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what we mean when we ask for pages


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When some designers talk about pages they are referring to the pages for page layout  in a publishing application. Page layout for a book.

When former fireworks (and freehand) users ask for pages we are not talking about pages for laying out a book. 

We are talking about a productivity feature. 

In the old days to make 12 astrology signs Id have 12 photoshop files or 12 illustrator files. Or I might have 12 artboards but it was not the kind of productivity we came to rely on with fireworks and the former macromedia freehand.  Fireworks offered layers and stacked pages accessed via a menu panel.

I could have the 12 characters one on each page all in one file. With a click I could click through each astro sign checking for exact placement.

I could have 12 colors on multiple layers. I could share all of those layers with all 12 pages or I could choose to share just one. I would turn them off and on and compare colors against all the signs in each page. I could have a two logos on two layers. I could share these to all the pages. turn off one. save out all the pages. turn off the other turn on the second one save out all the pages and offer up 24 options to the client. Everything remaining editable in ONE file.

IF the client loved one thing but not another I could go back into the ONE file and turn off the thing the client doid not want. try another iteration and save all those pages out all over again. ONE button click. Far more productive than opening 12 files and adjusting every single one.

pages. we want pages. And layers that can be shared at will with all or some pages. Not side by side pages as found in a publishing program used for page layout for books. Pages in a vector art program where multiple iterations of a single design or a style of button or more is required.

Share how you use pages in fireworks. It will help the developers to understand what we need. We dont need fireworks proprietary anything. What we need is for you to reinvent a method of productivity. And I for one will not care if it cant import old fireworks projects. That would be a plus but Ill settle for the productivity with new projects. Its the method and the increased productivity that counts. 

Make it so each page with its layers could be saved out to a PSD. Not that I care about photoshop anymore but a lot of people still using it. 

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Well, the main difference I can see is the "side by side" vs "one in place of the former one", as seen in this video, you can have all the variants you want (every page containing different images, texts, icons, etc.), and you just have to clic on one Page to go from verion A to version B. More or less.

 

Correct me if I got something wrong.

Best regards!

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dizeyner, I am afraid pages feature will be aimed to be book & magazine oriented side by side solution. Can it be useful for you workflow also? Or is it possible to develop artboads to suit better for your needs?

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haakoo you do not show your file to a customer. You show them an end result. There is a HUGE difference between productivity and end product.

Fixx, pages laid out next to each other have nothing to do with web design productivity.  Web is not print. Im hard pressed to explain it as well as others can. When you flip a page in a book the pages are side by side. when you flip though pages in a website or a phone or anything like that one view instantly replaces the other. This is valuable when you are checking to see that elements are where they belong precisely from web page to web page or screen to screen on a phone.  NOTHING must shift and its better to catch that before design goes into production. You do not see a minute shift in a common element in two pages side by side.

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Ive just found a program that does what I need it to do with regard to pages, layers, artboards and master elements. This is not a replacement for fireworks or affinity. Im putting the link in for the affinity developers because I do not think we all on the same page with regard to what web designers are hoping for in affinity designer.

Its the simplest way I know to show that print designer needs are not the same as web designers needs.

NOTE: while the application Im linking to has some essential productivity tools, like pages it does NOT rival affinity for creation of vectors or editing pre-existing web design collateral. This is not me recommending anyone leave affinity. this is me trying as hard as I can to get affinity to understand we are NOT ASKING FOR defunct productivity that is not standard. This is me trying to show that what we are asking for IS standard. And that we are asking for pages that assist in web productivity.

Personally I do not need all the wireframing and prefab buttons that usually come with these kinds of web prototype tools. I am not asking that affinity create a web prototyping tool. If I wanted a web prototyping tool Id have one. There are quite a few of them out there. They all have pages, master elements and art boards. None of them can create like fireworks did, or affinity does or illustrator does. Illustrator and affinity are alike at the moment. Neither of them provides web designers with tools we need for efficient production. Both of them offer superior creation tools like bezier curves and gaussian blur. I chose affinity because it gives me HOPE that Ill get what I need. And Im anti adobe at the moment. Plus never loved illustrator because it caters to print. Not at all web centric.

I  want my pages, my layers. my artboards and my ability to define a master element that can be applied to a master page. and of course symbols. We got the artboards with affinity. yay. we got the symbols. yay. but affinity designer only half the way where I need it to be.

https://www.sketchapp.com/

Sketch can do some of what affinity does. but INMHO not as well. Not by a long shot. IF sketch could do what affinity does with regard to creating all my design elements Id jump ship. But it cant and I do not think it ever will. Its not geared toward hybrid people like me who do more than website layout or screens for iphones. Its limited. So hoping affinity folks don't think my link to sketch app is me being disloyal. 

Im with affinity designer. Its just a huge struggle to use it because it cant do some pretty basic productivity things. Give me pages and master elements or master pages or both. Then Im happy to have lost fireworks and left adobe in the dust.

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I'm confident that you will make your point clearer if you search for a video where things are shown in the way you work them (like the video I linked to). I made something like that to show how the Shape Builder Tools saves a lot of time againts the Boolean Operations, and I'm sure more than one got the point.

Like they say, an image is worth a thousand words... and a video is worth a little more.

By the way 1: There are plans (but no public ETA) for Prototyping capabilities in Affinity. You might be interested in that for future workflows.

By the way 2: It's not the same but I just thought... what about this for the time being?

  • Use Layes as if they were Pages (there would more clicks to show and hide).
  • Use symbols to simulate the Master Page.
  • Use Groups to organize your page elements.
  • Organize your elements one on top of the other the way you'd do in Fireworks.

Best regards!

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7 hours ago, dizeyner said:

Fixx, pages laid out next to each other have nothing to do with web design productivity.  Web is not print.

What I meant is that pages functionality planned for Affinity Publisher is aimed for print production (as far as I know). All the better if it is flexible enough to be used for web development, but I would think there are a few challenges there.

That said, it is obvious that when AD is meant to be a tool also for web development and UX there should be better tools for it. Reusable elements and layout rules to be used multiple pages, export path to prototyping etc.

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I just wanted to attach this example to show what I mean with my idea. (just consider the fact that I'm not a Web Designer myself :P)  

Here is the font used. All Images come from Unsplash.

Best regards!

Web Site Design.afdesign

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On 3/9/2018 at 11:28 PM, Mithferion said:

I just wanted to attach this example to show what I mean with my idea. (just consider the fact that I'm not a Web Designer myself :P)  

Here is the font used. All Images come from Unsplash.

Best regards!

Web Site Design.afdesign

Wow you went the xtra mile to show me that tip. I think that would work for smaller projects. Not idea for my really big ones. But good in a pinch. thank you.

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28 minutes ago, dizeyner said:

Wow you went the xtra mile to show me that tip. I think that would work for smaller projects. Not idea for my really big ones. But good in a pinch. thank you.

Dun worry, I just took the concept and tried to apply it in a quick example. You could give it a try, maybe it will work better than expected.

Best regards!

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  • 1 year later...

It would definitely help a lot for webdesign to be able to have pages displayed on the same place to flip throught them. So we could compare different pages, layouts, steps, use a grid system on one place on the screen (instead of artboards being everywhere witch we can't really compare if they are beside each other) and don't need to do all that with the layering system (which is great, but doesn't suit this usecase). Being able to use a master-page here would be very efficient for this workflow, like having the default weblayout, like header, menu and all on the masterpage so we can flip through pages as being web-pages.

I agree this would help a lot to speed up the workflow a lot and would be a huge timesaver and help designing websites. Definitely a +100 for me on having a feature to have pages in Designer like this for webdesign!

I am looking for this workflow a long time, but didn't know how, and this is exactly what I was looking for. Especially now Designer has the page-navigation build in and in the codebase everything is there for pages (for Publisher) opefully Affinity will listen and implement this page feature for webdesigners!

 

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