How to Bend a Straight object at its center in affinity designer 1.8

[R C-R]

5 minutes ago, Boldlinedesign said:

Vectorstyler's "year of updates" is really no different than Affinity's model of paying again when the 2.0 version is released...

Well, it is certainly different in that for at least 5 years there have been a great many free updates to AD -- I think I bought the first 1.4 version back in 2014. I have lost track of how many updates I have installed since then.

11 minutes ago, Boldlinedesign said:

I can't imagine Affinity will be able to only do a paid major release every 5-10 years and stay profitable as a business. At some point, Affinity will be releasing a major update every year or two or three, requiring payment to upgrade to do so.

I am not so sure that is a safe assumption. There is still a huge untapped market for inexpensive graphics editing software, particularly for 'buy once, use for as long as the hardware & OS supports it' apps. Serif is also selling a tightly integrated suite of 3 apps, so there is a built-in incentive for buyers of one of them to also consider buying one or both of the others.

29 minutes ago, Boldlinedesign said:

It's felt like Designer has been abandoned in terms of development.

It may feel that way but I do not think it is true. Just over the last year or so they have made substantial 'under the hood' changes to improve performance & eliminate certain bugs. Besides, a lot of the development work put into improving AP & particularly APub also applies to AD, albeit indirectly.

Regardless, since we do not know what is on the internal roadmap, or if or when any 'must have' feature will be added to the 1.x version of AD or the whole suite, all we can do is make not-so-well-informed guesses about any of this.

[Boldlinedesign]

7 minutes ago, R C-R said:

for at least 5 years there have been a great many free updates to AD -- I think I bought the first 1.4 version back in 2014. I have lost track of how many updates I have installed since then.

Very few "real" updates in terms of new tools, new features. Perhaps a number of under the hood updates, but Affinity lacks major industry-standard tools in every part of it's trip of apps. I would gladly pay them more if they offered annual updates with substantive updates that actually made Affinity dramatically more useful. Today, Affinity's options are barely more useful than in 2015. Nearly ten years of clamoring for commonly found features in other similar apps and we're still waiting for them in Affinity.

 

10 minutes ago, R C-R said:

There is still a huge untapped market for inexpensive graphics editing software, particularly for 'buy once, use for as long as the hardware & OS supports it' apps.

I agree in part. The more that SAAS apps get predatory and expensive, the more enticing apps that are "buy once and use as long as the hardware and OS support it" become. Vectorstyler is just as much a "buy once and use as long as the hardware and OS support it" app as the Affinity apps are.

I "know" Designer has not been abandoned. It does feel that way in comparison to the other apps. Under the hood stuff is important and I optimistically hold out hope that it's a sign that 2.0 is around the corner filled with a ton of common use features that keep Affinity Designer from being a well-rounded professional app. I understand why they removed the roadmap, but I also think they could be doing more to appease the customers who feel like they are shouting into the void hoping to be heard.  I want to see Affinity do awesome and I want to be able to totally cut loose my reliance on Adobe CS6 and use a power set of apps including Affinity, Vectorstyler, Clip Studio Pro, etc.

[R C-R]

2 minutes ago, Boldlinedesign said:

Today, Affinity's options are barely more useful than in 2015.

Not true. Among other things, there was no APub app back then, so no StudioLink. All the apps now support templates, linking & embedding, the resource manager, & the "My Account" options. AD & APub now have the very useful "Select Same" & "Select Object" feature. The Stock panel was added in 2020. The Point Transform Tool was added back in 2019 (AD version 1.7.0), along with the other changes listed here like the Pen Tool rubber band mode, the lasso mode for the Node Tool, arrowheads in the Stroke panel, linear burn blend mode, the  Appearance Panel, bullets & numbering, & so on.

Back in 2017, the stroke stabiliser for all pencil and brush tools & a few other new features were added, listed here.

To see more you can open this topic & click through on the various version release notes. There has been a lot more development work done than just fixes & performance tweaks.

[LondonSquirrel]

2 hours ago, Boldlinedesign said:

Today, Affinity's options are barely more useful than in 2015.

That is simply not true. I have seen some very useful updates. In AD, 'select same fill colour/fill and stroke colour' was like a big 'yes!' moment for me when it came out. There have been numerous other updates.

[chillywilly]

13 hours ago, Wosven said:

@chillywilly

Since @Hens already showed the tools needed, here a speed test to create the earlier images.

With more structure and planned design, you can perhaps achieve what you need.

For one of the design, I would use another app, it would probably be faster...

ondulations.afdesign

Other app:

about_0.92-1_ZX0zrNN.svg 838.67 kB · 0 downloads

Wow, thank you @Wosven! I take it that you used the same techniques as Hen? The techniques Hen showed are really nice for emulating perspective changes with groups of lines, but they don't adjust vector groups with perspective calculations. You are showing a perspective shift in the purple line art. I'd love to hear how you accomplished that in Designer.

[chillywilly]

13 hours ago, Pšenda said:

Try search "Power Duplicate" - Ctrl+J.

https://affinity.help/designer/en-US.lproj/pages/ObjectControl/duplicate.html

 

 

Thanks for showing me the Power Duplicate trick! That's a great one.

[Wosven]

Yes, like Hens, I duplicated a donut, converted it to curves, and used the tools to distort it. After this, duplicating again to add shadow and light.

[Boldlinedesign]

@LondonSquirrel@R C-R i didn't mean it literally that Designer had not been updated at all since 2015... but the list of updates you both referenced are small additions added over many years. Maybe impressive if done in a year or two, not 10. I can appreciate Affinity wanting to build things well from the ground up, but they neglected the most commonly needed tools for things that while visionary, did not "put food on the table".  It's hard to enjoy the revolutionary shared file method, and account setup when I still can't warp text, use a vector eraser, create 100% vector brushes, have boolean operations that don't crash the app and create dirty geometry, etc. I'm sure in another year or two when 2.0 is released, our disagreements now will be meaningless because 2.0 will finally have the common tools we all expected in version 1.0.

[chillywilly]

9 hours ago, Wosven said:

Yes, like Hens, I duplicated a donut, converted it to curves, and used the tools to distort it. After this, duplicating again to add shadow and light.

 

Thank you @Wosven. Your effect turned out decently, and you and @Hens have shown me that in a pinch there's a lot I can do with these techniques. There's clearly a gap in functionality because true perspective shifts and warp effects offer a level of precision that look more "real." At least now I understand what Designer has to offer in the current state.

[chillywilly]

1 hour ago, Hens said:

If the outcome doesn't need to be vector you could use "edit in photo" and have the nondestructive live filters extend the possibilities.

Cool idea. In this case I was designing a logo, so I needed it to be vector.

[Dazmondo77]

3 hours ago, chillywilly said:

Cool idea. In this case I was designing a logo, so I needed it to be vector.

I agree 100% with everything Boldlinedesign has added to this discussion, and it appears we probably have a very similar workflow, for me Vectorstyler has enabled me to crack on and just get stuff done without even having to think about it, I just put all work together in Pub (StudioLink) and copy paste back and fourth between Pub and VS rather than coming up against a wall with what can be achieved in Affinity or moving over to Illustrator CS5 just for a bit of warping

So totally recommend adding VectorStyler to your workflow as we may be waiting another few years for a trickle of missing basic functions in Designer

Also see vid grab below to get an idea of the vector power of VectorStyler as a companion app to Affinity on a working job 

 

[Dazmondo77]

Anyone interested in VectorStyler See the link below

1 hour ago, SureWeb said:

I have been following this thread and also interested in using VectorStyler alongside AD. Today I found a 69% off promo deal and thought I would share incase anyone else was interested. I contact the folks at VectorStyler before I purchased and they confirmed the deal was legit.

deals.bluetailcoupon.net/sales/vectorstyler-professional-illustration-software

Hope it's ok to share. I have no affiliation whatsoever.

A few Affinity users have purchased VS via the coupon site and it looks all above board, everyone who needs a pure vector workflow needs to grab VectorStyler now 

 

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, Dazmondo77 said:

A few Affinity users have purchased VS via the coupon site and it looks all above board, everyone who needs a pure vector workflow needs to grab VectorStyler now 

As I mentioned in that topic, I could not complete the purchase using Apple Pay (or using my credit cards) because it kept telling me I had to enter my first & last name, so for the moment I can't take advantage of that offer. Bummer!

[LondonSquirrel]

14 hours ago, Boldlinedesign said:

@LondonSquirrel@R C-R i didn't mean it literally that Designer had not been updated at all since 2015... but the list of updates you both referenced are small additions added over many years. Maybe impressive if done in a year or two, not 10. I can appreciate Affinity wanting to build things well from the ground up, but they neglected the most commonly needed tools for things that while visionary, did not "put food on the table".  It's hard to enjoy the revolutionary shared file method, and account setup when I still can't warp text, use a vector eraser, create 100% vector brushes, have boolean operations that don't crash the app and create dirty geometry, etc. I'm sure in another year or two when 2.0 is released, our disagreements now will be meaningless because 2.0 will finally have the common tools we all expected in version 1.0.

Fair enough. I am still waiting/wanting a knife tool. Sometimes a knife is what you need, not a workaround.

[chillywilly]

On 11/6/2021 at 8:28 AM, Dazmondo77 said:

Anyone interested in VectorStyler See the link below

Thanks for the discount on VS. I tried it out and found that its feature set is much closer to Illustrator, so I bought it. Between these two apps I think I'll be covered for my vector needs. Thank you so much!