h.ozboluk

We are now almost in February 2024 still no blend tool...☹️

yeah, valid point, and I do not regret buying it at all even though I've not used it much, in large parts because it was in my budget and because I'm happy to fund an adobe competitor out of spite. While I'm not able to stretch my budget as much as the true pros on here, but I'd pay about 3x the price (with expectation that it'd be updated for a few years, low-key supported for another few years like bug fixes, compatibility with OS updates and the like).

There's a demand there, and people willing to pay, and idk, I know this stuff is complex, but that potential is being left on the table. To take the blend tool as an example, if they put a crowdfund goal on the site and anyone who wanted could contribute to make that feature a priority, I bet it'd get funded. And everyone would get the feature and benefit, because people aren't paying in order to be the only ones to have access to it, they just want it to get developed, so it'd also drive purchases at the regular price. I see a real potential for an actually symbiotic relationship where the software users actually like the company, as opposed to adobe which at this point feels like living with a toxic ex because you have nowhere else to go and they know it. /rant

edit: that said, the CC shortcuts are so native to me at this point that it's a bit of a hurdle, le sigh, so i can't say if I'd fall off the learning curve..
 

Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work that way. Someone who can afford to pay higher to get more features will just go to Adobe where they have many more options across programs. There's a number of enthusiasts here I suspect, but not all have the ability to pay beyond what they've paid, maybe because they still have to maintain an Adobe sub for other reasons (Lightroom, video, etc) or have purchased other software, etc. In that way, Serif has to act competitively by keeping the price lower until they can build up the feature set to break more away... (I think they understand their market well enough)...
I'd happily pay more to have a more polished suite. I have been testing some things in Adobe software and for me, it's aged very poorly. Some things are missed, but much of it feels like a dinosaur, especially the way AI<->PS work together... Affinity has its flaws, but for some of us, it's liberated us from what was a clunky setup for our workflows... but can appreciate many can't (and shouldn't) switch until there's enough feature parity for their use case to make the switch.

But if you do continue to trial the release(s), please do come here and keep posting your thoughts in the very least...

Anyway, it appears Blend Tool is closer than it's ever been, at least with the addition of Move Data Entry... I do very much miss Blend...

Just popping in here for my yearly check on if I can ditch Illustrator already. Apparently not yet.

You raise a good point here- AD's affordability is surely one of it's big selling points. It was for me. Probably wouldn't have gotten it if it was more expensive. But there are big-league designers who make a lot of profit on the tool, and for them it could cost way, WAY more and still be worth it. I wish there was some way to meet those. Like hey, pay more and get the shiny new stuff like a 6 months before it rolls out to the rest of us, so it remains equal and not too fragmented, but those who would like to can contribute to development as long as they get assurances that certain features are being worked on. Everyone benefits. Idk, just thinking out loud. I really don't like the idea of splitting into elements-vs-full-version kind of thing, in part because I selfishly want to have the shiny stuff, but I think also because you want folks learning on all the features, and then if they make it big, they can decide to pitch in to help drive development faster. More communal, sort of? anyway, end of rant.

and in case you staff missed my suggestion, shamelessly pinnnnnnn @Patrick Connor   
BTW, merry Xmas!

Just wanted to say Happy 2024. Another year passing. No blend tool.

Developing the plugin api takes way more time than implementing certain features.
And it has been being planned since a long time ago or already in development if you search in this forum.
Means it's taking years already and still no sign of release.

Live roughen vector effect!
That's what I'm missing the most, despite its clunky modal UI, and although there are a few somewhat usable workarounds in Affinity.
On the other hand though, the Roughen effect made me use Ill-frustrator more often that I would have ever wanted, including complex multipage layouts, simply because there's no such thing as a live Roughen effect in InDesign.
In general, the Affinity suite has a major advantage and potential here over the Adobe design apps due it ist universally exchangable document format.
In other words: What's available in one Affinity app is still seamlessly and "losslessly" available in the respective other two apps.

🤔 I'm not a fan of Adobe, but I think your imagination got a little carried away here.
Just to name few from the memory (things in Illustrator that Designer doesn't have):
pure vector brush creation vector patterns blend tool puppet warp extrude tool scripting (developers have started working on this, but it is in the early stages and it will take years before it appears in affinity apps) symetry drawing tools curvature tool mesh gradient Width tool that lets you change the thickness of strokes. free-form gradient extrude 3d material feature more advanced text editing features than AD more advanced transformations than AD objects along path recolor artwork simplify path much better transform panel remain curvature after anchor delete advanced repeat tools and loth more but i don't wan't to bother peaope that will read this Just to be clear. Until Serif developers doesn't stop making so many mistakes during production, there is not the slightest chance that they will come even a millimeter closer to what Illustrator has to offer Adobe users.
Too many errors during production force them to prioritize what to fix and limit the time they could use to create advanced features that users have been asking for for years. Better management, communication, strategy for the future, fewer errors/bugs , attention to the smallest details (avoiding stupid mistakes in the UI), more programming resources, in my opinion, are needed in their team right now.
Edit: Ohh i forgot +1  for the blend tool

I have an idea that solves all those similiar feature requests like "blend tool", but it will be hard to implement: make a node based tool just like "geometry nodes in blender".
It allows users to pack, save and share self-made presets which can be seen as "features" or "plugins".
What's more, affinity official could pack some presets along with the app itself. Also if it's possible, we could have a market for users to share/sell their own presets.

In the Windows version, it definitely does not invert the display in dark mode.

I'd like that!

Dear all, 

since the most UIs and especially AD comes with darkmode I wonder if there is any possibility to have a wireframe view mode that corresponds to that behaviour like so as seen in the attached file.

The adjustment of the background for artboards works just fine from the preferences pane and this would be a huge improvement and would be relaxing for the eyes when working longer with a document in this mode.

Regards

+1

+1 for a blend tool.

Let me put it this way: the spiral tool came in handy for a rather complicated illustration I was doing, but I would have done the work without it in a reasonably short time. Spiral tool is great for those rare occasions when I personally need it.
I'm about to generate several hundred shapes in transitions that can only be meaningfully generated by a competent and configurable blend tool. And tomorrow I have to do the same again in another illustration. And again on Monday in a third illustration. And so on. It's a permanent need for me.
So I have to go to another program to do it, but not everything is suitable for this round trip.
So for me, +1 is not enough of a statement. 
I really, really seriously need a blend tool and really, really miss it.

+1 for a blend tool.

serif is trying really hard to disappoint their users @Ash

since several years now people from all branches are asking kindly to implement the blend tool to affinity
functions that were working perfectly for years had to be reinvented after the relaunch last year and some of them took several month to be bugfree again and make the applications usable again
as the announcement to the beta 2.3 still does not contain this function just let it be clear:
if you don’t plan to implement the very needed function of a blendtool you are invited to say so and people can move on and more importantly away from serif 

no problem!

regards

Some companies do that if they consider "dot" versioning being decimal or something.
It definitely doesn't look like Serif would be one of them.
That pretty much sums up my Designer feature wishlist as well.  

To me this is the list of things I think Designer needs to be roughly on par with Illustrator functionality wise:
- Raster-to-vector conversion.
- Pure vector brushes/erasers.
- A blend tool.
- Vector pattern tools/fills.
- Freeform vector gradients.
- Some curve modifier tools that affect the shape of curves; i.e. randomise, noise, smudge, smooth, sharpen, and additional node merging options like merge by distance and merge to last/first selected. 
As for making Designer just straight up better than Illustrator in practically every way, then add animation support that works across Designer and Photo. Designer would practically become a more streamlined and well implemented version of Adobe Flash/Animate. That's more wishful thinking, but I do believe Affinity could be a great tool for raster and vector animation if it had a solid animation timeline (as long as it doesn't work like Photoshop's timeline that is :P).
I kind of doubt that Serif are holding out on features just for 2.5. 

A blend tool would be nice. I have said before that Affinity Designer is only several features away from being on par if not better then Adobe Illustrator. Maybe a bunch of most requested features will be in 2.5? the .5's seem to be the larger feature updates. 

Hi @Patrick Connor any updates when a blend tool is going to come to designer since mid-august?
P.S I must say that I am really enjoying the spiral tool so thank you for that.☺️

@2ddpainter@EricP i did not come across Cavalry so far. Prob better than C4D since it'll retain path fills & strokes etc - but I guess it's still a workaround, having the toolset in your main app and not requiring to single out individual parts of your designs + transfer/cp them around is paramount for a seamless creation process. But it does look great for other applications, thanks a lot for the hint!

Would also recommend to take a look at Cavalry (PC, Mac), its called
the MoGraph for Vector graphics
There is a free Version, you need only an account
Instead of Export or Save you have to Render your result
e. g. as .SVG but is basically the same

Here their Website
https://cavalry.scenegroup.co/
 

Have you tried using Cavalry, it's great at parametric vector design and a great companion to Affinity Designer. You can easily copy paste svgs between the 2 applications