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Spiro Splines and Automatic "soft curves"


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Hi everyone,

 

I have looked in the forum for a trace of this, and couldn't find it in the functionalities in the App, but it is such a sadly missing function of Illustrator that it is, for me, entirely necessary to add it to Affinity Designer to make it THE Adobe killer.

 

Some of you might have used Inkscape in the past, I discovered it very recently, being a mac user (and it is far from user friendly on a Mac...): The Spiro Spline, or automatic smooth curves, swirls and swooshes.

 

For both typography and ornaments, 2 "hot topics" nowadays, this tool is just fantastic.

 

 

There are 2 elements that are genius about it:

 

- First, it calculates automatically the "smallest curve value" between two points or a specific node, transforming any rough angle into smooth curves to create spirographic-style designs so easily it made my jaw drop when I discovered it (it is a nightmare in Illustrator).

 

- Second, and that's the most powerful, is the ability to edit "live and dynamically" the shape used as the fill of the stroke. Meaning you can easily conver a simple curve into a gorgeous "fat to slim" swirl and create highly editable ornaments on the go, using triangles and other shapes.

 

 

For those who never heard of it, check those two links, you will just be... wowed.

 

A simple tutorial to show your the "spiro magic"

http://verysimpledesigns.com/vectors/inkscape-tutorial-spiro-swirls.html

 

And this one to show you how powerful it is, especially for Typography design:

Inkscape + Spiro

(sorry it's in Spanish–which I'm not, and it goes fast, but it's quite straightforward).

 

 

This, combined to the user-friendliness of Affinity Designer, would make me put the premium for it right away.

 

Hope you enjoy it guys!

 

Boris

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Have you checked out the "Smart points" mode of the Pen tool.  Looking at the link you gave, smart points already does this for curve creation.

 

The spiral bit can be achieved by adjusting the Pressure profile for the path, but we don't do the fancy spiral stuff yet.

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  • 3 months later...

Yeah that tool is pretty incredible in inkscape. I was trying to replicate it with smart mode for the pen tool in AD and I couldn't really get it down. I'd definitely like to see something like this in AD. For making flourishes on text and logos this would come in super handy.

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  • 2 years later...
  • 4 years later...

Has this "Spiro Curves" feature get any notice yet? 😃

At least I hope everyone still remember it, and put it on the roadmap.

image.png

...And no Overlay version for better comparision.

image.png.537b1ea67e7edd5b167327db725fb706.png

Edited by BBkuro
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