DragonWhimsy

In Serif's original roadmap for the Affinity suite a Lightroom alternative was listed as something they wanted to do as the fourth program of the suite. That roadmap also mentions both Publisher and the IPad apps which at the time didn't yet exist. You can see this in the forward to the Affinity Designer workbook. My theory is that when developing Publisher and the IPad apps that both Affinity Designer and Affinity Photo took real hits to their development of new features. It's likely Serif felt that those programs had lost a lot of momentum that they originally had as they just weren't being developed fast enough for its user's needs and so they decided to refocus on their main three products for the time being until they are more feature complete. I have no doubt a lightroom alternative is coming eventually. But it does seem to have been delayed for the moment.

I can't speak for the original poster but many digital painting workflows make use of photobashing which most art programs aren't very good at. It's Photoshop's main advantage over more dedicated art programs. For those people a better brush engine in the Affinity programs would free them from Adobe's high prices. I have no idea what Serif's future plans are, but I am encouraged by their recent improvements to the brush panel, the addition of the recent brushes history on a layer, the improvements to the brush creation panel, and improvements to the color mixing brush. Maybe it's an indication of more improvements to come?

That's a really useful version of what I'm talking about. I like the idea as long as in the options for that panel you can pick which of the three you wish to display. Having all three in one panel like that is a really nice option to have. Is that from a specific program or did you mock that up?

That really doesn't solve the problem because it assumes the user always uses the same brush sizes in every project and does so with the same exact brushes every time. If those two conditions are not true, then to use your workaround is to create a huge amount of what are essentially duplicate brushes that clog up the brush panel. You suggest this should just be done in the brush panel but even you admit that your workaround is "a bit laborious." It's true this wouldn't be a major feature, but it IS a nice quality-of-life feature for some users. It takes the "a bit laborious" out of the equation and just makes the experience of using the brushes flow naturally and feel better to use. And a nice bonus on top of that is this is unlikely to require much of Serif's resources to implement.

You are correct. That is indeed what I am suggesting. I should have provided an image I suppose. Sorry for any confusion.

I know many might not think this is a very sexy feature, but I'd like to suggest adding a brush size panel to the interface in both Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer. Yes, there are keyboard shortcuts, the width dropbox, and even the dial on my drawing tablet. But somehow, I just find the ability to get the exact size of brush I want with a single click much nicer than scrolling or scrubbing up and down each size increment. It feels faster and less intrusive. I hope you'll consider this, thanks for reading!

It'd be great if in Affinity Designer's Pixel Persona we could have the option to hide the pixel selection like we have in Affinity Photo. I know there are workarounds, but nonetheless it'd be very convenient to have this quality-of-life feature ported over. At one point years ago, there was a dev working on this (yes I have a very long memory) but it seems to have been forgotten about so I thought I'd post a little reminder and hopefully someone will pick it up again. Thanks for reading!

I just wanted to take a quick moment and say thank you to Serif for adding this feature in the upcoming 2.1 release. I started this thread two years ago and it seems only fitting to close it out with a big 'ol thank you! Showing the brush names as well as keeping the brush highlighted even after changing the size is going to make the whole brush experience feel so much smoother. It's greatly appreciated.

I agree that the Affinity programs are a huge value for the money and anyone who says they haven't gotten their monies worth is just being hyperbolic. I do think the negativity is somewhat understandable though. I don't at all think that it has been made clear by Serif that a major upgrade is in the works for 2022. Where would I get that info? A random and still very vague and cryptic Twitter post? A blog I've never heard of before meant for publishers? I had no idea that 2.0 was happening until I read it on a post in this thread. To be made clear by Serif it would have to be on a sticky post in these forums if they only want the hardcore users to know, or on the Affinity Spotlight blog if they wanted it to be more commonly known. The last patch with new features was 1.9 and that was more than a year ago with no public beta available for the next one. The betas themselves often take a couple of months. So if you don't know that the next patch is a really big 2.0 patch, it seems like we're waiting a little long for a more standard 1.11 patch. I think part of the cause of this is that it has seemed that Affinity Designer and Photo have seemed to had their development slowed since they began working on Affinity Publisher. It does feel a bit like Serif is stretched to their limit and it's been unclear if they can develop 3 apps +3 Ipad versions of those apps at more than a glacial pace. I think there wouldn't be any negativity here if it had been made clear by Serif that 2.0 was coming this year. The problem is that wasn't made clear. And of course it's up to Serif when the best time to start marketing that is. But I think a quick "Hey this is happening" earlier would reassure the most dedicated users. I'd bet most users are aware that the 2.0 patch is a big deal and should take longer than the usual patches and are perfectly fine with that. What it really comes down to is that people don't really need this or that specific feature. They want reassurance that the Affinity Suite has a bright future and they are right to stick with it. Honestly when I found out yesterday that 2.0 is coming this year I felt a lot of reassurance. In any case I think you're probably right about the announcement next month and I'm guessing there will be a lot more positivity then.

I agree, when changing the size of a brush it's still the same brush, at least for the user, no matter what the app is thinking. And every other design and art app out there presents it in the same way. Speaking of changing brush sizes, another of those low hanging fruits would be a brush size panel. Sometimes that just seems faster than using the size adjuster already in the app or using the dial on my pen tablet. It's an easy feature and it's pretty standard in competing software. Also adding the brush name in the history panel. Instead of "Paint Brush Tool" it would be something like "Paint Brush Tool: Chalky Brush 1" or something. Clip Studio Paint has that feature and it's great for remembering what brush you just tested out 3 brushes ago and want to go back to. Just those 4 really easy features to add would enhance my experience with the program so much. Displaying the brush names in the brush panel on desktop, keeping the selected brush highlighted even when changing sizes, a brush size panel with different brush sizes already all laid out, and the brush name in the history panel. Super easy to add, super standard in design and art programs. And such a huge improvement to the brush experience. All without even touching the underlying brush engine. They're quick additions that add a ton of value.

I would love to see that too. I feel like there's a lot of low hanging fruit that Serif could pluck that would make the overall brush experience a lot more enjoyable without them even touching the bush engine. The lack of a few simple features is really making using brushes in Affinity a painful and annoying experience for me.

+1, and sooner rather than later if at all possible. There's two main purposes to the pixel persona, sketching and adding textures to vector objects. If I have to sketch in a competing product to get perspective guides then the pixel persona is 50% less useful. And having such a strong raster mode in a vector program is supposed to be one of AD's strengths.

Thank you so much!

It's been three years. Any chance we can get you to bump the request again?

+1 for vector free transform, perspective, and warp tools.

I have to agree with this. For example let's take a super simple feature. Some really low hanging fruit. Just showing brush names in the brush panel. This functionality is already in the IPad versions. It should be really easy for them to add it to the desktop versions. But nothing. Is it because they intend to do a major revamp of the brush panel and so don't want to bother fixing the old one? Is it because they think it will look cluttered? Some other reason? We don't know. They could probably fix this super annoying thing over the course of an afternoon but instead it's just left the way it's always been and using brushes in affinity software kinda sucks as a result. And what's worse we have no dialog as to why it's that way. You can take that example and use it for every other feature or quality of life addition. I think tackling the IPad apps and Affinity Publisher have really reduced the momentum Affinity had when it was just Designer and Photo on desktop. I'm guessing they know that too and have delayed the DAM app to work on 2.0. At least I hope so. It'd be nice if they told us though. And maybe started previewing some features. My theory is everything is quiet because they want to go big with Affinity 2.0 and so until we get close to it's release we can expect a quiet time.

I'm making heavy use out of the new "Select Same" feature and I'm really loving it! One little touch that would make it even better is if we got the ability to shift-select multiple layers and then could click on a single name box of a single layer and rename all of them at once. That would be incredible. As an example of how I would use that to improve my workflow: Let's say I'm making some vector trees for an illustration. It might be made up of vector brushstrokes for the trunk and branches, shapes for the leafy bits, and more vector brushstrokes clipped to the shapes to add texture. I'm currently naming each layer something like this "bt4-l" for "bushy tree 4- lines" or "bt4-s" for "bushy tree 4- shapes." It would go a lot faster if I could just quickly rename a bunch all at once. I do use color tags for some things (see my request for more color tags in another post) but especially when creating assets dedicating a color tag to something forevermore just isn't appropriate.

Yeah I want to make sure I don't grab anything that has the same colors, especially if I'm working from a limited color palette. Also sometimes the trees might be different colors anyway and I'm changing the vector brush or stroke size I used for the branches or something like that. It depends on the tree type. Even when just changing colors, global colors only work in a specific document. They're not application wide. But if I'm just dragging trees in I've already made from my assets panel, then global colors aren't useful. I don't even think they have to put much development time into it. They don't need to do anything fancy to give the color tags a significant upgrade. Right now they have the primary colors, secondary colors, and grey. Just add in the tertiary colors, brown, and white. At that point you've doubled the available colors and that all by itself would be great.

A couple of examples just from earlier this morning would be I made several different pine trees using a vector brush, and I color coded the branches green and the trunks grey. So anytime I want to make any changes to either I just select those same tag colors. Of course you could have the same effect by naming each branch "pine tree branch" and choosing "select same name" but that's a lot of time naming layers I'd rather not have to do if I don't have to. If all the trees were the same I could make them symbols, but they're all different. I do a lot of things like that, I'm a little bit of a color tag-aholic. It's the ability to do that sort of thing that makes vector illustrations so valuable to me over raster drawing. It feels like magic.

The new Select Same/Select Object feature is wonderful, I'm making heavy use out of it. But one thing it has me wishing is that there were more color tags to assign to a layer because "select same color" is something I like using quite a bit. I'd love to see more color tags available. Or even the option to select any color from the color wheel and make that into a layer color tag. Just something I think would make a wonderful feature even more useful.

I'd love to see Affinity Designer and Affinity Photo get a brush size panel. Yes, it's easy enough to use the width slider or to use the dial on my graphics tablet, but sometimes it's just faster to pick the exact brush size you want instantly from a full sized panel. I know it's not the sexiest feature ever, but sometimes it's the simple things that help keep you in your creative flow.

Another option might be to have the history panel include the name of the brush you just used like they do in Clip Studio Paint. And yes, please keep the brush you're currently using highlighted even when you switch sizes or do any of the other random things that seem to make the highlight disappear. Although weirdly it DOES keep it highlighted with vector brushes. Only raster brushes seem to have the problem with de-selection.

I'd really like the option to hide the pixel selection in Affinity Designer too. I know Serif probably doesn't want to add too many raster quality-of-life features to Designer so as to encourage people to buy Photo, but hiding a pixel selection is basic functionality that would help with the Pixel Persona's primary purpose: adding texture or paint to vector linework. The Pixel Persona just feels incomplete without it.

It'd be neat if we could organize our brushes in the brushes panel a little more with sub categories much like we have already in the assets panel.

+1. The brushes panel is the weakest panel in the suite right now. It needs an overhaul badly. I can never remember what brush I've used on something, even when I'm still in the middle of using it. I try to get around that by naming each layer after the brush I use in it but that is highly cumbersome and annoying. And I know I sound like a broken record but I'd also love to be able to see the brush names without hovering the cursor over it.