»Set Fill to Black and White«-Shortcut Irreversible Breaks Fill Layer

[Mr. Doodlezz]

Hey community!

The title actually says it all. I've been using this incredibly useful little feature ever since I learned it decades ago (when I was working with Adobe applications), and was very happy to find it right from Affinity’s first ever release (?) in the shortcuts menu: »Set Fill to Black and White«. It's particularly useful in Designer when you need to quickly reset the base colours of your shapes, but also in Photo, especially as all the apps in the suite work so seamlessly together.

However, using this shortcut in Photo with an active Fill Layer in the layers panel completely breaks it, like … irreversibly. Not even the »Revert defaults« button (if added in the toolbar) can revive its initial state! ☹️

Steps to Reproduce:

1. Set up a shortcut under Shortcuts → Miscellaneous → Set Fill to Black and White.
   Note: There's no menu item for this option at all, it's only accessible via a keyboard shortcut, factory default is D.
2. Create a Fill Layer.
3. Select Fill Layer (if not already active) in the layers panel.
4. Use the designated shortcut previously assigned to Set Fill to Black and White.

Expected Behavior:

I’m actually not sure what I expected. 😅
Probably a reset to white? But I'm not sure about the stroke, since a fill layer is practically borderless. And I suppose that might be the reason why it breaks.

Current Behavior:

The Fill layer turns transparent and stops responding to any changes of color or other fill.
As mentioned, Set Fill to Black and White completely breaks the layer irreversible. You have to delete the layer and create a new one.

I'm having the same problem on MacOS and Windows, but as I'm sitting in front of a Mac at the moment (and since the forum is lacking a thread for bugs that affect the application regardless of OS), I'm going to post it here.

Can someone verify this?

Cheers
Dennis aka The Guy With All the Fill Layer Issues 🥲

[Old Bruce]

@Mr. Doodlezz, Nice catch. This is also problem with the latest beta. Weird how hitting the D key (the default for the reset to Black and White) turns the Fill layer to transparent. It also seems to be Independent of tool choice, meaning it happens with whichever tool I have active.

[Mr. Doodlezz]

4 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

@Mr. Doodlezz, Nice catch. This is also problem with the latest beta. Weird how hitting the D key (the default for the reset to Black and White) turns the Fill layer to transparent. It also seems to be Independent of tool choice, meaning it happens with whichever tool I have active.

@Old Bruce, thanks for confirming. Oh, so it’s actually set to D by default? I wasn’t sure if that’s me and assumed it’s not set up at all by factory standards. 😁

[NathanC]

Hi @Mr. Doodlezz,

Many thanks for providing detail, I've replicated this across both platforms and it has now been logged with the developers.

During testing, I did find find out that if the document colour format is set to CMYK, this transparency bug does not occur, it will set the fill colour to black when using the shortcut. I also found that when this issue does occur in RGB documents, you can still invert the fill layer (Layer > Invert) and the fill layer will be opaque and you can then change the fill colour, so it's not completely irreversible.

[Mr. Doodlezz]

Hey @NathanC, thanks for your reply!

Thanks for your further tests, curious!
But these steps won't revert it to its original state, will they? Still seems a bit untidy to me. 😅

So I'm glad you could log it as a bug! 🫶

[walt.farrell]

It sounds like the shortcut is working on the Fill Layer's mask, rather than its fill color. Which is also the intended behavior if you were to paint on the Fill layer, I think.

[Mr. Doodlezz]

2 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

It sounds like the shortcut is working on the Fill Layer's mask, rather than its fill color. Which is also the intended behavior if you were to paint on the Fill layer, I think.

Hey @walt.farrell,

to me it sounds like you are confusing the topic of the usually vector-based Set Fill to Black and White with any of the raster-based Fill-options found in the Edit menu (see below).
These Fill-options work with all kinds of raster-based elements (layers or masks) but are not connected in any way to the item discussed.
And yes, while it's also used to reset the foreground and background colours to black and white, it shouldn't automatically floodfill the entire mask with either colour.

Simply hitting D (Set Fill to Black and White) shouldn't affect any raster-based layers – or masks – because there is no fill in terms of »fill of a shape«, if that makes sense.

So I counter and say it's not the intended behavior for Set Fill to Black and White on any raster-based layers or masks, as Nathan already confirmed with further tests and other issues.

[walt.farrell]

44 minutes ago, Mr. Doodlezz said:

to me it sounds like you are confusing the topic of the usually vector-based Set Fill to Black and White with any of the raster-based Fill-options found in the Edit menu (see below).
These Fill-options work with all kinds of raster-based elements (layers or masks) but are not connected in any way to the item discussed.
And yes, while it's also used to reset the foreground and background colours to black and white, it shouldn't automatically floodfill the entire mask with either colour.

No, I'm not.

If you change the Fill color while a Fill layer is selected, the new color is applied. This is standard Affinity processing. So, when you reset the foreground/background colors, and you have a Fill layer selected, that should change its color.

However, when you use the D shortcut, instead of changing the Fill color to White, it  seems to be changing the Fill layer's mask to white, which makes the layer transparent.

Remember that a Fill layer is somewhat magic. It has a built-in mask, unlike a normal pixel layer. And it looks like using the shortcut is affecting the mask part of the layer, not the fill part.

[Mr. Doodlezz]

Deleted, because double.

[Mr. Doodlezz]

4 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

sounds like the shortcut is working on the Fill Layer's mask

You were talking about the Fill Layer Mask previously, @walt.farrell.
This Mask – magically embedded in the Fill Layer or not – simply has to be a rasterbased layer.
How else would you be able to manipulate it with virtually any raster-based tool such as a brush, smudge or eraser?

16 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

So, when you reset the foreground/background colors, and you have a Fill layer selected, that should change its color.

Yes, that’s the result I was aiming for!

[walt.farrell]

3 minutes ago, Mr. Doodlezz said:

And that layer – magicially embedded in the fill layer or not – is a raster layer.

Sorry; I don't understand your point.

Color changes are automatically applied to Fill layers when they are selected. I'm saying there's a bug, and this one kind of color change is being applied to the wrong part of the Fill layer.

[Mr. Doodlezz]

Sorry, @walt.farrell, the website bugged out on me while editing my comment, feel free to re-read it – but there’s no need, I guess because …

I now have to admit, you're on the right track, I think!

Although, yes, regrettably it completely erases the Fill Layer's mask by covering it with black, it also resets the Fill Layer's colour to white (as expected).

One can easily check this:

1. Create a Fill Layer.
2. Change it’s colour to what ever suits you. (Except white, obviously. 😁)
3. Draw something on it’s integrated Mask.
4. Hit D.

Result:
The Fill Layer suddenly appears transparent, evidently because its Mask is filled with black.
But with Layer → Invert (⌘+I), as suggested by Nathan, a white fill layer is revealed again! The previous choosen colour is gone – magic! (Or something like that.)

Therefore, I now assume that Set Fill to Black and White actually affects both, the Fill Layer itself and the Fill Layer Mask.
It seems that the white fill is assigned directly to the Fill Layer, while the Mask gets the black fill, making it look like it's transparent.

Man, at this point it almost feels like a game of social deduction. 😅
The only thing I'd like to know now: Is that how the Fill Layer really was murrrderrred? 🔎‍

[Old Bruce]

8 minutes ago, Mr. Doodlezz said:

Therefore, I now assume that Set Fill to Black and White actually affects both, the Fill Layer itself and the Fill Layer Mask.
It seems that the white fill is assigned directly to the Fill Layer, while the Mask gets the black fill, making it look like it's transparent.

I think you are correct.