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What to do with such Designer import?


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Hi. I am trying to import EPS file downloaded from Shutterstock. And Designer's import making me crazy! Tell me how can I use Designer (I really want) and not use Illustrator when I Designer has such terrible import... So 2 huge problems when importing!

 

1. Image cropping is absolutely incorrect. Look at examples in Illustrator and Designer. In Illustrator vector is adjoins to the edges like should be, in Designer not!

2. Colors are just terrible! Absolutely wrong! I should open in Illustrator first and save to ai file with embedded color profile, and only after that Designer can show me correct colors!

3. Make finally Artboard tool, we discussed in this topic: https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/20103-exporting-to-eps-%E2%80%94-how-to-do-that/&p=93520 — method with drawing rectangle like clipping mask is terrible and I need to use Illustrator every time to check how your software exported. Just include Artboard feature to get always what I see. Because when I am importing eps with correct artboard to Designer I have not any rectangles!

 

Tell me what to do now and make it work good in next update! So great software with such terrible main features...

I attached original eps vector from shutterstock too.

SHUTTERSTOCK_431066056_Vector.eps

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post-18436-0-28121900-1468739908_thumb.png

post-18436-0-14753200-1468739915_thumb.png

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Hi bodich, you shouldn’t probably post licensed artwork on this forum (if that is the case here) …  ;)

 

What regards your color problems, you can go ahead and do the following:

  • After opening your document in Affinity Designer, go to File > Document Setup …, and open the Colour tab.
  • Click Assign.
  • Select your desired profile, for instance, RGB/8 and sRGB IEC61966-2.1.
  • Click OK.

This will get you the true 80ties look as shown on the Shutterstock page where you downloaded the image.

 

Hope that helps …  :)

Alex

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Hi bodich, you shouldn’t probably post licensed artwork on this forum (if that is the case here) …  ;)

 

What regards your color problems, you can go ahead and do the following:

  • After opening your document in Affinity Designer, go to File > Document Setup …, and open the Colour tab.
  • Click Assign.
  • Select your desired profile, for instance, RGB/8 and sRGB IEC61966-2.1.
  • Click OK.

This will get you the true 80ties look as shown on the Shutterstock page where you downloaded the image.

 

Hope that helps …  :)

Alex

 

It does not help at all. I tried already converting to all profiles! And I tried all profiles in Illustrator and you know, Illustrator ALWAYS shows correct colors, I just can't broke it, I tried but I can't broke colors in Illustrator.

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Here is one more image. I saved in Illustrator to ai file with embedded profile! But when I am opening in Designer all colors are wrong! And look at curves rendering, in Designer it is terrible with gaps!

 

Here is the free vector page, you can see how it should be looking. https://www.123freevectors.com/smiling-mouth-free-vector-image/

 

Hey DEVELOPERS! Where are you? Tell me what to do!!!

post-18436-0-17294800-1468749192_thumb.png

post-18436-0-68313500-1468749201_thumb.png

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bodich... I feel your frustration. Others have pointed out the outlines where shapes meet. I agree with you it is a problem...BUT, it is the weekend. I'm sure you will get a response from the developers but it will likely be tomorrow. They don't work 24 hrs a day 7 days a week.

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Yeah, Assigning color profile now works... (although the interface to do so is a little weird). Thanks for the tip ABC.

 

Regarding spaces: This too seems to be marginally better in 1.5. (I installed over top, so I can't do a side by side comparison)

But, in this particular case, to fix completely (because it seems to be urgent)...

Change the black layer to be a solid fill by deleting all interior nodes. Zero gaps.

 

iow, make this post-12544-0-91648200-1468769533_thumb.png into this post-12544-0-03110900-1468769525_thumb.png

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BUT, it is the weekend. I'm sure you will get a response from the developers but it will likely be tomorrow. They don't work 24 hrs a day 7 days a week.

 

No, they don't, but sometimes it seems as though they work 18 hours a day 6½ days a week!

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Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for Windows • Windows 10 Home/Pro
Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for iPad • iPadOS 17.4.1 (iPad 7th gen)

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Yeah, Assigning color profile now works... (although the interface to do so is a little weird). Thanks for the tip ABC.

 

Regarding spaces: This too seems to be marginally better in 1.5. (I installed over top, so I can't do a side by side comparison)

But, in this particular case, to fix completely (because it seems to be urgent)...

Change the black layer to be a solid fill by deleting all interior nodes. Zero gaps.

 

iow, make this attachicon.gifScreen Shot 2016-07-17 at 11.31.28 AM.png into this attachicon.gifScreen Shot 2016-07-17 at 11.31.38 AM.png

 

 

Yes, I making additional bottom layer to fix gaps. But anyway it is temporary solution. Both Affinity apps are so cool and it should not work like that. I'd never write such reviews to garbage apps, but Affinity made brilliant software I think and I love it so much and want it to work perfect as possible.

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Hi bodich,

 

I mean this is the best possible way: Please calm down.

 

Firstly, when was the last time one of the developers or project managers of any of your favourite Adobe software ever bothered to reply to you on a topic you wanted to discuss - and was it on a Sunday evening in their own time? I'm not saying the team here are spectacular, deserving of grand praise or anything insane, but I am saying that we actually care and are trying our best so try to take that as a sign that things will get better in time.

 

So, I had a look at your first eps - and I can tell you exactly why Illustrator appears to get that file oh-so-right - it's because the file you're looking at was authored in Illustrator and was output as a 'Illustrator EPS' file... Now that sounds innocent enough, but what it actually means is that the file you're looking at has two representations in it - an EPS file that has wonky padding around it, strange document structure and no specification of whether it was meant to be in RGB or CMYK, and it also contains a pure, native Illustrator file which is correct and perfect. Illustrator obviously opens the Illustrator file that's embedded in that EPS - whereas we cannot, we open the EPS - and that's the sole reason you get these 'huge problems'. The problem is actually that you're comparing apples and oranges - Illustrator looks grand because it's not displaying the same file you're actually asking to open in Designer...

 

Yes, we guessed incorrectly that it was CMYK - but that's because there were a number of CMYK colours inside it, so we assumed the author probably had a CMYK document, but they didn't. The format conversion/assigning could be more obvious in Designer, I completely agree with you there.

 

Next terrible problem: Hairlines visible on objects which have shared geometry... Yes, you're right these lines exist - they're a rendering artefact caused by any rasterisation engine that doesn't use constructive solid geometry - i.e. anything which basically isn't Adobe Flash - but then, Adobe Flash had its own set of issues... Now, you probably are going to be surprised when I said it's present in all other rasterisers and I can assure you that it's always there, it's just that some engines do little tricks to hide it from you... Here's a zoomed-in screenshot of Illustrator (current version) showing that same file - hairlines and all:

 

post-5-0-25113000-1468786246_thumb.png

 

So you can probably see these artefacts more clearly in Designer - that's down to the antialiasing ramp we chose because it gives drawings a nicer feel. You can select all the objects and go to the Blend Options dialog (the little cog at the top right of the Layers Panel) and adjust the blend gamma and/or antialiasing ramps. You can't do that in Adobe's software either.

 

The best solutions are always to construct documents yourself - that mouth is designed in a really strange way - why have all those pieces as geometry that butts up against itself rather than a black background with overlaying elements? Anyway, that's by the by...

 

All I'm trying to say is to take it easy on us - and the other forum users who have bent over backwards to try to help. So far, you've come across very angry, and I appreciate that if you're frustrated or in need of help that can make people angry - everyone has been there, but approach things from the point of view that maybe we aren't all fools and potentially the things you think you're seeing aren't always as black and white as they might at first appear to be. We genuinely just want you to be happy and enjoy designing. If there's a problem, ask nicely and people will flock to help. If there's a fault, tell us and we'll fix it as soon as possible :)

 

Thanks again,

Matt

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Hi Matt,

 

an unrelated or half-related question, if you don’t mind. I do not quite understand how Affinity Designer is choosing the colour profile applied to an unprofiled EPS document, when such a document is opened. Would it make sense to add a dialogue for choosing the profile on opening such a document?  :unsure:

 

Thanks, Alex

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Yes, we intend to add a dialog asking which format you'd like it to open in - something we'll add soon... It just takes a guess at the moment by looking at what kind of colours are in the document (as we can't find a definitive flag in the document that says the intended format)...

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Hi bodich,

 

I mean this is the best possible way: Please calm down.

 

Firstly, when was the last time one of the developers or project managers of any of your favourite Adobe software ever bothered to reply to you on a topic you wanted to discuss - and was it on a Sunday evening in their own time? I'm not saying the team here are spectacular, deserving of grand praise or anything insane, but I am saying that we actually care and are trying our best so try to take that as a sign that things will get better in time.

 

So, I had a look at your first eps - and I can tell you exactly why Illustrator appears to get that file oh-so-right - it's because the file you're looking at was authored in Illustrator and was output as a 'Illustrator EPS' file... Now that sounds innocent enough, but what it actually means is that the file you're looking at has two representations in it - an EPS file that has wonky padding around it, strange document structure and no specification of whether it was meant to be in RGB or CMYK, and it also contains a pure, native Illustrator file which is correct and perfect. Illustrator obviously opens the Illustrator file that's embedded in that EPS - whereas we cannot, we open the EPS - and that's the sole reason you get these 'huge problems'. The problem is actually that you're comparing apples and oranges - Illustrator looks grand because it's not displaying the same file you're actually asking to open in Designer...

 

Yes, we guessed incorrectly that it was CMYK - but that's because there were a number of CMYK colours inside it, so we assumed the author probably had a CMYK document, but they didn't. The format conversion/assigning could be more obvious in Designer, I completely agree with you there.

 

Next terrible problem: Hairlines visible on objects which have shared geometry... Yes, you're right these lines exist - they're a rendering artefact caused by any rasterisation engine that doesn't use constructive solid geometry - i.e. anything which basically isn't Adobe Flash - but then, Adobe Flash had its own set of issues... Now, you probably are going to be surprised when I said it's present in all other rasterisers and I can assure you that it's always there, it's just that some engines do little tricks to hide it from you... Here's a zoomed-in screenshot of Illustrator (current version) showing that same file - hairlines and all:

 

attachicon.gifhairlines.png

 

So you can probably see these artefacts more clearly in Designer - that's down to the antialiasing ramp we chose because it gives drawings a nicer feel. You can select all the objects and go to the Blend Options dialog (the little cog at the top right of the Layers Panel) and adjust the blend gamma and/or antialiasing ramps. You can't do that in Adobe's software either.

 

The best solutions are always to construct documents yourself - that mouth is designed in a really strange way - why have all those pieces as geometry that butts up against itself rather than a black background with overlaying elements? Anyway, that's by the by...

 

All I'm trying to say is to take it easy on us - and the other forum users who have bent over backwards to try to help. So far, you've come across very angry, and I appreciate that if you're frustrated or in need of help that can make people angry - everyone has been there, but approach things from the point of view that maybe we aren't all fools and potentially the things you think you're seeing aren't always as black and white as they might at first appear to be. We genuinely just want you to be happy and enjoy designing. If there's a problem, ask nicely and people will flock to help. If there's a fault, tell us and we'll fix it as soon as possible :)

 

Thanks again,

Matt

 

 

I am not angry, trust me) I want to say just one thing — the best is to get result that you expecting. What about eps — is it good or bad... Very often image is only in eps and there is no ai file with embedded profile so it is very important make Designer working correct with it. Mouth is just an example. And if Illustrator can open this files properly — I am sure you can make it too. And sorry, I did not think you are not smart enough. You are great, really, and I love Affinity software:)

 

What about the gaps — it appears even if objects are intersected a little bit, so you are not right here, it looks like bug.

 

Anyway I understand that you have seen this problems. But only what I want to say — this problems are very-very important and making work very difficult. Also I know feature that will be super useful in designer — if user will have ability to distort geometry, something like warp tool with presets like wave etc.

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Mouth is just an example.

 

Sorry, bodich, but the illustration you linked to has a very unfortunate document structure, to say the least. And I believe that Matt has demonstrated conclusively that Illustrator does no better job in opening this document than Affinity Designer. If you ask me, Affinitd Designer is perhaps just a little more honest in pointing out the flaws of the original design.

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Mouth is just an example.

 

Sorry, bodich, but the illustration you linked to has a very unfortunate document structure, to say the least. And I believe that Matt has demonstrated conclusively that Illustrator does no better job in opening this document than Affinity Designer. If you ask me, Affinitd Designer is perhaps just a little more honest in pointing out the flaws of the original design.

 

 

Еру problem is more deep. Gaps appears even if geometry intersected, I have this bug on every image. It is not more honest etc., I can't agree with you, no way. It is just bug. When objects are intersected, the gap must NOT appear anyway but it is. . .

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Hey bodich,

 

I'm trying to replicate the intersecting objects gap thing. 

Are there blending modes, groups or layers involved? 

(I think I have seen this on certain combinations of things.... just can't remember what)

 

Can you post an example .afdesign?

 

 

Unfortunately, I cannot reproduce this …  :(

 

(Have you engaged the Use Precise Clipping button, by the way? Does it make any difference? Just another idea …)

 

 

Here is the file. I made small intersection. And you can see that the gap is right here and saying HELLO FELLOWS! :) (Precise clipping does not affect the gap)

PS: I'd rather love to get solid transition without gap even if in fact very small gap exists, or have ability to set up this feature in settings and not keep under control every micro gap especially in not my illustrations. So I'd love to see conversely situation or at least have it like an option in settings.

 

And one more attachment. That's ai file, not eps. And look at the colors. I think all is clear here and nothing to add, so don't tell me about bad EPS.))

Mask.afdesign

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post-18436-0-20732800-1468831518_thumb.png

post-18436-0-55180600-1468831521_thumb.jpg

post-18436-0-71249300-1468833790_thumb.png

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Hi bodich,

 

I would say, the gap you are noticing in your exported document is, in some respect, due to a precision problem with your drawing. If you use closed paths for your grey background layers, and align the borders perfectly on the pixel grid, you won’t get this gap in your output.  :)

 

Alex

Edited.afdesign

post-1198-0-17252000-1468834058_thumb.png

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Hi A_B_C

It's not that simple. Zoom to 1573% for example and you should see it. If you scale the image on export it may also include the gap on the export, depending on the scale factor.

While in most cases we can workaround this, setting a few things and structuring the document correctly, there's other cases - patterns with several "layers" of objects  in particular - that are harder or too tiresome to control.

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Yes, I do see that the gap is visible in the screen rendering, but I thought we were talking primarily about the pixel output. And I believe it is no wonder that there is a vertical pixel line on the exported drawing, when the vertical paths are not pixel-perfectly aligned. 

 

My PNG file (“Edited.png”) does obviously not show this vertical line, or am I completely wrong here? And if you export to a larger pixel file, where the document width is no exact multiple of the original document width, isn’t it to be expected, at least up to a certain point, that a rendering artefact will show up?  :unsure:

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Hi bodich,

 

Thanks for the file - I can see what you're referring to now :) It doesn't matter if you've overlapped the shape edges slightly if that difference is less than perhaps an eighth of a pixel at the current view zoom - basically they will start to display the rendering artefact I talked about previously whenever you get shared edges (or edges which are extremely close when rasterised at the current zoom). As I mentioned before, this is down to the method used to rasterise and is present in all rasterisers that use the same technique although some engines have tricks that hide this from users... In Illustrator's case, it appears to round out pixels to make things share edges exactly and then applies a more aggressive antialiasing ramp that minimises the artefact. You can adjust the antialiasing ramp within Designer to mask the artefact in the same way, should you require...

 

Here's a zoomed view of the same document in Illustrator showing the effects of the artefact down the centre-line to show that the same artefact exists in Illustrator (and all other rasterisers that I'm aware of - with the exception of Adobe Flash):

 

post-5-0-46391700-1468834999_thumb.png

 

Now to reduce the artefact in Designer, you can open your document, hit Select All (Cmd+A) and then go to the Layers panel, click the cog icon at the top right to access the blend options panel. Now go to the 'Coverage Map' control (this is the antialiasing ramp) and drag the curve to look like this:

 

post-5-0-52857800-1468835133_thumb.png

 

You can even save this profile if you'll use it often...

 

Now when you look at your hairlines you should see that their effect has been reduced dramatically - and you can make it look just like Illustrator with a bit of trial and error. Here's a screenshot in Designer afterwards showing no hairline:

 

post-5-0-26030300-1468835206_thumb.png

 

I appreciate this is an extra step and that's not good. The honest reality is that the reason everyone else isn't always up in arms about this is because people generally approach their designs differently - creating solid shapes that overlap, rather than butt against each other. You've actually used that method in other parts of the same design (the yellow eye shapes have the detail overlaid on top of them, for example, so they will not show the same artefact). I'm not saying you're doing anything wrong with your designs at all - and we may need a way to allow users to specify their own default antialiasing ramps so that this can just be setup once and forgotten about forever, but I'm just trying to get you to see that Illustrator is not doing anything different - it's just that the default ramp it uses is masking the artefact more than our default ramp. We chose our default ramp because it made shapes (and text in particular) look nicer, so we don't really want to have to change it...

 

Thanks again for all the kind things you've said - and thanks for sharing the file so we can look at the issue (the file looks great, incidentally) :)

Matt

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