cece Posted November 13, 2014 Share Posted November 13, 2014 Maybe a long shot but Layer Comps (from Photoshop) might be quite a nice feature.. as currently importing PSD files with multiple layer comps hides everything else camloken 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff Ben Posted November 13, 2014 Staff Share Posted November 13, 2014 We don't yet import these. You will be getting the state of the document as it was last saved from Photoshop. Quote 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 More sharing options...
camloken Posted February 27, 2015 Share Posted February 27, 2015 As a UI designer / developer I use Illustrators multiple artboards a lot. However, over my many years of designing, I have found that layer comps are actually more useful to me when laying out interfaces. Illustrator does provide a "New View" feature that works like Photoshops layer comps, but it is hard to find and only works on layers in the same root (when you create a sublayer it breaks). Also when you add a new layer, the "Views" feature breaks by leaving the new layer open. Anyway, aside from Illustrator breaking, it would be really nice to be able to have a layer comps feature. You could also allow for some basic interactivity so you could save it out to a web browser and allow clicks to turn on or off certain layers (e.g. your layer comps). You would gain a lot of usage that way as many people like myself are prototyping interfaces and testing them before I actually hard code it. +1 for layer comps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jango_fx Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 i don't care for the photoshop import right now. but i don't want to have copies of the same assets multiple times in several layers or artboards and/or change visibilty of dozens of layer by hand to export multiple varying instances of the same screen. which seems to be the only solution right now... +1 for layer comps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
el.Fakir Posted July 10, 2015 Share Posted July 10, 2015 Yup, +1 for layer comps too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tazintosh Posted August 5, 2015 Share Posted August 5, 2015 +100 for this feature. Here's a real case example: I'm working for some months now on the design integration of a website. For this, I receive designs from the designer of the customer we are working for. This designer provides me with Photoshop —of course :(— designs that use layer comps. For this single feature missing on Affinity, I need to open back Photocrap. This is a pain. I'm really expecting the time I'll be able to fully remove Adobe softwares from my Mac. Madame and pcote 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff Ben Posted August 5, 2015 Staff Share Posted August 5, 2015 The only way we are going to support any given feature in PSD import is when we have a compatible feature in Affinity. At present we have no feature like this, so it's not just the case of writing the bit that extracts the data from the PSD file. Quote 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 More sharing options...
Tazintosh Posted August 5, 2015 Share Posted August 5, 2015 Hi Ben, I fully understand of course. Still, while not being a developper, the layer comps are a powerful for the user, but quite simple on the dev aspect no?: saving a list of what is checked, what isn't at a given moment. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff Ben Posted August 5, 2015 Staff Share Posted August 5, 2015 To a degree. What we are trying very hard to do is write features that don't appear to just be a bolted-on after thought - and where possible reimagine how things would better work (i.e., not just copying Photoshop). While many people love certain features of Photoshop, it's evident by the way they are presented and the way the file format is written that a lot of features are very much non-core, and crudely stuck on. I could reel off a list... Quote 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 More sharing options...
Tazintosh Posted August 5, 2015 Share Posted August 5, 2015 Don't get me wrong, if you have an endless list of complains with Adobe, I do have mine too. After all, why do you think I'm so enthusiastic with your apps? I know quite enough major Adobe products to hate them much more! Today, thanks to brillant companies like yours and some other that develop very specific and nice apps, we are well served. I perfectly know you are not just copying Photocrap, and that's makes the full difference, so yeah, please never change this. But even if, Adobe code is a pure crap (no need for me to be developer to notice it), some features makes sense. So just keep a close eye on providing them to us. Cheers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Teo_ Posted February 4, 2016 Share Posted February 4, 2016 Waiting for symbols in Affinity Designer (so I can manage artboards as layer comps) I give a +1 to this feature request. For my usage (specially as interface design) it could be enough a basic “Layer comps” feature as described here: in Export Persona I select from layers panel an artboard (or layer) and create a slice.Now the create slice button becomes disabled. The proposal is to create multiple slices for the same layer. I create a second slice from the same artboard with another name, then with this slice selected, from layers panel I switch on/off some sub layers. The slice could record the on/off status, so if I select the first slice, the visible layers are different. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Staff TonyB Posted February 4, 2016 Staff Share Posted February 4, 2016 Our symbol implementation will make Layer Comps redundant. :) Teo_ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben_allison Posted February 10, 2016 Share Posted February 10, 2016 The only way we are going to support any given feature in PSD import is when we have a compatible feature in Affinity. At present we have no feature like this, so it's not just the case of writing the bit that extracts the data from the PSD file. Our symbol implementation will make Layer Comps redundant. :) This is the right approach. You guys started from scratch, and want to keep things consistent, performant, etc. The whole problem with something like PS is that it ends up being an inconsistent patch work. However, In my case, I work in a team. This is something to keep in mind as you look to gain market share. People will be using AD along side people who use PS. No one wants you to clone PS, but if you want people to switch (and believe me, most of us are dying to) there needs to be a baseline level of fluidity between the apps, or at least, between things that can be saved to a PSD and what AD can support. I'm tired of PS and want to switch, but when a coworker sends me a PSD with Layer Comps for a web UI we're working on, I need to be able to open the file, edit it, and pass it back. Studios have workflows in place, and you're going to run into resistance if AD's feature set doesn't map to those workflows. Among designers who use PS for UI work, Layer Comps is seen as a core feature. Even if a studio does move to a new workflow, there are still legacy files that need to be recallable once the CC subscription gets cancelled. Your "Symbol Implementation" might be the tits. If something works better, then people will migrate/change their workflows over time. The lack of Layer Comps support is significant enough to give plenty of designers pause. Obviously, your implementation could have its own twist: currently Layer Comps in PS don't respect scale or rotation; you can't save states for type properties, you have to rely on "Blending Options" just to change colours. It's really lame. But, I don't think it's a feature you can just shrug off. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Singapored Posted February 11, 2016 Share Posted February 11, 2016 Layer comps is a good tool for teaching. It can easily show the difference between one approach and another. Other than that, I have not found it useful as a painter. For a web designer or UI designer Im sure it can be useful. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paolo.limoncelli Posted February 11, 2016 Share Posted February 11, 2016 UI designer Im sure it can be useful. Moderately... In my case these are as useful as the 3D painting or timeline: zero. But I never used PS intensively for UI design so it depends on one's habits... If you come from PS probably you could miss them even if I know lots PS UI designers not using them at all. Currently AD Snapshots could do the trick (even if these are not the same as LayerComps). As a Sketch user I really miss symbols because you can really speed up things an propagate fixes with a good design strategy in mind, so I'm glad to see they are in the roadmap. Quote The white dog, making tools for artists, illustrators and doodlers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcote Posted September 30, 2016 Share Posted September 30, 2016 To a degree. What we are trying very hard to do is write features that don't appear to just be a bolted-on after thought - and where possible reimagine how things would better work (i.e., not just copying Photoshop). While many people love certain features of Photoshop, it's evident by the way they are presented and the way the file format is written that a lot of features are very much non-core, and crudely stuck on. I could reel off a list... Hello Affinity Team, I would also like Layer Comps because I'm retouching multiple picture variations of the same product but keeping the same effects and composition everywhere. Where this is currently a p*** in the a** is when you have to export your 20 variations one by one: - Correctly check the desired picture - Uncheck everything else but not the composition's effects - Go to the Export Persona - Rename the Exported File's name - Export - Repeat from step one x 20 times If Layers Comps were there, it would be possible to export everything at once. For us, this is a core feature because having to work around it makes us lose precious time in a day. Please boost priority for this feature, it can't come quickly enough. Thank you guys! Philippe Côté Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcote Posted October 4, 2016 Share Posted October 4, 2016 Our symbol implementation will make Layer Comps redundant. :) If we can place Symbols inside Symbols, maybe. Layer Comps have their own usefulness, different from Symbols. Symbols and Layer Comps could be used together. moefinley 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moefinley Posted March 2, 2017 Share Posted March 2, 2017 Symbols don't replace layer comps. If you're creating multiple states for the same design you don't want to have to create a new artboard and convert everything to a symbol just so you can show and hide a drop down menu or alike. Plus as mentioned before it would add greater compatibility with Photoshop. Symbols and constraints are great tools for responsive design but layer comps were useful long before we were all doing responsive design and they continue to have a role. +1 for still adding layer comps even though we now have symbols Teo_ and morbandit 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
morbandit Posted November 13, 2017 Share Posted November 13, 2017 Agree with @moefinley here. I have a UI mockup of dynamic form fields. How am I meant to show the different fields that can be displayed based on other selections? This is what layer comps (or a similar feature) is for, and it doesn't exist in an app touted as being superior for UI design? I really want to know what I'm meant to do in this scenario Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kirk23 Posted November 13, 2017 Share Posted November 13, 2017 Wile layer comps is super helpful in Photoshop I would offer a kind of alternative. Xara has so called "names" Basically it's a kind of tags you can assign to objects and when you copy an object a new copy inherits all the same tags. You can do multiple tags to same object. Then from a tags (names) list you could select and make visible only objects with a special tag. Same as color codes in Photoshop but more flexible since each thing could have several tags. Beyond replicating layer comps behaviour the system allows easily to find and select necessary things and all related objects while you spare the time to keep it consistent since the tags are inheritable automatically. morbandit 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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