Jump to content
You must now use your email address to sign in [click for more info] ×

Affinity Designer Customer Beta (1.5 - Beta 1)


Recommended Posts

Issue getting continuous export to work with multiple documents open. 

  • I have one document open, with continuous export checked. It's working fine. 
  • I open another document (continues is greyed out but checked). I export an artboard. Now continues is checked and not greyed out (so it looks like continuous is on) but continuous exports are not working. 
  • I need to then toggle the continuos check box off and back on. 

Not a show stopper but was surprisingly tricky to work out why it wasn't working. It seems that continuous should be off for a newly opened document and not greyed out as continues export should be considered a session based action, not a property of the file???

 

Cheers.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

These new features rock!

Guides and Snapping are vastly improved.

Constraints are terrific.

 

Some things I found:

 

I think there's actually a problem whenever the 'Lock Children' checkbox is set on the context toolbar in the Move Tool... and that's (unfortunately) set by default whenever you select an artboard! :(  So, I think the bug is that Constraints and 'Lock Children' aren't playing nicely together right now... I'll get that sorted out :)

 

Also Alignment doesn't work for constrained elements, but this could be a "by design" thing maybe?

In this case I'd suggest a "Reset Constraints" button that revert objects to default settings, so we can start from scratch.

An Edit > Paste Constraints would be very useful too.

 

The Auto Distribute = 0 doesn't work anymore, and it was a very handy feature to keep stacked items perfectly positioned.

 

--------------------------------

 

Suggestion for future releases: 

Please make an Alignment Studio or give us the possibility to detach the alignment panel: it will speed up things dramatically.

The white dog, making tools for artists, illustrators and doodlers

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Finding a consistent bug using symbols.

 

If I alt-click to replicate a text box within the symbol it links the two text boxes (not sure if this is intentional but it doesn't seem like logical behaviour to me) then when I delete the text in the second box it deletes both boxes and Affinity crashes. I've now replicated this four times in a row by accident! :)

 

Other than the occasional crash though the symbols functionality is brilliant, I do a lot of graphics for documents where one element is highlighted to show a position within a heirachy, using the symbols means that when someone wants to make changes to the layout of the main graphic, I can do that and each version which has a different highlighted element changes with it. This will save me hours and hours of re-work in the future so a big thank you here!

 

One last question... is it just me or does the zoom feel different in the Beta? I keep having to re-position the page after I've zoomed because it doesn't seem to zoom in the place that I expect?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Staff

Guides and Snapping are vastly improved.

 

At least someone notices.  Thanks Paolo.  ;)

SerifLabs team - Affinity Developer
  • Software engineer  -  Photographer  -  Guitarist  -  Philosopher
  • iMac 27" Retina 5K (Late 2015), 4.0GHz i7, AMD Radeon R9 M395
  • MacBook (Early 2015), 1.3GHz Core M, Intel HD 5300
  • iPad Pro 10.5", 256GB
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great, " functions properly!

 

Perhaps x, a, c are not mentioned, because they will be improved?

 
For example 4cm/c results in 4.0904…cm when using Arial Black and 4 cm when using Arial. In other apps you get 4 cm and 4 cm.
 
If you activate one or more text objects that use different fonts and change c, the result is often wrong because only one c is assigned for all.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just to note re the canvas flashing issue I reported a couple of days ago - it is definitely related to openGL. When I turn off "Use hardware OpenGL" in preferences, the flashing goes away (but scrolling and resizing becomes extremely jerky).

 

Cheers,

Oliver.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great !

 

I have another issue with Artboard titles (since their introduction, it's not specific to this beta), they're too small and too light.

 

Note that I have a special configuration for the LCD font smoothing:

defaults -currentHost write -globalDomain AppleFontSmoothing -int 4

Also note that my screen is not Retina.

 

ScreenShot2016-06-27at16.24.17.png

I have noticed this as well. Maybe a couple of sizes bigger would solve this one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Staff

Just to note re the canvas flashing issue I reported a couple of days ago - it is definitely related to openGL. When I turn off "Use hardware OpenGL" in preferences, the flashing goes away (but scrolling and resizing becomes extremely jerky).

 

Cheers,

Oliver.

Thanks for that, Oliver :)

 

We managed to find a 2015 MacBook Pro Retina 13" and it also exhibited exactly the same issues - it seems there's an OpenGL call which does something slightly different to how it acts in the reference implementation or on any other Macs in our office! :S  Anyway, the issue is resolved for the next beta which will hopefully be on Thursday :)

 

Thanks again,

Matt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Staff

I have noticed this as well. Maybe a couple of sizes bigger would solve this one.

I've had a stab at this earlier - the text is marginally bigger and the sub-pixel positioning of the text on non-retina screens should be improved so the text rendering has a better chance of looking good. The problem is also magnified by the fact that I'd inadvertently set everybody's artboard backgrounds to black (oops) which shows the problem at its most extreme! *sigh*  That issue is also solved for the next beta :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

(1) the arrow to adjust the width (or height) of the side panel does not appear on my MB or iMac

++ now that we have so many useful panels available it would be nice to be able to toggle the left or right column of panels separately on/ off (for 11/12/13inch MacBook users)

 

(2) regarding symbols:

when I make a group and make that group a symbol

- only the selected group is scaled when selected

- when I select the parts of the group and rescale, all instances are scaled

if it´s intended that way, I guess it´s fine

 

- if I move a group that was made to be a symbol, only the group moves

- if I move the parts of the group that was made to be a symbol, there seems to be a certain view point to which all objects are moved in a certain ratio, if I select only n-1 parts of the group, all objects move as expected

 

(3) I still wonder if/ how one can de-detach parts of a symbol

(3.1) dragging group from the layers panel onto the symbols panel could make a symbol, would be a nice touch, same goes for assets where it does not work for me

 

(4) view > customize tool, select the number of columns

The list pops up nicely on first try but when you go from 1 to 8 to 5 e.g it does work correctly for 1,6,7,8 and incorrectly for 2,3,4,5. the list does not fully extend anymore

it´s like the annoying live adjustment filter list that does not properly pop up  :blink: https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/14675-visibility-of-filter-drop-up/?p=65485

 

(5) bleed preview and pages are planned for 1.6 I guess?  :ph34r: 

 

(6) could you further a bit on what Retina Rendering Single Pass VS Retina Rendering Multi Pass (Retina) means?

It is somehow confusing because the setting says "Retina Rendering" and then the Multi pass also says retina so one might think that only multi pass is retina rendering but why is it then that single pass is also available under the "retina rendering" headline.... :huh:

 

(7) if I have artistic text and choose the pen tool and select the text in the layers panel I get pen tool like points on the glyphs but can´t modify them so I guess they are not meant to be exposed (the text is not converted to curves)

 

​(8) constraints

- having inner and outer constraints active in the constraints dialog should either lock the whole container or should be made illegal, as it is now, the outer constraints overwrite the inner ones but there is a visual clue for that missing in the panel

- no constraints behaves like inner constraints, should also be made illegal 

- right lock with inner constraints blows the object up with every container rescaling operation, left lock behaves the other way round and"micro"nizes the object 

- right and left lock with outer constraints behave just like outer constraints (I´m not yet sure how they should behave)

 

BTW: for those who wondered: If you make an asset from a symbol it does not synchronize across documents 

 

 ​file > export "has almost a responsive type of feel" as ashley might say  :lol: still beach balling while selecting the pop ups but not as excessive as it used to be

 

Crashes:

#1 Designer Crashes reproducible when you have an image or a shape masked with another shape and you want to add outer constraints to the masking shape

speaking of a new beta I´d be interested to know of any of what I´ve mentioned is legit or if it (mainly the constraint thing) is just based on my lack of knowledge 

 

looking forward to learning the constantly improving software  :)

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Staff

speaking of a new beta I´d be interested to know of any of what I´ve mentioned is legit or if it (mainly the constraint thing) is just based on my lack of knowledge 

 

looking forward to learning the constantly improving software  :)

Hi MBd,

 

Sorry, wasn't meaning to ignore - just been very busy and it looked like a large list to respond to that needed to wait until I was building the code! ;)

 

I can definitely help on some of the points you raised:

 

2. Yes, a symbol is always placed with its own transform. This is by design - rightly or wrongly. I'm happy to accept criticism and if it needs to change it can be changed - it's just an artefact of the way everything works and is the natural state of things, but I can make it act differently by changing the way our objects work...

 

3. It's not possible to re-attach any part of a symbol right now. In the future, you may be able to link arbitrary attributes of any objects together - the fill from one object, blend mode from another, transform from another, and the stroke from another can all be linked onto any object even at present, but there is no UI to facilitate this yet. Our symbol architecture is very flexible and is a good starting point for many other cool features, but this is part of the reason why it took so long to appear!

 

3.1. Yes, I agree, that would be nice :)

 

5. I'm afraid I just haven't had chance yet to add bleed preview - but (like the many other things people are keen to point out to me that I haven't done yet) I'll keep trying my best to get it in as soon as I can. I do appreciate its value, I just haven't had time yet... With regards to pages - they're in and working in Publisher, but I don't know how much of that is coming to Designer and that's a chat for another day...

 

6. I think it's a very confusingly named dropdown, unfortunately, and it's actually missing the third option that makes it useful! Basically, by the time we're ready to release, you should have control of your rendering: Single-pass 'standard' resolution, Single-pass 'retina' resolution or Multi-pass rendering.

 

7. I think we've made a mistake by showing these un-editable node handles for text objects and I'll remove them soon...

 

8. Constraints are definitely best understood by watching a video - I'm hoping there will be a video available from us very soon that will explain what on Earth to expect and how to go about using them! In the meantime, I'll mention one key point that has been messing up everybody so far: They seem to be acting incorrectly if you're using the Move Tool and the 'Lock Children' checkbox is checked on the context toolbar - this is the default state when you have an Artboard selected... so if you're constraining objects as children of an artboard, then changing the artboard to see the effects, it may be acting incorrectly, so just uncheck that box :)

 

 

The Assets panel is a storage area of concrete things - changing the symbol instance on your document afterwards will not update the concrete instance in the Assets panel, nor will it propagate to other documents and this is by design.

 

Thanks! :)

Matt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

(8) ok alright, I already got a bit more confident with constraints using your file for Malcolm, deselecting "lock children" indeed resolves this weird maximising/ minimizing (which I thing should nevertheless be somehow prohibited) 

 

text styles:

the text styles are also pretty confusing to me but I´ve not really dived into them yet, anyway looking forward to understanding them soon.

I also didn´t really see the baseline text snapping happening? Could that be?

 

export/ slices:

I hope the export persona will also allow for resizing (say the slice covers an area of 100*100px but I´d like to export that slice at only 10*10px) at least in AP, or is this even possible and I´m just somehow missing it?

And slices still don´t seem to snap which is somehow strange  :blink:

 

(3) great, looking forward to these symbol reattaching thing!

(3.1) great  :D

(4) the adjustment pop up thing is still unmentioned for so long, I really find it disturbing and wondering why nobody else is mentioning this  :lol:  :ph34r:

(5) yeah I just thought about the bleed thing again as I remembered it was sort of working before the 1.4 release already in a testing environment of you, definitely looking forward to it!

(6) the rendering is a really great improvement cause every other added feature is just dust in the wind if not displayed smoothly 

 

mentioning some positive things:

- I also think that embedded documents that render as vectors in final output is a big thing to happen

- beta Icon is indeed improved vastly! 

- Assets will be great for watermarks for photographers and kill the nasty brush type workaround (I think they´ll also be in Photo?)

- snapping to gaps, although not working yet is something I really actually use, was the first feature on my Mac I really enjoyed after opening Keynote!

- the included Assets are a really nice touch! 

- your Web preview plan is actually really interesting! https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/21239-ad-prototyping-links-web-iphone/?p=99278

 

Im more on the photo side of things (waiiiiiiiiting  :wub: ) so if I mix up certain designer features please bare with me  :rolleyes: 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Staff

I also didn´t really see the baseline text snapping happening? Could that be?

 

export/ slices:

I hope the export persona will also allow for resizing (say the slice covers an area of 100*100px but I´d like to export that slice at only 10*10px) at least in AP, or is this even possible and I´m just somehow missing it?

 

Baseline snapping should be happening - it should only snap the first baseline of your selected text against all baselines of other text objects, I think? At least at present...

 

You can now specify a multiplier (1x, 2x, 3x) or a width, or a height on each slice export... Just go to the Export Persona's 'Slices' panel, open the row with your slice in it and click the dropdown that says '1x' to see other options. For example, you can select an arbitrary sized slice and just enter '10w' and it will be exported at 10 pixels wide with the corresponding height defined by its aspect ratio. '10h' would do the converse, '10p' would be 10 points, so would write the correct number of pixels to make the right point size (so includes DPI calculations). Does that make any sense? :)

 

Thanks,

Matt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Matt,

 

there seems to be a serious bug with symbols and artboards. Artboards can obviously become symbols as well, and everything is fine as long as you keep such symbols apart on the canvas. But as soon as you drag such a symbol to the canvas such that it touches the borders of another one, things go crazy … beachball of death …  :(

 

Other than that, symbols are simply stunning. They are updating blazingly fast, even with numerous instances, I almost can’t believe it …  :o

 

Awesome work …  :)

Alex

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Staff

Hi Matt,

 

there seems to be a serious bug with symbols and artboards. Artboards can obviously become symbols as well, and everything is fine as long as you keep such symbols apart on the canvas. But as soon as you drag such a symbol to the canvas such that it touches the borders of another one, things go crazy … beachball of death …  :(

 

Other than that, symbols are stunning. They are updating blazingly fast, even with numerous instances, I almost can’t believe it …  :o

 

Awesome work …  :)

Alex

YIKES! I don't even like to think about what's going on there, but I'll debug through it tomorrow! :S

 

Thanks!

Matt

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guys, first of all, congrats on finally getting the 1.5 Beta out! :D The new Text Styles panel surely looks promising (and, if implemented in the same fashion in Photo, will run circles around Photoshop's text engine, which can't even handle the full scope of OpenType properly)… It already gives us a whiff of what Publisher will bring, am I right? ;)

 

As for snapping, I've been testing it, and though I will always repeat my position on wireframed/phantom dragging and self-snapping until you eventually add it as an option, it works much better now. It's still a bit hit-or-miss, though, especially when working with bigger numbers of objects (apparently, Designer has an extremely limited buffer for snapping candidates and starts “forgetting” objects after you selected more than six of them in a row… which always forces me to convert everything to curves and use the Node tool as a subterfuge; at least I finally got the hang of it, though it entails selecting all objects with the Move tool, then switching to the Node tool and pressing Cmd+A to select all nodes, then manually selecting the snapping target and, finally, dragging from the desired source node to the target node… Phew, in Illustrator I could actually do that in only two steps, and having the ability to temporarily switch from the Selection Tool to the Direct Selection tool by pressing Option makes it even easier, so couldn't we at least get that shortcut? At least Affinity makes super clean and rigorous snaps, so there's that), so I'll be sure to send you a video demo of my experiments later on.

 

I also have a thing or two to add when it comes to guidelines: they aren't snapping properly to points and objects at all (they are working fine in 1.4, so I'll consider that a bug), and – something I only now realized, after mentioning my node tool subterfuge – you should definitely be able to add (or even drag pre-existing) guidelines with the Node Tool (that never worked in Affinity, as far as I can recall, and should be fairly easy to implement), which could be very useful in complex geometric illustrations (smart guidelines and snapping are very useful, yes, but sometimes having visible and permanent guidelines can come very handy).

 

Oh, and by the way, I noticed a terrible inconsistency in the Node tool that could and should be solved, and which would make object selecting and snapping *that* much easier… When you select a curve (or various curves) and a shape (or various shapes) with the Move tool and then switch to the Node tool, or when you select both directly with the Node tool, the nodes in the curve(s) are individually draggable, whereas the “nodes” (not that they are editable as such, but they *are* there) in the shape(s) are not only non-draggable, they are not even selectable (but can serve as manual snap candidates, hmmm). On the other hand, when selecting one or various shapes with the Node tool, you will get the exact same size and rotation handles as you get in the Move tool. Now, this makes absolutely no sense whatsoever UX-wise; the Move and Node tools are supposed to be different “modes”, and if you're not supposed to individually edit a shape's nodes, at least make it an all/none proposition (selecting one node selects all of them, de-selecting one does the opposite); likewise, if you're not supposed to resize and rotate objects with the Node tool, you should also make the resize/rotation handles just disappear for *all* objects when selecting them with said tool.

 

As it stands, the Node tool is just extremely confusing to work with when selecting, moving and snapping stuff around (because it just stealthily behaves the same as the Move tool when selecting and dragging shapes, and plainly ignores them when curves are thrown into the mix), and even though you love to tout your smart guidelines and snapping, there are times and projects that call for finer control. If you think about it, investing in great automated features *and* manual control (as you did with your snapping manager, but taking it a step further without even further complicating the UI panels) aren't mutually exclusive propositions… I will also add that you should really fix this glaring inconsistency before Affinity hits the Windows market. It's already bad enough that Mac users are getting used to a tool behaviour that doesn't make much sense; it'd be even worse if it became an entrenched standard… It would be Illustrator all over again (except much speedier and with different nags), and I believe Serif is aiming much higher than that. :\

 

Afterwards, I shall do all my spot colour transparency, gradient and cross-gradient testing to see how far along it is as far as print production is concerned. I haven't read anything related to that in the release notes, but one can always hope for a surprise, right? ;)

 

Finally, symbols and assets really do bring it on par with other competing packages and will make managing larger projects a breeze. I've done a lot of stuff before in Illustrator where symbols made a huge difference in keeping files lean, so I can certainly see myself, little nags notwithstanding, using Affinity for more complex stuff as soon as 1.5 hits the RC stage and the MAS.

 

So far, even with all my complaining (I'm sorry… I just want to make the permanent switch to Affinity ASAP, and I want it to be perfect  ;) ), I must say I am very impressed with what I've seen. Kudos for your great work!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Designer has an extremely limited buffer for snapping candidates and starts “forgetting” objects after you selected more than six of them in a row …

 

Have you seen the new options? Have a look at the screen shot below …  :)

post-1198-0-79073100-1467184033_thumb.png

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Staff

 

7. I think we've made a mistake by showing these un-editable node handles for text objects and I'll remove them soon...

 

 

 

Actually they are there intentionally.  If you have some of the Pen/Node tool snapping options turned on it will show you small nodes for objects selected that are not converted to curves.  This gives you targets for aligning other nodes to in editable curves.

SerifLabs team - Affinity Developer
  • Software engineer  -  Photographer  -  Guitarist  -  Philosopher
  • iMac 27" Retina 5K (Late 2015), 4.0GHz i7, AMD Radeon R9 M395
  • MacBook (Early 2015), 1.3GHz Core M, Intel HD 5300
  • iPad Pro 10.5", 256GB
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Actually they are there intentionally.  If you have some of the Pen/Node tool snapping options turned on it will show you small nodes for objects selected that are not converted to curves.  This gives you targets for aligning other nodes to in editable curves.

 

Yeah! Brilliant.

The white dog, making tools for artists, illustrators and doodlers

Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Guidelines | We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.