effects/adjustments above artboards in hierarchy are not applied on export

[mb69]

i have setup of two rectangles like so, with adjustment above both of them and outline on the grouped artboards,

this is very useful (eg in game development) if you have many assets and want easily control some of their properties all at once

however, even tho it works in the editor, it gets exported like this...

Would like to point out that your Main Competitor, despite overall pretty terrible artboard experience, works as expected in the same situation.

AF Photo is the same.

I think either this should get fixed, or you shouldn't show in the editor what isn't going to get exported.

 

Thanks

 

artboardbug.afdesign

[mb69]

Oh i mean in export persona artboard slices, exporting it as single picture makes using artboards pointless for me.

[walt.farrell]

6 minutes ago, mb69 said:

Oh i mean in export persona artboard slices, exporting it as single picture makes using artboards pointless for me.

I haven't tried it, but I would expect that process to require that you have the adjustment layer in the Artboard, not floating somewhere above it.

Have you tried that approach?

[walt.farrell]

For example, here's an analogous situation to what you have, only using a Rectangle above (but not within) an Artboard, and exporting a Slice created from the Artboard/

.afdesign document:

Exported PNG file:

The Artboard Slice is only those items that are actually in the Artboard physically.

[mb69]

well yes, but as a image editing wysiwyg editor, i would expect artboard to export exactly as it looks in the editor.

You can put the adjustment inside the artboard, but then you lose ability to adjust all artboards simultaneously, which is whole point of the exercise. I worked around this by making the adjustment layer a symbol, and while hacky and clunky, that works, but still havent figured out the way to easily control layer effects like blur, outline etc for multiple artboards.

I still think this is a bug and should either work as expected or artboards should look the way they will export when it doesnt work.

[walt.farrell]

2 minutes ago, mb69 said:

or artboards should look the way they will export when it doesnt work.

But they can't do that. Look at my example. The rectangle is there. It can't just disappear over the Artboard.

You would have an inherently conflicting situation, between:

1. The overall design, as you see the complete screen, and as would be exported by File > Export;
   and
2. The design of an individual Artboard, as it would appear if you export using the Export Persona.

You can only "see" one of those.

[mb69]

well, then it should work correctly shouldnt it.

[walt.farrell]

It does. As I showed. An Artboard Slice includes the content of the Artboard, and ignores items that are not part of the Artboard.

[mb69]

Is there a good reason it should ignore them? and that the slice in the export persona shows different thing than the main view? Because only thing i see is that it's limiting my workflow and making harder case for switching from industry standard. It bothers me too, since artboard handling is otherwise way way better.

[StuartRc]

@walt.farrell is absolutely correct!

It is not a bug.. but a file with an incorrect layer structure. The Adjustment layer needs to be inside the group.. then it will work just fine

[Paul Mudditt]

Ok, misunderstanding, have you played with linked layers in Affinity Photo yet, they might be just what you need.

Maybe a different way of thinking but in this example, I duplicate linked the HSL adjustment and apply it to both artboards. But if you change it in one the other automatically changes.

 

[mb69]

Will take a look tomorrow at work, will probably work, but still is clunky workaround, i achieved the same thing with symbols as I written, but you still need the duplicated adjustments there which is a mess and extra work and the software still doesnt export what it shows on the main view. I still think that current state is at least a case of poor ux.

[Paul Mudditt]

4 hours ago, mb69 said:

Will take a look tomorrow at work, will probably work, but still is clunky workaround, i achieved the same thing with symbols as I written, but you still need the duplicated adjustments there which is a mess and extra work and the software still doesnt export what it shows on the main view. I still think that current state is at least a case of poor ux.

This is the video to watch. You can easily share attributes like layer fx across artboards and linked adjustments easily on desktop and iPad. (Took me a while how to figure it out on iPad !)

 

[Paul Mudditt]

Here you go, just create links in Affinity Photo. Both the HSL adjustments are linked and the layer FX are linked And the links continue to work in Designer as well. 

iPad demo but same on desktop.

 

 

 

 

artboard Links.afphoto

[Paul Mudditt]

Demo starting in Designer Desktop, move to Photo to create the Links then continue in Designer with the linked adjustments and effects still working and exported as desired.

 

Edited January 27, 2023 by Paul Mudditt
Screen recording bloopers edited out in Lumafusion on M1 Mac Mini

[mb69]

yes, but you're telling me that i have to edit that in layer by layer when i decide i want the same outline or adjustment for all stuff in file like this, and have to always think about it when making new files, and having each artboard cluttered with extra linked layers and groups. Look, I understand the workarounds, their existence doesn't mean that this isn't an issue. If you want The Competitor's users, stuff like this needs to work, my friends that I try to get to try AF out of sheer spite for the other A company, all think this is ridiculous also. You are losing pro customers over stuff like this.

If you really want to be new state of the art, just give us a full proper node tree mode, eventually some new 2D editor will do it and become a new standard.

[Paul Mudditt]

@mb69 After trying hard, I now have to say you are 100% correct.

I can see no reason why adjustments outside of an artboard should not simply apply to all artboards below and follow the same logic as if they were simply rectangular shapes containing other shapes.

And also groups of artboards should work just like groups of shapes.

I bet this is how it was originally working and would likely simplify the developers code base.

Now waiting for someone to come along and explain why they would not want adjustments to affect all artboard containers?

 

[StuartRc]

Thanks for the additional information...I can see your issue now!. mm

Nice idea but appears to be not available...could add it as a feature request!

Interesting. I had a play around with the same king of scenario.. having objects on separate artboards and attempting to apply FX (outline)..You are correct this does not work!.. But I can see the logic of why it does not work. Simply the FX has nothing to apply.. I had a play with a possible solution to the problem.

If you cannot apply the FX to the artboard and content then:

Set up a file with xx objects on artboards (mixed groups and layers + a couple with existing FX applied). Nested artboards to see if could apply inheritance.. erm NO!
(artboards | symbols are just objects in layers) I would think this is because trying to apply FX to a container that has no content (+ logically the FX would apply effect to the artboard no the nested content!)

So to get the FX effect to work you either apply FX to all objects (Slow) or create 1 and duplicate to all object layers (works but not efficient and could get messy)

So what if objects were at group level!.. could you apply to all with 1 FX.. yes! if grouped.. This works. BUT.. would need to restructure | organise file to something like:

Artboard > Group [FX] > Objects OR Artboard > Group >Objects [FX] 

Possible solution
1. Set up a single artboard (a lot of artboards just delete the artboards and keep objects!. re-arrange on single board)
2. Add objects to artboard and group (or separate if want different FX)
3. Apply changes on mass ..to group
4. Slice option from original artboard would be lost: 
a. Make sure have a naming convention for objects (to avoid confusion!)
b. In export persona mass create your slices (with objects sometimes I get odd results so check slice is containing object.)
c. Outline size change: Check whether Slice size considers FX position i.e. grows with object.. I expected this to fail but if you change the size of the FX the slice will grow to compensate!

Then the FX needs applying at the Object level

 

[Paul Mudditt]

@mb69 I was working on something else, and likely I have missed the point yet again but this seems to be able to add effects to multiple objects on multiple artboards and exports each correctly.

Multi Artboard Export.afdesign

Edited February 7, 2023 by Paul Mudditt
afdesign added

[Paul Mudditt]

36 minutes ago, N.P.M. said:

It's about adjustments.

Ah yes gotcha, if only they added some some adjustments to the Special FX window then this method would work possibly?. Any in particular adjustment you use, trying to be quick and practical here.

[Paul Mudditt]

5 minutes ago, N.P.M. said:

It isn't about me but the OP wanted use 1 adjustment ,say a LUT, to overlap all artboards and have it applied to the single slices in the export persona.

Ah sorry I thought I was replying to the opo, who I was hoping had more modest requirements for the games example he showed. With his artboard layout he may not have stumbled across being able to select all the items on the artboards, without, without selecting the artboards themselves.