preferences: add option to remove/hide brush outline

[mick560]

I didn't have this problem with the 2018 issue  but since I downloaded the 2020 there is the bloody cross hair again and I can't get rid of it, can't believe they havn't done anything about it, how are you supposed to be able to do any fine detail with that thing in the way ?

[dominik]

2 hours ago, mick560 said:

I didn't have this problem with the 2018 issue  but since I downloaded the 2020 there is the bloody cross hair again and I can't get rid of it, can't believe they havn't done anything about it, how are you supposed to be able to do any fine detail with that thing in the way ?

Doesn't this option work for you?

[DroppedAdobeLikeABadHabit]

I like to make screen recording videos of me creating drawings and paintings. To do this, I chose not to use Affinity Photo (even though I otherwise kind of like the program) and use a competitor that allows me to turn off the cursor/brush preview. Having the cursor/brush on during these videos takes away the "magic quality" when making these videos. Please add the ability in preferences to do this. Thank you. 

[mick560]

hi dominik, sorry i didn't answer before, only just seen this,  thanks for your screenshot, i have always been aware of the option to tick the box but it didn't work for me, i finally sorted the problem by downloading the new 1.8.2. version and the crosshair doesn't appear now thank goodness !      it used to drive me mad, many thanks for your help, best regards, michael.

[Allan Windmill]

On 4/13/2018 at 12:11 AM, aradnom said:

Adding to this.  If you're painting with a stylus the brush outline is super distracting.  Having the option to turn the preview off is a good start though.

Totally agree. I always feel Affinity Photo brush is even slower than gInk.exe partly because of that distraction.

[Allan Windmill]

On 3/8/2020 at 10:11 AM, dominik said:

Doesn't this option work for you?

This button totally doesn't work when brush size gets small. There should be a "always hide brush crosshair".

[99Combo]

I'm having the same issue, it would be such a better experience without the white outline🙏😭🎨🖌️💚

In rounded brushes the outline is not a problem because you can still see what you are painting, but in more weird shaped brushes it becomes pretty annoying.

The improved version would end up looking somewhat like this:

[Jowday]

Maybe in preferences - maybe not. I have no.. ehm... preference. But there is another way, I always (since forever) toggled the visibility of the brush outline in Adobe Photoshop with the caps lock key:

So, this feature with a custom keyboard shortcut for it would pretty much solve the issue. I would expect Affinity Photo to remember the last used setting so if I disable the outline I would have to enable it later. I think. Disabling/toggling is fast anyway if it does not.

Shortcut should be configured here:

[whitehead]

Without wishing to sound the pessimist, this 'feature' request goes back at least three years and like a number of other utterly basic artist-specific issues in AD and AP (such as Affinity remembering which brush you are using after changing the state of the brush and size increments to the nearest whole number, rather than bonkers 4.9, 9.7, 15.6 and so on) it has been ignored. I've long since given up on Affinity as a tool, and as I've described in previous posts they certainly lost business in me being able to recommend Affinity to my company's design team. Although I can conceive of people using Designer for standard vector tasks, it's beyond me how anyone can use it for digital painting given the problems with the interface.

It's a shame as the brush engine is actually really nice: although it doesn't have the real world dynamics of some packages, it's in the same kind of league as CSP. The world is crying out for an all-in-one vector/bitmap solution for artists, but ironically you feel CSP is starting to move into the vector space more and more and of course their tools for drawing are incredibly mature now. Even Krita has come on pretty strongly in the same period but - for the artist - Affinity has been stuck, aside from some stability improvements and the excellent isometric grid options.

However, I am absolutely certain that this, like every other post on this subject, will remain ignored. This isn't even a goad to prompt the team: it's just a statement of rather sad fact. 

[whitehead]

Indeed the first post on this was by Paulo Limoncelli back in October 2016: if Affinity can ignore Paulo, I guess they can ignore anyone. It's really baffling 🙄

 

[Renderluz]

Its funny, I want the opposite that what this thread is suggesting, well... what I really want is toggles for both workflows, not what they implemented currently, which is a brush preview that is nearly invisible, or no preview at all.

[ZufDraw]

+1 to turn off brush outline... plz

[Renderluz]

On 10/18/2021 at 5:17 AM, ZufDraw said:

+1 to turn off brush outline... plz

Its already off, and this is its unlikely to change, I would love however to have a toggle,

so both you and the people that want an outline can use the application.

[whitehead]

1 hour ago, Renderluz said:

Its already off, and this is its unlikely to change, I would love however to have a toggle,

so both you and the people that want an outline can use the application.

Are you referring to the iPad version, Renderluz? Sadly (within Windows at any rate) the accursed 'outline' is very much a permanent issue, as the (many) comments above attest, going back years and years. Just a sad joke now.

[Engelbert]

Agreed, the outline is very distracting. For painting this gets annoying really fast, +1 for a toggle to switch it off.

I like AP a lot and keep wanting to use it for my painting work, but this is one of those little things that keep sending me back to other software.

[Renderluz]

On 11/3/2021 at 3:35 PM, whitehead said:

Are you referring to the iPad version, Renderluz? Sadly (within Windows at any rate) the accursed 'outline' is very much a permanent issue, as the (many) comments above attest, going back years and years. Just a sad joke now.

Really? that is kinda hilarious I mean I would love to have that, as my painting workflow makes heavy use of the outline of the brush and the tilt function of the stylus to draw thick or thin lines just by angling the stylus differently, but I need to see how the brush shape is changing so I'm certain of the shape size and direction of stroke before I make it, wouldn't be great for me to get the interface you have atm, and you to get mine?, hopefully at some point Serif will realize just how important to their product this feature is and make a robust cursor UI. I dont want to force people to have an outline, I think we all be served better with a toggle and several option as to how the brush outline can be presented, Clips Studio solution is wonderful, even better than Photoshop's in some regards, something similar would be wonderful to have here.

This lack of a feature has prevented me from using Affinity Designer for a whole year, as I simply can't paint properly or use the brushes I like, and since I have a very long muscle memory as how I work to try to switch to a non existent cursor workflow is not worth the time, so I'm sticking to Photoshop, not because it has the best solutions in terms of brush engine and effects, but because I have such a long muscle memory that switching is extremely impractical, I would already need to re-create all my brushes in Affinity, and find where all the equivalent effects I use more often are, then adding not being able to see the cursor makes the switch just way to much of a problem, if they add the outline I would jump into the app right away, it has so many interesting features... that I can't use yet.

I'm puzzled as to why they have not worked on this for so much time, I mean one would image they want to compete and increase their user base, Clip Studio finally realized how important this is, and now I'm using the app for my inks, (the vector inking is unparalleled on that app, but without a proper cursor I could not try it properly) Affinity designer has the potential to really be the main painting solution for concept designers, and this seemingly simply feature would actually make them way more user friendly for those that are on the fence as to switching or at least making much more use of their application even if they have a very long muscle memory of using Photoshop for many, many, years.

[whitehead]

On 11/4/2021 at 2:37 AM, Renderluz said:

Affinity designer has the potential to really be the main painting solution for concept designers, and this seemingly simply feature would actually make them way more user friendly

Absolutely agree on every point. For me, all Affinity need do is clone CSP's brush dialogue and we would be there so everyone is happy, but even after years we are still no closer. I genuinely do not know how anyone approaches painting/sketching in AD/AP with such fundamental issues (the brush 'resize and unhighlight the brush you are using' is another corker) and it is incredibly frustrating, as is the basic silence from Affinity. This, apparently, is their modus operandi and to some extent understandable - no developer has the time to comment on every feature request/bug report - but after all these years it starts to feel a lot like arrogance.

Of course, over time CSP have ramped up their own vector tools and you feel they could make serious inroads into this market if they had a mind, just as they have started to mop up on PS's space for illustration now. I can't imagine Procreate aren't looking at the vector space too.

Anyway, all very interesting - I don't use an iPad and your comments have answered some questions I've had there. The most galling thing around Affinity is their focus on everything else but this, from focus on Publisher to their 600k object layers... effectively absolutely anything rather than address very legitimate feature requests going back to 2016 or so.

[cgidesign]

My vote as well:

BUT !!

Let us see the cursor while increasing, descesing size. So, when painting = hide cursor; when adjusting size show cursor.

[Renderluz]

Hello, Can some one here confirm if the new version that launched has more cursor options or if that remains the same, I want to know of if the new version will work for my workflow or if I should pass, Thanks!!

[cgidesign]

If you are asking about cursor visualization, then no change in V2 unfortunately. For example: the cursor still can't be hidden.

[whitehead]

14 hours ago, cgidesign said:

If you are asking about cursor visualization, then no change in V2 unfortuately.

I wish I could say I had been holding out any hope.

[cgidesign]

Me to and not only regarding the brush cursor. I started to try out other products in more depth now as none of the requests and bugs relevant to me got adressed in V2.

[Renderluz]

I downloaded the trial, no new option, too bad its seems Serif really does not care about this request at all, its weird tho, I would be interested on finding a way to increase my user base to you know... to get more money, but alas this feature is a non starter at all, super weird. Clip studio has a robust cursor system, so does Photoshop, Affinity has really good everything else... but its like a car with a supercharged engine and racing wheels with not steering wheel, how do they think the car is gonna be driven then?

Ill check in year from now just because I find this one of the most kafkafian things ever. Its like they hate the this feature for some reason.

[whitehead]

The annual check-in is a familiar ritual. For the record, I've still purchased 2.0 to keep my skin in the game: as I've often said, Affinity's aims are laudable but their refusal to attend to their illustrator base feels simply perverse. It's so sad and strange, but now as the bottom will probably drop out of the digital illustration market anyway, perhaps they've just been incredibly far-sighted all along not to care. Ho-hum!

[whitehead]

Just to say that within V2 there is indeed the option to toggle between the brush outline and crosshair by using the Caps Lock key. 

As revealed in the thread linked, there is some work going on to solve the non-highlighted current brush issue, and the conversation leads to Ash Hewson's note on the Caps Lock function; I'm not sure how widely this was understood.

Peter