the breadth of how much can be done with Bézier curves alone, and why all those features could be placed into a Persona of its own (however radical or far-fetched it may feel). I would however suggest improving the basics of curve handling before an application of any of these is considered. 

• Most of the proposed features come directly from Glyphs 3. There is of course much more to Glyphs. I could only wish for its segment component functionality to make its way to Designer's Symbols window. 
• The disconnectors come from DTL FM2. They are available in DTL LetterModeller. It can be a bit tricky to get into the font editor in LeMo. It has a lot of other really useful features that I didn't mention because I intend this post to primarily propose features that would be 'unlocked' to the user with only a difference in the handling of existing functionality within the software. However one 'separatable' feature I particularly like is the Shift Smooth, which is a way of moving an anchor point and recalculates all 4 BCPs of its adjecent line segments to maintain the smoothness of curvature.
• The curvature combs I showed come from Yanone's Speedpunk, which is a FOSS extension to RoboFont and Glyphs. Including this feature is part of why I am intent on proposing all these together as one Persona rather than individually — displaying this information in particular can be computationally intense if done by accident in an e.g. illustration process, so I think it should not be possible to accidentally enable it within a process that wouldn't make use of them.
• A lot of other useful functionality exists in the spaces of plug-ins for RoboFont and Glyphs. 

4. Why the proposal? Is it even suitable?

There are many things that Affinity Designer aims to be, and I know certain features, e.g. auto trace, are very often requested by people who wish to get as far away from Adobe's pricing model as they can. I notice that recently it also aims to be a bit of precision tool, allowing import and editing of CAD files which can also be locked behind an oppressive subscription. I believe that this is a strong point for both, providing features that most people would use and find indispensible after having tried them, and ones that people who need precision would be very happy about. They strenghten the core of what a vector design program is. The people who need precision are not just the few who cannot live without CAD support within Affinity Designer, but also anyone who e.g. designs a precise icon or logo, customises type for a large poster or mural, or just isn't sure where the object they want lies on the scale from squircle to circle to diamond, and doesn't have 4 hours to set up an elaborate grid and move the BCPS one by one, through one iteration by another.

The reason I think Affinity Designer is uniquely suited for these features is because though they make life much easier, they can introduce a lot of visual clutter, which Designer already has a way of dealing with; the Personas. Dedicating one entirely to much stronger vector functionality seems to me like a good place for features that are sorely missing from the entire space, one only this particular program could provide effectively as it stands (which is why I elected to put this proposal here rather than e.g. sending it to Adobe, whatever that could have accomplished.) I am also admittedly a bit sick of creating a new font file whenever I want to edit an SVG with a modicum of speed and accuracy, despite having access to both Designer and Adobe Illustrator.

To end my million-word bézier novella, I want to clarify that it doesn't matter to me how the issues I brought up are addressed if only they are. The methods used by font software are of course tried and working well; everyone I know with experience using font tools tends to edit paths within them, even if that means having to paste them from and back into other software, not to mention reposition them. If nothing changes about Affinity Designer, then that is just what I will keep on doing, but I think it would be neat if this functionality was more accessible. To anyone yet unconvinced, I urge you to download a free trial of FontLab (mac/win) or Glyphs (mac only) and spend a few hours editing paths within them, then see how you feel after returning to Designer. A testimony on the Glyphs website says: "After using Glyphs, the pen tool in Illustrator feels like carving a chicken with a chainsaw." That it does, and I'm afraid Designer currently feels quite the same, but it has the potential to make Illustrator feel like that in comparison.

[Live Filters in Affinity Designer & Live filters and effects to objects in the Appearance panel]

1) Live filters
Considering the Affinity Photo and Designer files are exactly the same, why not allow Affinity Designer users to use the live filters Affinity Photo provides if they own Affinity Photo, at the very least? 
The filters tend to be useful and would provide a 'short term' scalable (semi vector, scales as long as it's in its native software) replacement to vector distortions Adobe Illustrator provides before we get the actual vector distortions. 
And yes, I know there is that "Edit in Photo" button, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who wants their workflow to consist of as little software as possible? Isn't it why Affinity Publisher has all 3 programs capabilities in it, providing you bought the other ones?
Perhaps in the future, some live filters, such as perspective or twirl could be expandable into actual vectors, similarly to how Illustrator's distortions work. We'd basically get the same thing in Affinity Designer, and I feel like vector distortions are important to so many people.

2) Live filters and effects in the Appearance panel
isn't this one self-explanatory? I feel like it kinda is. Let's say that I want to blur just one stroke on an object with a couple of strokes and fills.. or if I wanted to give one of the fills an effect from the effects panel? I'd have to work my way around it and create several separate vector shapes. and while we're at effects and distortions for paths, a great one to be able to give to strokes or fills in *general, not just the appearance panel* is offset paths. If I wanted to achieve a negative offset path effect on a fill in Affinity Designer, I'd have to add a stroke to the vector, expand it and subtract from the vector. And if I want to change the offset later, I've got a problem.
effects on individual appearance layers are incredibly powerful (esp offset paths)
Path offsets help even more with fills on advanced and/or annoying shapes

[Freeform Gradient tool]

This and a gradient mesh tool for more fun with gradients!

[Convert Layer effects to curves?]

I've been playing around with affinity designer and I was trying to make some font corrections when I spotted this problem; I found no way to convert layer effects to vectors, more specifically, the layer's stroke. Is there a way to do this? To expand curves to layer effects and include them in so that they are regarded when I i.e. use geometry functions using them?

[Merging Curves Layers?]

(Introduction to the problem, not really important)

Hey! I've just been playing around in affinity photo coloring my text with gradients and I decided to give it a 3d feel, so I copied the black text twice, moved the top one a bit on the left, selected the 2nd text and 3rd one (moved to the left) and went to geometric functions to subtract the moved to left part from the copied text essentially creating a 3d side. I used a gradient on the letter and a reversed gradient on the side to give it a real nice 3d feel.

Now, here's the problem;

When I wanted to combine the 2 layers to create a single curves layer I spotted a problem. Affinity wants to keep as many coloring functions still available when the layers are merged and so when I do it using geometric functions (add) one of the parts gets the same gradient as the other one or they both loose color and I can't set them both separate different gradients.

So that's the question;

Is there a way to merge 2 curves/text/element/curve layers, no matter which one with which one to keep all the gradients they had before merging? I found rightclick>geometry>add not working and neither the merge down function so I start getting worried I would need to export the file as svg every time I wanted to merge 2 gradient colored objects to get them as 1.

Any help?

Thanks