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I'm trying out some basic shape stuff in Designer for Windows and I'm unable to Add a straight Pen line and a rectangle together (I'm trying to create a drip effect). However whenever I select both the rectangle and the line and try to Add them together the line disappears. Same thing happens when I attempt to combine them as well. I've tried shifting the layer order around and still nothing. I've attached an image to show where I am at the moment and what I'm trying to achieve. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated!

In Affinity Designer, when rotating a text frame beyond 90 degrees, the text within reorients itself to 180 degrees from original, preventing the text in the frame from being rotated upside down. Is there a way to prevent this?

Hi, I was missing an obvious option to remove a layer fx, for example by: 1. context menu (RMB) 2. an entry in menu layers (plus shortcut) 3. via drag 'n drop (like in Adobe Phoooooop) Up to now, I had seen me forced to click on the fx icon and then deselect all used fx (in worst case all 10) to get rid of the fx. Together with all the mouse movements too much clicks and precise mouse work. WORKAROUND (I just found today): w1. CMD+C on an element with no layer fx (and no style) w2. CTRL+CMD+V to paste the fx So now this feature request can be seen as low-prio/cosmetic :) Keep continue working on this great piece of software, Stefan. see also: https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/24663-toggle-layer-fx-onoff/

I love the donut tool in Affinity Designer, it is very useful but I noticed that sometimes it is difficult to size the inside circle. For example, let's say I draw a donut and then I want to adjust the size of the inner circle. So I click on the red adjuster that adjusts the size of the inner circle and move it but it jumps to what looks like predetermined distances and it won't allow me to use a size that is in between the predetermined (or set) distances. Of course those distances are not what I'm after. I want it to smoothly adjust the inner circle without it jumping (it moves as if it were snapping but I have all snapping turned off). If I zoom in then I can smoothly adjust it. Is this how it is supposed to work? If so, why? I noticed it since the first release and it is the same in the latest beta. Thanks in advance for any insight that anyone can provide in helping me to solve "The mystery of the misbehaving donut". Hokusai

Hi guys, beside this great thread about auto-select objects: https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/23944-ad-auto-jump-to-selected-object-in-layer-panel/?hl=find+layers but back to my concern: at the moment AD does not allow to "find multiple selections in panel layers". Okay, I see the point that two or more objects are likely that far away from each other that they cannot be displayed at once in the layer panel. BUT I totally disagree to disable that functionality in case of having 2 objects selected. Even they are positioned side by side. Currently there is no chance to use this nice feature. My suggestion: - mark each object in panel layers AND jump to one object - ideally jump to the "last selected" object The advantages I see: 1. I don't "loose" my selection to use this feature 2. at least it would help me to see one object (of my selection) immediately Why I would like to prefer "the last selected" object to be the one that got focused in the panel? It makes it much more variable and easier for the user to influence what is shown in case of multiple targets. If "find in layers" function would always go and present the first object in layers hierarchy - the user would have no means to influence the result. If the first selected object is the one that would be presented - it would force the user to re-select everything to "find" an other object in layers. If it is the last selected object - perfect: no need to start over the whole selection if you wanna see a different object in layers focused. >> Just deselect and re-select the desired object that you would like to see in layers << I have already worked with programs that had such functionality and I liked and used it a lot.

Hey! I just started using Affinity Designer (win beta) over Fireworks about a week ago. Thus far I absolutely love it and everything I've wanted to do has followed a similar logic to how things work in FW, which makes the transition quite easy. Today I ran in to the first situation where I can't seem to figure out how to do something as well (or better) than in Fireworks. That is to export a circular logo in transparent PNG-8 form optimized as well as I did all the time with Fireworks, without having jagged edges / antialiasing issues with the logo. I've attached all the files of my tests below. I did try many other more specific settings with Affinity too, trying to find a good solution but I can't seem to figure out how to get the same results as I do with FW. Original file: 27,6 KB Fireworks export PNG-8: 13,2 KB Affinity export PNG-24: 29,9 KB Affinity export PNG-8, with jagged edges: 12,9 KB For web purposes this is a big enough difference that I need to disturb my workflow and jump back to Fireworks to do these types of things. I'm hoping someone has more experience with this sort of thing in Affinity and can give me a solution that can reach the same filesize as FW without those jagged edges that I seem to get when exporting PNG-8 from Affinity Designer. Anyone? :)

I've been preparing several packaging files for vendors and continually run into a major roadblock when I want to outline live type. In Illustrator you can simply Select All and Outline Text. Done in 2 seconds and the file retains its structure. Is there currently anyway to accomplish this in AD? I'm aware of the (Layer >) Convert to Curves command. The trouble is that this command doesn't seem to penetrate groups. Which forces me to either: 1. Select/search though every group in the Layers panel for any and all text elements and manually convert them, which is both very time-consuming and prone to errors. or 2. Select All, Ungroup (x times) and then convert everything. This technically works, but it then creates an unmanageable file with hundreds of curve layers and also releases all clipping masks. :( Am I missing an awesome command or tool somewhere? Anyone know of an easier way? Thanks! :D

Hi, when I use the transformation panel to type in exact values it happens regularly that I overlook that the anchor point is set to a false position which I realize just after hitting return. On my display the brighter color is more obvious than the bigger (grey) area. So in my opinion it would be more obvious and better to: 1. not to have only a bigger area for the current anchor point (status quo) but also in the brighter color as it is now (and I do not know why, but always for the top left position) 2. don't tint the top left corner in white - it's only confusing and competing with the actual setting My two cents, Stefan.

Using tab stops in Designer is pretty frustrating. I am trying to have tab stops out to 8 in, but right aligned. Half of the time when I press the right align button in the tab stop section of Paragraph pane, it does nothing. How can I get it to consistently work?

Click here to download the latest beta Status: Public Beta Purpose: Stability Requirements: None As this is a beta release, it is considered to be not suitable for production use. This means that you should not attempt to use it for commercial purposes or for any other activity that you may be adversely affected by the application failing. In addition it is worth noting that files created in Affinity 1.5 cannot be opened in 1.4, which means files created with the Windows beta cannot be opened in the Mac AppStore version of Designer, instead you will need the latest macOS beta. We hope you enjoy the latest build, and as always, if you've got any problems, please don't hesitate to post here and we'll get back to you as soon as we can. Thanks once again for your continued feedback. If you have a general question about the software, please head over to the Questions Forum, or if you have any suggestions, please head over to the Feature Requests forum. Fixes Added Colour Picker Tool context bar items Fixed measurement display to only display after a small mouse movement (to avoid flashing up the measurements when doing a keyboard shortcut) Fixed being unable to add text over pixel layers Fixed font lookups failing (due to mismatch between Windows and macOS font names) Added Paste FX Fixed 'Mitre' spelling for English UK Fixed crash after clicking Close in PDF Export Settings Fixed Assets panel Embed menu item not displaying the out of date state Fixed PDF Font Replacements not being remembered correctly Fixed Font family drop down not rendering high quality previews Fixed closing the More dialog for WMF export crashing the app Fixed crashing font traits on Edit Text Styles Fixed gradient map not displaying changes made with tint slider Fixed all Levels sliders appearing red Fixed blurry context toolbar buttons Fixed Ctrl+Shift+2 crash Fixed Artboard rulers to reset to origin Fixed rulers to show current cursor position Fixed Corner Tool to remove corners when radius is set to zero Fixed exporting and printing of vector brushes with no colour Added "Save thumbnails with document" to preferences Fixed crash when altering colour dropdowns on adjustment and context menu Fixed Tighten/Loosen More shortcuts failing to work Fixed tabbing not working as expected for hex values in colour chooser dialog Fixed Help so that it can be used when modal dialogs are open Fixed crash editing 'No Style' Character / Paragraph style Fixed Text Styles Create Group Style Button always disabled Fixed Text Styles Character/Paragraph Style 'No Style' Drop down menu being different to mac Fixed being unable to continually resize text by holding down shortcut Fixed certain characters being marked as mis-spelt when they shouldn't be Fixed pressing delete with a stop selected on the Gradient Flyout removing the object Fixed being unable to apply swatch if it is already selected Fixed panels vanishing after minimising app Fixed Colour Editor combo to prevent selecting the separator using keyboard Fixed Hintline text appearing too dark compared to macOS version Added snapping for text height when creating new Artistic Text objects Fixed help failing to display in Chinese Fixed Slice names not updating with Artboard name changes

Hi folks, I love apps that remember the last used folder, like AD. But I even more love apps, that remember several last used folders, e.g. for "open file" / "place file" / "export file". Unfortunately AD mixes it. IMO the likelihood that users import / open files from a different folder than they export their files is much higher than using the same folder. Even not - having this "feature" would only speed up the workflow of those who use different folders. For those who don't mind/care or use different folders - would not be affected. They wouldn't even notice it. Thanks a lot, Stefan.

Hi, color fields are cool and have their benefits. That's why I would definitely like to use them in the layer fx as well. But until now, I couldn't find a way to do so (drag n drop ). Thanx a lot, Stefan.

Hi, I'm not very advanced in programs like excel and stuff, but I'll need to design badges for around 600 people soon where I get lists of people in excel with their info distributed in different columns. I have used affinity designer for a basic design. For example, cel 1: "Naut", cel 2: "Netherlands", cel 3: "blue". With this info I would like the tekst:"Naut" at the top, a dutch flag at the bottom and a blue square in the middle. Is it possible to use affinity designer for this?

For me, the UI for the Stroke colour and width could be refined. Now, the width indicator is always white and it doesn't reflect the current colour that is being used for the stroke. For me, it would be better if the stroke width indicator (if that is what it is called) appeared as the same colour as the stroke that was being applied. Sorry if that isn't so clear but my screen shot should make it clear. Hokusai PS. I'm loving new beta!

Hello, I'm having some issues with selection using Affinity Designer. I may be using it incorrectly. I have a group with a number of layers and I want to select all the nodes in the group. At the moment I could do this by selecting the group, then opening the group and manually selecting every layer and using the node tool. Which is fine but seems a bit inefficient and a waste of time. If I select the object using the move tool, I can't then marquee select sub layers. I have to shift click and when there are a lot of objects this is impractical. Is there a faster way to do this? If not, could there be a an option on the layer context menu to select the layer and all the sublayers? Or, even better, a a marquee select for within selected groups?

Forgive me if this has already been addressed. I did some looking, but couldn't find anything. In AD, is there a way to make tools such as align (object), text tool, and nudge respect the current rotation of the canvas with regard to creation and manipulation? I'm sure it's no easy task, and understand why the program would behave this way—respecting the object's coord/origin according to the artboard—but it just seems counterintuitive at times. Don't get me wrong, the ability to rotate the canvas is fantastic, especially when it comes to packaging work, but not being able to manipulate objects in an intuitive way when the canvas is rotated counteracts the benefit a little. Thanks! :)

Click here to download the latest beta Status: Public Beta Purpose: Text Styles & Stability Requirements: None As this is a beta release, it is considered to be not suitable for production use. This means that you should not attempt to use it for commercial purposes or for any other activity that you may be adversely affected by the application failing. In addition it is worth noting that files created in Affinity 1.5 cannot be opened in 1.4, which means files created with the Windows beta cannot be opened in the Mac AppStore version of Designer, instead you will need the latest macOS beta. We hope you enjoy the latest build, and as always, if you've got any problems, please don't hesitate to post here and we'll get back to you as soon as we can. Thanks once again for your continued feedback. If you have a general question about the software, please head over to the Questions Forum, or if you have any suggestions, please head over to the Feature Requests forum. Text Styles New! Text Styles should now be in feature parity with the macOS versionFixes Fixed Colour Wheel behaviour to match macOS version (selecting a colour via the outer wheel now applies full saturation) Fixed fill colour dropdown strings to match the macOS version Fixed hit testing of text nodes (clicking inbetween characters will select the whole object) Fixed creating or opening multiple documents causing the first object to draw slowly Fixed slow rendering performance on some hardware and driver combinations Changed clicking with Text tools to prefer selecting existing text nodes Fixed Text wrap shapes to behave as if they are closed, even if their source curve isn't Added Shift modifier to constrain RGB values on sliders (to match macOS version) Fixed pressing Enter while editing a colour in the Colour Chooser closing the dialog Fixed being unable to scroll over Y label in the Transform panel Fixed colour not updating for transparent gradient fills after changing opacity to 100% Fixed switching font families not preserving the font style Fixed negative font sizes flipping the font Fixed being unable to change certain tab stops when multiple are present Fixed fill colour not correctly updating when stroke swatch is in front Removed Comic Sans MS from list of websafe fonts as it was removed from iOS in version 4 Fixed missing printers marks for long text Fixed being unable to drag child layer over trash bin to delete it Improved performance of choosing colours via the Colour Chooser dialog Fixed ICC Profile list in export dialog not updating Added handling for Windows font collection changes (no need to reset fonts via Preferences now) Fixed font preview not working correctly Fixed deleting all asset categories not disabling the Delete and Rename options Fixed crash after altering printer properties with Canon Printer Pixma MG5750 Fixed Musical TTF font not getting a font style applied on import Fixed Space Horizontal/Vertical using the wrong icons Fixed CTRL+Z to do multiple undos when held Added toast notification when adding assets with unavailable fonts Fixed Assets panel 'Embed' menu item not working Fixed Colour Chooser dialog to offer the same options as the macOS version Fixed Swatches panel failing to remember what palette was last used between run ups Fixed incorrect toolbar tooltips Fixed crash when opening the Document Setup dialog with a 32bit aphoto file Fixed lines with Square caps not invalidating the right area Added ALT modifier to change between the Node Tool’s old and new style deletes (whether it tries to preserve the curve's appearance) Fixed snapping of slices to allow spanning at the edge of the document Fixed being unable to drag a shapes node handle with the ALT modifier pressed Fixed Snap to pixel + Move by whole pixels to work for edge handles Fixed Colour picker tool missing keyboard shortcut Fixed Fill tool not applying the fill stroke correctly Fixed Move to Next/Previous View Point failing when only 1 View Point exists Fixed help search results appearing in the wrong order (least relevant at the top) Fixed being unable to enter the Node Tool after doing Convert to Curves Fixed Pencil Tool leaving artefacts if ‘Use Fill’ is checked Fixed crash if you force attempt to open a macOS shortcut file Fixed Align Centre shortcut not matching macOS version Fixed Blend Options Reset only resets Master Channel Fixed Scale with object in layer effects dialog not sticking Opening Help now places the caret in the search box automatically Fixed manually entering values in the colour chooser not updating the selected object Fixed sliders when clicking on the track without moving the mouse Added snapping when dragging assets from the Assets panel Fixed pressing delete with a stop selected on the Gradient Flyout removes the object Fixed pressing Escape not closing popups Fixed fx button on Layers panel Fixed slider clicking and dragging Fixes (clicking quickly on the track part of the slider sometimes didn't apply the operation) Fixed new symbols not being in the snapping candidates list Fixed Control+Tab and Control+Shift+Tab takes precedence over tool keys so we can always switch between documents Fixed AltGr + Drag breaking other shortcuts Fixed align text left/right shortcut not functioning Fixed pressing Enter after writing the name of the font in the font dropdown not changing to the selected font immediately Fixed Help window so that it closes when the app closes Fixed colour profiles not being remembered on next runup Fixed Pencil Tool so that it now works correctly in symbols Fixed solo view not working with ALT modifier Fixed space horizontally/vertically options missing from alignment menu Fixed editing a global colour from swatch double-click using the pipette loses it's globalness Fixed New from clipboard so that it marks the document as dirty after creation Fixed measuring so that if you’re over one of the tool handles it doesn't stop you interacting Installer Fixed empty requirements dialog on Windows 7

I thought it would be nice if there was a way to have designer show us or warn us if we use lines that are too thin to be printed (not a warning every time you use or make a line though). I was thinking something like a gamut warning in a photo app. If you selected the "line warning" in the Views, it would highlight lines that might be a problem if they went to print. That way we would know which lines to make thicker. I worked for a publishing company before and one problem that we often had was designers would use lines that show up on screen but wouldn't print because they were too thin. Hokusai

Hello! I would like to make some PDFs for downloadable printouts for a client website, but many of them are longer than one page. Is there a way to add pages in Design so that I can export a full PDF of the pages all together? Thank you! Heather

I suggested this in the Designer Mac Beta Thread but I also wanted to post it here in the Features Requests as it is technically a request. I would like to see the ability to drag and drop colour swatches from the Colour Palette on to objects in Designer. I would also like to be able to drag and drop objects into the colour palette and have a swatch made of the same colour. Thanks, Hokusai

Not really sure if this is the best section of the forums to post this in, but it seems to be the most relevant. http://blog.iconfinder.com/affinity-designer-1-5-beta-review/ Pretty nice in-depth review of Affinity Designer from the vantage point of icon designers. They have also done a review of Illustrator, and will soon be publishing their Sketch review, as well as a comparison of the three apps.

Status: Public Beta Purpose: Stability Requirements: None Download: 1.5.0.12 Beta Here As this is a beta release, it is considered to be not suitable for production use. This means that you should not attempt to use it for commercial purposes or for any other activity that you may be adversely affected by the application failing. In addition it is worth noting that files created in Affinity 1.5 cannot be opened in 1.4, which means files created with the Windows beta cannot be opened in the Mac AppStore version of Designer, instead you will need the latest macOS beta. We hope you enjoy the latest build, and as always, if you've got any problems, please don't hesitate to post here and we'll get back to you as soon as we can. Thanks once again for your continued feedback. If you have a general question about the software, please head over to the Questions Forum, or if you have any suggestions, please head over to the Feature Requests forum. Fixes Fixed UI Gamma slider in preferences Fixed Guides Manager to display in preferred number of decimal places Fixed Corner Tool to allow numbers greater than 5 Added embedded document assets to Assets Panel Added subcategory Move Up / Move Down to Assets Panel Added search control to Assets Panel Fixed crash when changing paper size in Printer Properties dialog Fixed PDF font replacements so they are now remembered Fixed Measurement mode on Artboards Fixed boolean operations not invalidating after undo / redo Fixed disappearing symbols when docking / undocking Fixed fx button on Layers panel to show for the row that was clicked, not the current selection Updated Artboards to disallow constraints (because they define the document size, which in turn would affect them) Fixed Pen Tool to draw the tool when editing nodes during creation Fixed trivial bool operations generating invalid curves Fixed crash when scrolling through History Fixed Align Distribute not working correctly from the context toolbar Added dragging to opacity label on the Layers panel Fixed placing images/embedded documents to use their DPI rather than assume 96 Fixed History panel not scrolling to latest item when after not being visible Fixed copying of Export settings to clipboard Fixed Layers panel continuously redrawing Fixed Tools column width setting reverting to 1 Fixed Show Tools causes a crash if it has already been hidden Fixed right click on document causing the selection to hide Fixed scroll speed with mouse wheel / trackpad (it nows moves a quarter of the distance it did previously) Fixed message dialogs not closing with the correct option when using the Escape key Fixed copying and pasting a nested Symbol between documents so that it no longer sets up a cross-document link Fixed import and export of RTF to correctly load fonts and characters in codepage 1250 Added RTF text to clipboard when copying text Fixed PDF export to prevent named layers from being optimised away for PDF formats that support them Fixed Text tool so right-click changes the text selection (unless it hits the current text selection) Fixed Alt+Click on Layer thumbnail on already selected item not solo'ing the selection Fixed SVG import to load <a> tags as a group Fixed SVG export of relative coordinates to use a relative “m” for a move to a subcurve of a polycurve Installer The installer now requires Windows 7 Platform Update (https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/download/details.aspx?id=36805) before it will install (previously it would continue the installation, but the app wouldn't let you start it) Default install location is now C:\Program Files\Affinity\Designer (upgrades will continue to install into the previous location) The %APPDATA% folder has now moved to Affinity\Designer\1.0 (Beta), so your next start will lose your preferences

Hello! We have recentley upgraded our Designers to Affinity. Our main issue we are now having is creating brushes. We have created brushes by using the below method: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNZbmvjtdmU But we are having issues with distortion and the brushes becoming lower resolution. Please see attached photo. Thanks! Matt. IT Support Agent Provocateur

Hey guys, Every time I go through my fonts the app crashed. This doesn't seem to happen when I pick a font at once, just when scrolling through them. Is there anything I can do on my end to fix it? Thanks

I just discovered that when I export a PDF from Designer, it creates a "title" of the page which is the file path to where I save it and this is embedded in the PDF. I can get rid of it by opening Acrobat and removing it, but that is cumbersome. I don't want people seeing this information on publicly distributed PDFs. I've attached a screen shot of the "Properties" panel in Acrobat which shows the title attached with the PDF when exported from Designer.