Export size differ from artboard size by 1px (pt)

[Arghmath]

Hi there,

Have anyone encountered the problem when exporting artboards. Sometimes the export size is off by 1px. I was not able to find why...

Here is the export window:

...and here is the size of the artboard:

It basically doesn't matter if you select in the export area "Selection" or the specific artboard name.

Is this known bug?

 

 

[walt.farrell]

 

2 minutes ago, Arghmath said:

Have anyone encountered the problem when exporting artboards. Sometimes the export size is off by 1px.

Many users have experienced that, and it is not a bug.

You need to ensure that the X, Y, W, and H values in the Transform panel are all integers. If not, the size won't be what you expect when exported. Your Y value is not an integer. Just change it, and you should find it works as you expect. (However, to be sure, you may want to increase the number of decimal places for px measurements in your Preferences, User Interface, to 3 or 4.)

[Arghmath]

Thank you for the quick reply and info @walt.farrell.

I see, so the coordinates of the "whole" number. Hmm very strange behavior as when you exporting specific Artboard with specific size, it shouldn't matter where it is position in "space".

[Arghmath]

I have just test it and you are right

[walt.farrell]

I agree that it's strange, but it seems to be how Serif wants it to work.

[Grzeniu]

22 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

I agree that it's strange, but it seems to be how Serif wants it to work.

Well, do you really think it's a feature, and not a bug? I've also been struggling with this for some time and finally found this thread and thank goodness, you have saved me so much neurons and time with the integer tip. For me it looks similar, as below. And I think it should be considered a bug since - how does a user find out about this? Only by visiting forums... and that's not how software UX should work, I think.

 

[walt.farrell]

50 minutes ago, Grzeniu said:

Well, do you really think it's a feature, and not a bug?

Yes, I think it's a feature, based on the number of times it has come up and the uniform responses by Serif staff.

[Arghmath]

Well in that case, does Serif has any explanation for it? It really seems to be a bug...

[Grzeniu]

1.8.0 does not fix the issue, unfortunately

[MEB]

Hi Arghmath, Grzeniu,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
Contrary to other apps, in Affinity Designer the artboards are (a special type of) object(s), subject to the same conditions as any other object and listed in the Layers panel as part of the layers hierarchy (they are not independent entities/canvas floating over a pasteboard area). For this reason their X,Y coordinates (and dimensions) do matter when exporting to other formats. Any decimal parts will be converted/added as an additional pixel in raster formats. One thing you can do to prevent this is enabling Force Pixel Alignment in the main toolbar to ensure that objects created, moved, stretched etc always end with integer values both for their X,Y coordinates and dimensions (width, height).  Also, keep Move by Whole Pixels (the button on the right of Force Pixel Alignment) disabled otherwise the decimal values will be kept when you move the objects.

[Arghmath]

Hi MEB,

Thank you for the explanation. It sounds only logical, considering that you have various types of units (not only decimal). I think this is very helpful explanation as figuring this out was not a trivial

 

[MEB]

This approach lets you manipulate/perform a few operations with them as you can with other objects: for example use Power Duplicate to create a grids of artboards or even convert an object to an artboard and vice-versa (menu Layer > Convert Object to Artboard and the inverse, almost on bottom).

[Arghmath]

Sounds great! Haven't thought about the grid of the layouts yet, but now I see that it will be useful feature. For example to distribute the artboards and align them. Now I thinking about them as "objects"...