Does anyone use Designer for doing basic layouts?

[MikeW]

My feeling is that artboards need to be rethought altogether. But one can resize them easy enough.

 

For the bleed (until such time as Serif makes bleed guides?, consider adding a rectangle (I color mine red) with no fill. Make it the artboard/document size + double the size of bleed and with no fill. Then use the transform box to position it precisely. Lock it.

 

I so dislike the artboard implementation, I will only use pages.

[KipV]

Artboards seem ok to me, I just feel that they need to advance a lot more. Simply moving the pre-existing artboard feature from Designer over to Photo (without even adding any features) would be a massive improvement to me. Artboards are still a pretty new feature for Affinity so I expect we will see some important improvements to them in upcoming versions.

 

Is there a way to make your red bleed rectangles not show up when exporting? Some programs give you that option. Another feature I would like is the ability to export just a portion of an artboard. With the project I am currently working on I have a front and back cover on a single artboard but sometimes I just need to export just the front or just the back. I think this was possible with FreeHand.

[MikeW]

Hi Kip,

 

Well, that highlights one of the things I dislike about artboards--at least with the Windows beta. That is, I cannot see that rectangle around the artboard. One can still snap to it, just not see it. Clip at the edge option has no effect.

 

For the rectangle not to hit the PDF, just uncheck its visibility. I use pages and have the rectangle on the first layer, it's the only item on that layer and it's locked.

 

For partial exporting, I would create a new document of the correct size, bring the design into it and either export that, or go so far as to clip the design into a rectangle.

[KipV]

It seems like there was some program where you could view a layer but not print it (and maybe not export it either.) Was it FreeHand that did that? Not sure if InDesign can do that.

[MikeW]

Many/most vector editing software have the ability to have a layer display and not print or export. I mainly use Xara Designer Pro (PC only) and that's a feature I often use. But not for the bleed issue, it supports bleed guides.

 

It's been a long time since I used FH. ID and QXP both can set layers visibility and print-ability separately. 

[KipV]

I don't think I had much need to use that feature when I was in FreeHand. 

[MikeW]

I often use non-printing layers for notes. I also use them for assets that may or may not make the final design. Those assets and notes are on the pasteboard, are viewable but neither print nor export.

[Petar Petrenko]

InDesign uses guides for bleed (and slug), so they are, by default, non-printable.

[Petar Petrenko]

...Is there a way to make your red bleed rectangles not show up when exporting? Some programs give you that option. Another feature I would like is the ability to export just a portion of an artboard. With the project I am currently working on I have a front and back cover on a single artboard but sometimes I just need to export just the front or just the back. I think this was possible with FreeHand.

 

Just use guides instead of rectangle.

[MikeW]

Just use guides instead of rectangle.

 

I would if guides showed up on the pasteboard.

[Petar Petrenko]

In that case, resize the document for the size of the bleed, and use margins as bleed markers.

E.g. document original size: 100x100 units

resized document: 106x106 units

set margins to 3 units on all sides.

[KipV]

Petar, if you did that the bleed marks wouldn't show  up right on export. Serif just needs to add bleeds to the editable documents.

[MikeW]

I agree (obviously) with Kip. There's a right way and a work-around way. That's it currently. It needs to be corrected for the Windows launch and the MAS update hitting soon.

[Petar Petrenko]

Well, you shall inform the printer what you've done. Sometimes I use the same workaround even I use InDesign.  :)

[MikeW]

The only time I use a larger page is when I need to use a larger page for 100% scale...

 

There are some things I create when I need to manually place fold and cut marks and this cannot be gotten around. But even placing those in AD manually isn't difficult and if I was limited to a single vector design software, I would do so.

 

But for an application billing itself as professional software, work-arounds for bleed guides are a hack that in the 21st century should not be necessary.

 

Mike

[KipV]

I agree (obviously) with Kip. There's a right way and a work-around way. That's it currently. It needs to be corrected for the Windows launch and the MAS update hitting soon.

There is still so much work to do with basic layouts that Serif could do an entire version that just focuses on layout; bleeds being just one of the needed improvements in that update.

[KipV]

Is anyone getting the paragraph leading shortcuts to work? (text > paragraph leading > increase/decrease) The feature isn't working for me.

[TheRogue]

Its what I got it for. Its perfect for short story book covers.  I used Illustrator until it went all subscription on us. And with art boards, different versions of the same.  I don't need anything else. Bring on Publisher!

[MikeW]

Is anyone getting the paragraph leading shortcuts to work? (text > paragraph leading > increase/decrease) The feature isn't working for me.

 

If not a difference to the MAS and the betas, they work here. Have you changed them from the Alt/Opt up/down arrows?

[KipV]

I got it to work partially today. If you select the text block when using the shortcut precise increase and decrease works, regular increase and decrease does not. Same thing happens when you highlight the text, precise work the other does not. Of course I can select it form the menu but the point is to simplify the process by using shortcuts. 

 

@TheRogue

That is good to hear that someone else is using Affinity for book covers. Perhaps I will make a post about my experience and we can compare our workflows. I wouldn't call my experience perfect but there were certainly advantages over using the Adobe solution. Mostly the tools share a common file so I didn't have to spend so much time working in the Finder. The Mac's share feature is handy when passing versions off to a client look at. I don't have to post items to the desktop as much as before emailing them a copy. Just select share > email and it passes you from one app to the other. Serif is a lot better at taking advantage of OS features then Adobe is (at least as far as CS6 is concerned. I haven't tried the latest versions yet but I doubt they have changed much on that front.)