Pinch Zoom Stopped Working

[AmpedAndy]

In the middle of my workflow, my pinch to zoom stopped working. Is there a setting I bumped, or is this a bug? 

I need help quickly because I'm on a deadline. 

 

[Callum]

Hi AmpedAndy,

 

Welcome to the forums

 

There isn't a setting in our app for this as it is an iOS feature is this issue still occurring?

 

Thanks

Callum

[David Edge]

It's a feature that usually works perfectly well in the Mac desktop apps; and then just stops working and you need to use Cmd+ and Cmd- which is a right PITA. I haven't worked out why it switches itself off.

[R C-R]

So are you are using one of the Apple trackpads? If so, which one?

[David Edge]

Well you could have knocked me down with a feather! I had no idea anybody was still using mice. Yes, it's an A1339 Trackpad. It works brilliantly for zooming and canvas rotation. Until it doesn't.

[R C-R]

Since there are at two Apple Trackpads & several mice with touch sensitive surfaces, plus a variety of third party graphics tablets & other pointing devices like trackballs that people use for one reason or another, it is never safe to assume that what you are using is what others are.  So it is always a good idea to include that info in your posts, plus the OS version you are running & which Affinity app (& version) you are using.

 

Anyway, have you checked Preferences > Tools to make sure that canvas rotation with trackpad is still enabled, & the relevant System Preferences settings for your trackpad?

[David Edge]

I haven't checked preferences for the simple reason it turns itself on and off seemingly at random. The trackpad works perfectly with all other applications all the time; it's just hit and miss with Affinity. So I think something inside Affinity is deciding whether it wants to cooperate with pinch/spread to zoom and canvas rotate.

[R C-R]

Again, it would help to know which (or both, if you have them) Affinity app(s) you are having this problem with & the versions of everything (apps & OS) you are using.

[Tevya]

I'm having this issue as well. Pinch to zoom on my Apple Magic Trackpad 2 worked great (pretty sure) when I first fired up the trial a few days ago, but now it doesn't! It's quite annoying and anyone with a trackpad (or using on their Macbook or other laptop) will tell you this is the preferred way to zoom in and out. I used it consistently on Illustrator and Photoshop. Want to use here... but it's not workin!

[David Edge]

Has it stopped just for Affinity or all apps? In my case it was the latter and a restart fixed it.

[LeonLQ]

Found this topic at last...I have the same problem as well.

My touchpad on MBP 2016 13" with Touch Bar works fine with all apps, but some months ago the Pinch to Zoom stopped working from time to time. I could fix it by turning the pinching functionality on and off several times in system preference. By it kept happening and it bother me, especially when Im working on a design and zooming in and out is a very often task.

I tried to pin-point the source of this issue and found that Affinity Designer is the reason. My other apps (Adobe PS, AI and other stuff) work just fine. But whenever I launch Affinity Designer, there's a 90% chance that after some time the Pinch to Zoom will stop working. By quitting Affinity Designer, the pinching would work again after some more minutes. 

I tried to turn off every touchpad related option in AD but the problem is still there. It's not a big issue, but somewhat inconvenient. Turning the pinching on and off in system preference is by far my only solution whenever this problem occurs, since it always happen when I have loads of design to work on AD and restarting can be a pain in the ...

 

BTW, I have another MBP which is a 2015 model that comes with a conventional trackpad (instead of a force-touch version), and this problem never occurs.

 

Could anyone in Affinity dress the issue?

[Tevya]

Hi, going into sys prefs > trackpad and disabling pinch-to-zoom then enabling it again worked for me. 

I found this on Reddit: 

 

 

It suggests that it could be a conflict with Better Touch Tool (in my case) or similar apps like Magnet, etc.

Here's my issue though: this doesn't happen in any other apps! It doesn't happen in Illustrator, Photoshop, Chrome, etc. It only affects Affinity Designer (I don't use Photo) for me. So maybe the BTT devs can help, but it seems like it's an Affinity issue that needs to be fixed on their end!

[NewInBoston]

I just searched this forum after encountering the problem many times including about 10 mins ago. I never thought to check Magnet, but it does seem to occur around the same time as using Magnet to resize the Affinity window. Quitting Magnet made pinch to zoom on trackpad work immediately. (2017 MacBook Pro, Mojave 10.whatever the newest is)

[affinity4Christ15]

On 3/8/2019 at 9:23 PM, Tevya said:

Hi, going into sys prefs > trackpad and disabling pinch-to-zoom then enabling it again worked for me. 

I found this on Reddit: 

 

Thanks a TON for this! This is the only solution I found that works. I've been having this same issue for months now, since 7.1, and always had to completely restart my Mac, a loss of at least 10 minutes. This saved me and my company time and $$! 

It suggests that it could be a conflict with Better Touch Tool (in my case) or similar apps like Magnet, etc.

Here's my issue though: this doesn't happen in any other apps! It doesn't happen in Illustrator, Photoshop, Chrome, etc. It only affects Affinity Designer (I don't use Photo) for me. So maybe the BTT devs can help, but it seems like it's an Affinity issue that needs to be fixed on their end!

 

[alanj]

It's 2023, and this still happens to me still as well (in Affinity Designer 2).  For some reason pinch to zoom decides to stop working from time to time.  I don't have BTT or Magnet running.  but who knows, maybe something else is conflicting....  It is weird, but will say that this is the ONLY app that does this, so I'm thinking it's not an apple bug, if it's an app conflict, maybe it's something about how Affinity is setup to work (I don't use Photo enough to verify it happens there, but i'm in Designer quite often).

Macbook pro, usually using an apple trackpad + keyboard with laptop plugged into a multi-monitor setup.

For me, the above "disable and enable" worked briefly, like for 10 seconds, after I changed focus to chrome (to close this thread actually), then went back to affinity designer, it was no longer working.

Though, I DID stumble on an odd thing that works for me:  "Medium click the trackpad with one finger, then pinch zoom with the other".  After that it seems to kick it back into gear.  (I use tap to click, so just enough pressure to get the simulated 'click'.  too much pressure and you activate the context menu, which you don't want.

Maybe that will help someone, of give a hint into what could be causing it. 🤷‍♂️

[JeremyJaydan]

This issue also happens to me. It just happened and somehow it fixed itself.

 

What I did that may of fixed the pinch to zoom:

- two finger double tap on my wacom tablet ('Smart Zoom', see more here: https://affinity.help/photo/en-US.lproj/index.html?page=pages/GetStarted/gestures.html?title=Gestures)

- single finger tap with zoom tool selected

 

I'll follow up if it happens again.

 

[JeremyJaydan]

Ok it happened again, neither of the above suggestions fixed it but it again started working again by its self.

What could be the fix this time could be:

- switching to lasso tool and selecting something

 

Other than that it could be a galactic issue with how the stars align.

[JeremyJaydan]

(FIXED?) Ok third update, I believe I've identified the issue.. it could just be window focus.

 

I have more than one monitor and I occassionally click away from Affinity to another monitor which takes the focus away from Affinity. While Affinity has no focus the panning still works but the zooming does not until you focus on it again. This has lead to confusing UX where I pan and try to zoom and the zooming seems to not work but I simply don't have Affinity focused, which could be the underlying issue at least for me.

 

I'll report back if it happens again and if it's definitely not focus.

 

Some more details:

- Affinity Photo 2 (2.2.1)

- Mac Studio M1 Max (Sonoma 14.1.1)

- Wacom Intuos Pro (Driver 6.4.4-5)