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In the attached image how do I cut off the part of the ellipse object that is outside the rectangle?

Test 3.afdesign

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There's two ways to do this (there may be more, but I've started my AM coffee IV Drip :| )

 

The first way to to use the rectangle as a clipping mask: In the Layers panel, just drag the Ellipse layer over the rectangle until the Feedback (that cute little blue line) appears below the ellipse text and release the hounds, er mouse/stylus.

 

This will give you a nice clean cut of anything outside the rectangle.

 

The other method is to use the boolean operator Intersect. Select the Ellipse and Rectangle shapes on the canvas and click on the intersect button on the Operations section of the toolbar. 

 

the issue with this method is that there's a blur effect on the ellipse, so the cut line is also blurred. If that's what you want, then great.

 

However if a nice smooth cut line is what you're after, then the Masking method is the one I'd use. The advantage of this method is that it's non destructive and you can adjust the ellipse as much as you need to.

 

I've attached a copy of your file with layers named after each of the methods I've described. Hope it helps.

 

Happy Holidaze!

test3 MR.afdesign

Mac OS X Catinlina, 2014 iMac, 3.5 Ghz Intel Core i7, Huion Kamvas Pro 22 Graphic Tablet, 16GB RAM, MacOS10.12 || Magic keyboard w/numeric keypad, wireless trackpad, Kengsington Edge Trackball || Flux Capacitor in a secure location

---

I encourage kids to go ahead and play on my lawn. I mean, how else can I make sure the death-traps work?

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Thanks for that Miike. The mask is the preferred method. I like the idea that it is non destructive.

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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There's two ways to do this (there may be more, but I've started my AM coffee IV Drip :| )

 

The first way to to use the rectangle as a clipping mask: In the Layers panel, just drag the Ellipse layer over the rectangle until the Feedback (that cute little blue line) appears below the ellipse text and release the hounds, er mouse/stylus.

 

This will give you a nice clean cut of anything outside the rectangle.

 

The other method is to use the boolean operator Intersect. Select the Ellipse and Rectangle shapes on the canvas and click on the intersect button on the Operations section of the toolbar. 

 

the issue with this method is that there's a blur effect on the ellipse, so the cut line is also blurred. If that's what you want, then great.

 

However if a nice smooth cut line is what you're after, then the Masking method is the one I'd use. The advantage of this method is that it's non destructive and you can adjust the ellipse as much as you need to.

 

I've attached a copy of your file with layers named after each of the methods I've described. Hope it helps.

 

Happy Holidaze!

Hi Mike

I did a successful experiment but when I try to apply it to my project it didn't work. I have attached a file for you to look at. 'A' was the successful one and 'B' the unsuccessful one. What am I doing wrong?

Vector masking.afdesign

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Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi Mike,

Did you ever get a chance to look at the file I sent you about my clipping mask problem?

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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@Jackamus, sorry I missed this. I was crazy-busy with the holidaze and the (sadly abortive) con-prep.

 

Jakerlund's totally correct, the "B" shape just one one shape on top of the other. You have to drag the shape you want over the containing shape so you see that blue line. The line's as wide as the shape you're dragging over, btw. 

 

Sometimes this can be tricky and hard. So I modified your original file. There's 3 pairs of shapes. One shape is bigger than the other in 2 pairs and one pair has an outer glow FX. In the top layer is the "final"results, one shape dragged onto the other to form a vector mask. The layer below it has the different shapes in their original layer sequence. If you want, open up the vector masked layers in the Final Shapes layer and you can see how the layers are masked, i.e. which are the mask layers and which are the masked layers.

 

Remember to look at the width of the blue line in the layer panel -- it should "start" where the text begins, if it starts on the right of the thumbnail for the layer, then all you're doing is just moving the layer. Only when the blue line is as wide as the text and only the text (i.e. the name of the layer. Here I left the names as their defaults, so the name's just the type of shape within parenthesis) will releasing your mouse/cursor/stylus will "drop" the layer inside the destination layer and make the destination layer the mask.

 

As an alternate, just create some shapes, different colors and kinds like I did. Now, in the layer panel drag one shape layer over another with the goal to use the destination layer as a mask. Take your time and look at the visual feedback AD's giving you. AD's is quite verbose, if you have the eyes to listen. :)

 

(I'm now following this topic, so I'll get an email when there's a reply.)

 

Have fun!

Vector masking mr.afdesign

Mac OS X Catinlina, 2014 iMac, 3.5 Ghz Intel Core i7, Huion Kamvas Pro 22 Graphic Tablet, 16GB RAM, MacOS10.12 || Magic keyboard w/numeric keypad, wireless trackpad, Kengsington Edge Trackball || Flux Capacitor in a secure location

---

I encourage kids to go ahead and play on my lawn. I mean, how else can I make sure the death-traps work?

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Thank you both for your help. I have to say that Jakerlund's video said it all. I'm afraid that Mikes file confused me even further but now I know how to do it Mike's makes sense. I think it was because Jakerlund used my original file which I fully understood. Now I can go where only a few have ever been before - Captain Kirk! ;)

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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Jeez, I didn't even notice that link at the bottom of Jakerlund's post. Thought it was a signature or some such, I just ignored it. Dopey me!

 

Yeah, explaining visual things via text-only is hard. I bombed. Big time. Sorry if I added (albeit temporarily) to the confusion. 

 

I would love to do a live Google+ Hangout and demo stuff and answer questions, but Google seems to be full of a lot of nothing as to how to start up a live video stream from a screen instead of a video camera. (sigh).

Mac OS X Catinlina, 2014 iMac, 3.5 Ghz Intel Core i7, Huion Kamvas Pro 22 Graphic Tablet, 16GB RAM, MacOS10.12 || Magic keyboard w/numeric keypad, wireless trackpad, Kengsington Edge Trackball || Flux Capacitor in a secure location

---

I encourage kids to go ahead and play on my lawn. I mean, how else can I make sure the death-traps work?

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I have Screenflow, which allows for audio and pretty good editing of the video with no time limit, so Jing would be a major step down for me (not to say Jing is bad or inferior in any way, it's just not a good fit for me).

 

What's frustrating about Google is that I use the search engine so much and it's been instrumental in my learning about stuff, but when it comes to stuff that google does, finding useful info is neigh-impossible. It's as if Google doesn't wanna share. But now this topic is totally derailed, sorry Jackamus!

Mac OS X Catinlina, 2014 iMac, 3.5 Ghz Intel Core i7, Huion Kamvas Pro 22 Graphic Tablet, 16GB RAM, MacOS10.12 || Magic keyboard w/numeric keypad, wireless trackpad, Kengsington Edge Trackball || Flux Capacitor in a secure location

---

I encourage kids to go ahead and play on my lawn. I mean, how else can I make sure the death-traps work?

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This all stuff that is way out of my expertise. For what it is worth I stay clear of Google. The only time I knowingly used it was Google Images. I use it a lot to provide references for my paintings. However I recently found Flickr where the images are of a higher resolution.

I do have a website. www.classiccarartist.co.uk

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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Thanks for the compliment MEB. I too almost completed a drawing of the red SS Jaguar using DrawPlus before I changed to a Mac and I didn't save the DP file as a bitmap therefore I do not have a copy on my computer. However I do have a 2 DP files still on my Mac but I can't view them to see what they show. Can you suggest a way I can send the files so that they could be changed into a bitmap or converted into an Affinity file?

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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  • Staff

The best way to bring DrawPlus artwork to Affinity is exporting it as a PDF. Some things may not come exactly as they were since Affinity doesn't support all DrawPlus features, but it should be workable.

 

Unfortunately i don't have access to a PC now (i'm on a Mac too) neither have their latest version, or any virtual machine installed to make the export/conversion for you. Unless you know someone you trust, with access to Drawplus to make the export, there isn't much more i can suggest than installing a virtual machine (Parallels or VMware), Windows and DrawPlus on your Mac so you can do the conversion yourself -  but that seems overkill just to convert two files  :(.

 

This is something i will have to sort out myself too because i also have some works in progress done in other PC software that would like to bring to Affinity to complete. Maybe then i can be more helpful too  :unsure:

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Thanks MEb that is very useful advice.

This will make you laugh - I set up a laptop PC just for this purpose and the very next day I got an email from Serif offering Affinity! I jumped at the chance and forgot all about moving the DP file from the Mac to the PC. Fortunately I gave the laptop to my daughter so I should be able to re-load DP and copy over the file provided the Mac hasn't corrupted the file.

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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Glad you can sort it out Jack. My PC is definitely broken (motherboard failure - hard to find a new one to replace) so I will have to go with the virtual machine approach or just buy a small laptop - it may prove useful later for other stuff too.

 

Curious to see you bring those skills in painting to the digital world. Affinity with it's mixed vector/raster environment and solid brush engine gives plenty of freedom to try different expressions/styles. 

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I've now mastered Clipping masks but how do I remove a mask without using 'cmd Z'?

I want to reuse the clipped object but changing its orientation which means un-clipping it.

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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To remove the clipping mask, select it on the Layers panel clicking over its thumbnail and press backspace/delete.

If you just want to change the orientation of the clipping mask, select it on the Layers panel clicking over its thumbnail and then rotate it on the canvas (or using the transform panel) like you do for any other regular object. You can also drag it over another object in the Layers panel if you want to re-apply it to another object.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Can you explain why I can't clip this shadow to fit the red line?

Clipping.afdesign

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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You can't clip an object inside a line (a line doesn't have a fillable area unless you close it and turn it into a shape). You can only clip objects inside shapes.

 

So in order to do what you want you would have to convert your line into a shape using Layer -> Expand Stroke. But there's another problem here. Since your "line" isn't a pure vector object (it has a raster brush applied to it  - remember when i told you about the limitations of using raster objects to create gradients on lines? - this is one of those limitations), expanding it to a stroke will do nothing. Its appearance is being controlled by the raster brush.

 

So your "only" option to clip the shadow is to rasterise the line going to Layer -> Rasterise and then dragging the shadow over the rasterised line in the Layers panel. It will do what you want. The problem with this approach is that it is destructive: you are not able to edit the line anymore with the Node tool since it is now a bitmap. This may not be a problem if you don't intend to change it again. But if later you decide you need to edit it after all, making it wavy for example, you will have to recreate all the process from scratch.

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Thanks for the detailed explanation. However I used this method.

 

I just created a rectangle the same width and orientation of the line and clipped the shadow.

Clipping 2.afdesign

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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Well you can't win them all!

If voting made any difference it wouldn't be allowed!

Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.

To be ignorant of world happenings is forgivable - to be willingly ignorant is unforgivable.

Truth does not need to be protected only lies do.

Mac OS Monterey 12.6.4

AD version 2.3.0

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