Magic Wand [German "Zauberstab"] missing in Affinity

[FFWD]

What I'm missing is the function of making a vector from selection. Let's say you have a bitmap (black shape on white back). With the Magic Wand Tool in Fireworks you could click anywhere in the black area, it automatically selected it with marching ants, and from the context menu you could choose "make vector from selection". 

 

I need this desperately! 

thanks.

[TonyB]

Thanks for the suggestion. I will add it to my list.

[bandit69]

+1

[HartmutQuedlinburg]

It's not important for me to have the same tool, but to get the same results.

Nevertheless, please consider how the magic wand (Zauberstab) tool works in Photoshop (Photoshop Elements 5 still works fine on my Mac Book OS X 10.5.8): When you click on any part of a picture it selects an area, depending on the "tolerance" you choose. Then there are moe than four other options: glätten, benachbart, alle Ebenen, Kante verbessern (three more parameters). So it is a very complex tool. It is useful to knock out the background of an object or other elements of a photo and I prefer it to the lasso tool. It would be great to have something similar in Affinity Designer.

[MEB]

Hi HartmutQuedlinburg,

Welcome to Affinity Forums.

I know it's not the same as the Magic Wand but have you tried the Selection Brush in Pixel Persona? It's quick (you just have to paint the selection), you can adjust the size for smaller details, and clicking on Refine in the context toolbar gives you an even deeper bunch of controls to fine tune your selection... Just give it a try.

 

Affinity Photo, coming before the end of this year as a beta, is our dedicated app for image editing and should cover a even broader range of selection tools. That's the most suited app to be compared to Photoshop.

[JDW]

I found several discussion threads in this form on the topic of Magic Wand Tool.  What we all want is not what that Selection Brush does (Pixel Persona).  What we want is...

 

1. Sketch a bitmap.  Use paintbrush to paint a "J" for example.

2. Use the Magic Wand Tool to click once in the whitespace outside the "J" you just drew and find that every bit of whitespace outside the "J" is selected.  

 

Of course, just like in Adobe apps, there should be tolerance settings as well as the ability to antialias or not, AND the ability to select ALL whitespace (i.e., a contiguous or non-contiguous setting).

 

There is no equivalent for the Magic Wand Tool in Affinity Designer.  There should be.  Because if you try to replicate what the Magic Wand Tool does in Adobe apps, it takes so much work you ultimately either give up or go back to an Adobe app to accomplish that every-so-simple task.

 

All said, please add a Magic Wand Tool.

 

Thanks.

[Alfred]

There is no equivalent for the Magic Wand Tool in Affinity Designer.  There should be.  Because if you try to replicate what the Magic Wand Tool does in Adobe apps, it takes so much work you ultimately either give up or go back to an Adobe app to accomplish that every-so-simple task.

 

I understand where you're coming from, but Affinity Designer is not Photoshop. Affinity Photo, as you might expect, has the kind of Magic Wand Tool that you're looking for.

 

I've never used Adobe Illustrator, but I understand that it does have a Magic Wand Tool. However, I've read that it will only select entire bitmap objects, so it doesn't do the kind of pixel-based selection that you've described.

[JDW]

I understand where you're coming from, but Affinity Designer is not Photoshop. Affinity Photo, as you might expect, has the kind of Magic Wand Tool that you're looking for.  I've never used Adobe Illustrator, but I understand that it does have a Magic Wand Tool. However, I've read that it will only select entire bitmap objects, so it doesn't do the kind of pixel-based selection that you've described.

 

Affinity Designer (AD) is not the same as Illustrator insofar as AD offers a Pixel Persona.  Reminds me in some way of Deneba Canvas 3.5.x which I absolutely loved back in the day.  Illustrator is very much a vector only app even though it allows some rasterization.  As such, due to the presence of the Pixel Persona, a Magic Wand Tool is only logical.  

[Brakus71]

Affinity Photo, as you might expect, has the kind of Magic Wand Tool that you're looking for.

 

 

hi,

 

where to find this in AP? im lost actually (using newest version).

[Alfred]

Its official name is 'Flood Select Tool', but (as you can see) the icon is a magic wand. ^_^

[Brakus71]

duh.....i tried this one and it did nothing on the image's background i had opened.....hm, tried again seconds ago (on another pic) and it worked, lol, but thanks a lot anyway^^

[Brakus71]

hm, and again, its not working?

 

there s a template i use, only one layer is being edited, mainly by putting a new gfx. in it.....and this new gfx. could have some black background which i want to "magic wand" and delete .... it doesnt work, i can click so many times on the black area, nothing happens (no ant-feet, no selection shows up). the correct layer IS selected in the layer-overview.

i dont understand the mechanics with this.....why it doesnt show anything that is....

 

edit:
pix-example:

 

see attached.

black shape should be erased....

[Brakus71]

*bump*

[MEB]

Hi Brakus71,

Welcome to Affinity Forums :)

This is because you are working with an Image layer type. When you place of drop (from Finder or Windows explorer) an image file on the canvas it is added as an image layer type (look at the label between parenthesis after the layer's name in the Layers panel). These type of layers retain all the original image data, so you can scale, rotate, skew  etc (transform) them without losing quality however you can't change their content data (the pixels).

For this your will need to convert them to a pixel layer type (to do it right click the image layer in the Layers panel and select Rasterise...). The image will be rasterised using the dpi set in the document setup and you can then change its pixels using the Magic Wand Tool and deleting the black part as you want.