Anchor point handles always get in way

[kevinshea]

Is there any way to turn off the annoying but useful anchor point handles - when I am creating numerous, close anchor points the handles pop up and prevent me from adding new anchor points where I want to add them.  I've just been moving on to other areas and returning later to add mor but this is annoying and slowing down design.  Is there anyway to turn those anchor point handles off so they do not automatically appear and interfere with adding more anchor points? Thank you for your help.  I love Affinity Designer....

[MEB]

Hi kevinshea,

Welcome to Affinity Forums :)

Currently there's no way to hide the anchor point handles.

I'm moving your post to the Feature Requests section.

[laneallen]

I was just going to post something similar concerning the anchor points, but it's a slightly different issue than adding points (which I also run into). This is an issue even on low density anchor points, in that when trying to move a selection group, it's near impossible to select + move those points. It constantly picks the handles more times than not, not to mention that a group selection of points becomes fairly difficult to even see the anchor due to all the handles.

 

 

Try this: Pick some objects, go into Node Selection Tool, select some points, try to move an anchor point. I will bet you that 90% of the time you pick a handle. It's so frustrating!

 

My suggestion is this:

- On group selection of points, don't show the handles, since making more than one selection doesn't transform the points from one handle. This would be a tremendous UX quality of life improvement.

- For kevinshea's issue, don't show handles on created points after release, rely on the user utilizing command with the pen tool selected to modify created points with the node tool. Basically hiding handles unless node selection tool is active and on initially creating an anchor with the pen tool, but on release of creating that point, the handle disappears.

- Make this a toggle with the period key that remembers the user preference as a consistent option key for states.

[MattP]

We deliberately try to hit off-curve handles first, otherwise there's no way to hit them at all if they're near to an on-curve handle, so this is the root cause of your problem :(  I can definitely understand your frustration though - as I've been there myself... I think there's some mileage in your suggestion to not show off-curve handles when you have a multi-selection of nodes, but maybe we could just generally be smarter and not show off-curve handles that would overlap the on-curve nodes - this way you'll be able to zoom in until they no longer occlude each other and then get access to their handles if you wanted? It also means that if you didn't have overlapping handles that you'd be able to drag then around even with a multi-selection of nodes. I think that might be okay?

 

Thanks again,

Matt

[laneallen]

Hi MattP, yes, something like that would work I think. Just keep in mind that zoom removes context of what people are working on. Also, by removing handles on multiple selections could also notify people that multiple selections are made, meaning, two (or more) overlapping points. One possibility of strengthening this visually would be highlighting multiple selection points with a different color, say purple, then showing a fade on actual vector lines. Then on single selections, visually highlight it with (something like) green. You could even show the influence on a line, although I don't know how difficult that would be to program in, just a thought.

 

[timnhe]

Hello! same issue here >.<

 

The 'hide handlers on multiple node selection' idea is great! another option may be use option key for example, to force the translation movement instead work with handlers