Shape builder tool

[telencephalon]

Hello)

Does Affinity Designer have shape builder tool as in illustrator ?

[MEB]

Hi aawado,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
No, you can use the geometry operations (add, subtract, intersect, etc) to achieve the same results although with a bit more work.

[telencephalon]

Thank you MEB,

I hope Affinity will soon add a similar tool.

Recently acquired: Designer, Photo, Publisher, declined from Adobe.

Thanks again for the answer.

(-:

 

 

[rasoolakhter]

On 2/27/2020 at 11:36 PM, MEB said:

Hi aawado,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
No, you can use the geometry operations (add, subtract, intersect, etc) to achieve the same results although with a bit more work.

What shape geometry will do more than cloud we need some professional shape builder or some thing like that tool if we want to make S and we start with lines and circles and at the end of the day how we can make this so called geometry operation if you have some tutorial please show me I will love to see that

[MEB]

Hi rasoolakhter,
The approach you take depends a lot of the objects you have/specific case you are working with. Are you building the intended shape starting with open strokes, using shapes, a mix of both? If working with just open paths you may have to break them at certain nodes to then join them with other (open) paths before expanding them to convert the manipulated stroke into a shape. If a mix of open paths and shapes you will have to expand the strokes first before attempting to use geometric operations with shapes otherwise you may get unexpected results (Designer doesn't support boolean operations between shapes and strokes) etc etc. So it really depends on what you are working with. If you post a sample file with an example i'm sure you will get plenty of replies to get there. Meanwhile check this video tutorial here. It should give you some ideas on how to deal with some cases.

[sfriedberg]

With the (several) requests for a shape builder tool, it apparently is something useful.  As a long-time Corel user with essentially no time in Adobe tools, I had never even heard of a shape builder tool before reading, in these forums, how essential one is.  Yet, somehow, being ignorant of such a thing, I have never felt the lack, nor have ever felt hampered in constructing complex shapes from simpler ones.  (Pretend oblivious naive cynicism mode off)

I heavily use boolean operations (they have different names in CorelDRAW, but they are the same basic operations) together with raw path editing operations (add vertex at apparent intersection, split curve at vertex, join curves at vertex, drag verticies and Bezier handles around).  Seems to build shapes quite well. I will have to go read up on what shape builder does.  From the example given in the initial post in this thread, it appears to be something that could be scripted in CorelDRAW and added to the hotkey assignment and/or the toolbars.  Of course, AffDes doesn't have scripting yet, but it does have all the basic operations.

[mexicola84]

Again, from my side. If you are a professional and need to work out a lot of ideas in a quick manner, the shape builder tool is essential. It's the one tool, I - and MANY of my friends can't miss and that's why I cannot recommend this as an 100% alternative to illustrator. 

Sure, technicially spoken it does kind of the same thing as the boolean tools, but if you have plenty of shapes to combine, you may have to do a lot of work to make it happen. For me personally, I've purchased all products by Affinity, but can'T use them to my speed.

With version 1.8 I'm very happy with a lot of newly added features, but I hope for 1.9, the shape builder will be added. People desperately search for alternatives to the Adobe cosmos, but I believe, it still takes quite a bit of time.

[telencephalon]

I would like to know have plans to add shape builder tool for Affinity Designer ?
A very necessary element for working with the golden ratio for example.
And very much saves nerves, time
🙂

[os design]

On 3/5/2020 at 3:52 PM, mexicola84 said:

Again, from my side. If you are a professional and need to work out a lot of ideas in a quick manner, the shape builder tool is essential. It's the one tool, I - and MANY of my friends can't miss and that's why I cannot recommend this as an 100% alternative to illustrator. 

Sure, technicially spoken it does kind of the same thing as the boolean tools, but if you have plenty of shapes to combine, you may have to do a lot of work to make it happen. For me personally, I've purchased all products by Affinity, but can'T use them to my speed.

With version 1.8 I'm very happy with a lot of newly added features, but I hope for 1.9, the shape builder will be added. People desperately search for alternatives to the Adobe cosmos, but I believe, it still takes quite a bit of time.

exactly that is the only thing that makes me think a lot before buying affinity instead of illustrator its just a small and very effective tool that you cant do with out it . 

[.svg]

I recently bought Affinity Designer and I have to say I'm very disappointed that it doesn't have a shapebuilder tool. I make complex designs with lot's of lines and stuff and therefor the shapebuilder tool is so necessary. Guess I have to switch back to Adobe again.. :-(

[telencephalon]

On 6/3/2020 at 7:55 PM, .svg said:

I recently bought Affinity Designer and I have to say I'm very disappointed that it doesn't have a shapebuilder tool. I make complex designs with lot's of lines and stuff and therefor the shapebuilder tool is so necessary. Guess I have to switch back to Adobe again.. 😞

I hope they do it

[Namysh]

I also hope they'll add it, although there isn't any official talk about it

[Mahdimov]

We really need a shape builder tool.

And if you are going to say that you can achieve the same results with geometry operations , then I should say that you can achieve the same results with paint.

It is not about achieving , it about how you achieve .

Edited June 19, 2020 by Mahdimov

[Jowday]

1 hour ago, Mahdimov said:

It is not about achieving, it about how you achieve .

                             ^ this

I for one just need a simple knife tool right now ... more than anything for tons of details in a rather complex big poster. Sure, I can achieve the same with boolean operators, but it is frustrating in the middle of many, many vector objects and it is just (almost) the greatest time robber of all times. Further it destroys the creative process and inspiration. I will have to spend a lot of time on a lot of individual objects. I found myself postponing the workaround hell and procrastinating like a maniac because the many hours of tedious manual work just suck. The first 30 - 40% of the poster was a joy and was very satisfying. Then I came to the interesting, difficult part that is just pointless slow boolean operations for hours and hours. Copy pasting it back and forth between programs that do have a knife is not a whole lot easier.

Affinity Designer 1.x draw persona:

 

[JavierGomez]

 Shape builder tool is essential, we need the tool.

[siddhu.ai]

Please add the shape buildertool

 

[Jonathan L Clark]

The shape builder tool is a significant time saver and quality of life feature. I have used Adobe Illustrator since the 1990s and am used to both the old school booleans and the new shape builder tool method. The shape builder tool makes the process far more intuitive and enjoyable.

[José Pinto]

We really need Shape Builder tool, it helps in a lot of areas, please add it in future updates

[Namysh]

We want an official answer about that case please 😇

[Scarred]

This is one tool I miss from AI within my first 15 minutes use of AD. It'd be nice to have in future releases.

[GraficoDesign]

We really need something like a shape builder tool... I don't think I can do my illustration work without it, well not as simply anyway

[Sir Doyle]

Please add a shape builder, it an essential tool

[Petar Petrenko]

On 2/27/2020 at 5:30 PM, Antiplanet 140mm said:

Hello)

Does Affinity Designer have shape builder tool as in illustrator ?

Use "Geometry" tools like:

1. select the rectangle and the left most circle and ALT click on "Add" (geometry);
2. select the newly created object and the next circle and, again, ALT click on "Add";
3. and so on.

Now, you can CTRL click on any object if you want to manipulate it. See the "Layers" panel, too.

[telencephalon]

1 hour ago, Petar Petrenko said:

Use "Geometry" tools like:

1. select the rectangle and the left most circle and ALT click on "Add" (geometry);
2. select the newly created object and the next circle and, again, ALT click on "Add";
3. and so on.

Now, you can CTRL click on any object if you want to manipulate it. See the "Layers" panel, too.

Don't be ridiculous... 😉

I want to see how much time you spend working with the gold section. You'll just get tired of using "Geometry" tools when in a project, for example, 100 circles))) , than a simple tool like shape builder.

[Petar Petrenko]

7 hours ago, Antiplanet said:

Don't be ridiculous... 😉

I want to see how much time you spend working with the gold section. You'll just get tired of using "Geometry" tools when in a project, for example, 100 circles))) , than a simple tool like shape builder.

Sorry I was so rude to comment on your post.

To avoid such situations in the future I will not comment any post in Affinity forums in the future.