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Does Affinity Designer support pie charts like Illustrator:

 

... or any similarly easy way for a novice to make them?

 

 

If you have Numbers/iWork, the pie charts copy to the clipboard as PDF data, so that might be one way to those types of graphics into AD.

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Sorry but we don't have pie charts. If we do have pie charts one day then they will be in Affinity Publisher and not Designer.

 

Fair enough. Could pasting from Numbers be fixed, so it doesn't rasterize the graphics?

 

EDIT: Vector copy/paste works from Numbers -> Pages but not from Numbers -> TextEdit for example, then it rasterizes, too. A workaround is to save the chart from Numbers to PDF, load it in AD, merge the pie pieces and then copy it into the document I'm working on from there. Kind of a tedious workflow, but worst-case, it will do.

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Very good idea! I did, but by pasting, it is rasterized in Affinity Designer :(

 

 

Fair enough. Could pasting from Numbers be fixed, so it doesn't rasterize the graphics?

 

Technically it should be possible. In iDraw, a pie chart pastes in as a PDF (single object) and there's a right-click option to split the pie chart into its constituent objects (so each piece of the pie, the numbers, etc. all become individual objects). I imagine it's just a matter of the Affinity folks implementing support for this particular kind of workflow.

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Fair enough. Could pasting from Numbers be fixed, so it doesn't rasterize the graphics?

 

EDIT: Vector copy/paste works from Numbers -> Pages but not from Numbers -> TextEdit for example, then it rasterizes, too. A workaround is to save the chart from Numbers to PDF, load it in AD, merge the pie pieces and then copy it into the document I'm working on from there. Kind of a tedious workflow, but worst-case, it will do.

 

I just noticed a topic a few threads down (https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/1484-pdf-import-as-vector-object-components/) that shows how to pull out the PDF components in AD:

 

 

 

I only just figured out that the way to decompose the PDF into its component vector objects is to choose "Convert to curves"; it works great, thanks!

 

Can you try this command from a normal copy/paste to see if it works? If not, seems like the actual feature request would be to get AD to import the pasteboard as PDF instead of rasterizing it.

 

Another approach I just tried is to copy the graph in Numbers, then load Preview and select File → New from Clipboard. Preview will let you save it as a PDF; that way you don't have to save the entire Numbers doc to PDF. There may even be a way to automate this process with Automator or AppleScript.

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I just noticed a topic a few threads down (https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/1484-pdf-import-as-vector-object-components/) that shows how to pull out the PDF components in AD:

 

 

Can you try this command from a normal copy/paste to see if it works? If not, seems like the actual feature request would be to get AD to import the pasteboard as PDF instead of rasterizing it.

 

Another approach I just tried is to copy the graph in Numbers, then load Preview and select File → New from Clipboard. Preview will let you save it as a PDF; that way you don't have to save the entire Numbers doc to PDF. There may even be a way to automate this process with Automator or AppleScript.

 

Really appreciate you taking the time!

 

Pulling components from a PDF *file* is not a problem. Using "Convert to curves" on the raster didn't have the desired effect (it remained raster-looking, hard to tell whether it was vectorized or not), and the rasterization is in the first place a lossy operation? Would be nice to work losslessly with vectors.

 

Your approach rasterizes the image as well, and it's a bit on the tedious side.

 

EDIT: Seems something changed in iWork? :(

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5568637

 

Now I'm mostly curious whether it's a matter of implementing support for it, or waiting for Apple to patch iWork, using a PDF-file intermediary in the meanwhile :/

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EDIT: Seems something changed in iWork? :(

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5568637

 

Now I'm mostly curious whether it's a matter of implementing support for it, or waiting for Apple to patch iWork, using a PDF-file intermediary in the meanwhile :/

 

Ah, that would explain it: I'm still using iWork '09. Seems like the new iWork no longer copies charts to the clipboard as PDF. A shame, really, as I was hoping Apple would have worked out these kinds of kinks by now.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi royfactorial,

 

Have you tried this?

  • copy/export your pie chart into AD
  • paste/place on to your page
  • use the Quickshape tool to create a pacman face
  • copy and paste this over the first pie chart
  • use the red dots to adjust the proverbial pizza slices.
  • then using a combination of copy, paste, lock and the various colours tools adjust each slice to fit...

Good luck!

 

Ps I've made an art form out of tracing!

MacBook pro, 2.26 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB 1067 MHz DDR3, NVIDIA GeForce 9400M 256 MB, OS X 10.11.6

 

http://www.pinterest.com/peter2111

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Hi royfactorial,

 

Have you tried this?

  • copy/export your pie chart into AD
  • paste/place on to your page
  • use the Quickshape tool to create a pacman face
  • copy and paste this over the first pie chart
  • use the red dots to adjust the proverbial pizza slices.
  • then using a combination of copy, paste, lock and the various colours tools adjust each slice to fit...

Good luck!

 

Ps I've made an art form out of tracing!

 

I do this quite often and need a quick workflow with few steps, this is a bit over-complicated I would say. It would even be easier for me to export to PDF (file) and then load in AD.

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Hello chaps,

 

Pasting PDF is working in the latest beta - why not check it out? You can download and use for free (if you have a purchased copy of AD) - check out the Beta section of this forum. You should be able to paste your charts properly in the beta :)

 

A

 

Just downloaded the latest beta and gave it a spin. It still rasterizes the stuff from Numbers (but copying from Numbers to Pages works, for example). Very odd.

 

 

Try opening Numbers, pick the chart template, copy one of the existing charts, the pie for example. Paste in AD, size up. All pixly!

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Just downloaded the latest beta and gave it a spin. It still rasterizes the stuff from Numbers (but copying from Numbers to Pages works, for example). Very odd.

 

 

Try opening Numbers, pick the chart template, copy one of the existing charts, the pie for example. Paste in AD, size up. All pixly!

 

I just tried the AD beta with a chart copied from Numbers '09... works fine (the pie chart's components are sub-layers of the main layer that gets pasted in). So, it looks like the issue is with Apple and their newer iWork version not copying to the clipboard properly. Unfortunately it's not the only thing that's regressed with the new iWork.

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I just tried the AD beta with a chart copied from Numbers '09... works fine (the pie chart's components are sub-layers of the main layer that gets pasted in). So, it looks like the issue is with Apple and their newer iWork version not copying to the clipboard properly. Unfortunately it's not the only thing that's regressed with the new iWork.

 

It's not broken, it just works differently. Copying between Numbers and Pages works. Likely the data is not plain vectors but perhaps some iWork-object containing additional information.

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  • 2 months later...
  • Staff

Any chance of seeing this implemented? Tried with the latest beta and it's still not working.

 

This require Numbers to produce a vector version of chart. The format used to copy and paste between Apple Apps isn't shared. If you find any other non-Apple application that can paste a vector version of the chart from the newer version of Numbers then let me know and I will investigate further.

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This require Numbers to produce a vector version of chart. The format used to copy and paste between Apple Apps isn't shared. If you find any other non-Apple application that can paste a vector version of the chart from the newer version of Numbers then let me know and I will investigate further.

 

Figured, was hoping it was documented and would be easy to support :(

 

I tried Excel 2011, and it works. I'll just keep my fingers crossed that Excel 2015 will work the same way, then I'll switch to that instead.

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