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Snapshots in Affinity Designer


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Since Affinity Designer blends vector and raster, it is imperative that snapshots be added to the history panel.

 

One of the most amusing discussions on Adobe's Illustrator forum is that of adding history to illustrator. The arrogance of the posters and adobe really shines there. :-) One of the top reasons I am going to dump Illustrator for Affinity Designer is the history functionality. It saves so much time. We are talking a couple work days per year just with this function and not having to constantly save a million different states of a project when working on it. 

AD needs a snapshot tool. It just saves so much time in both creation and post-production processes. 

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It does actually have, and can use snapshots from within the history panel, but they are not currently exposed to the user. Instead, they appear in Affinity Photo's history panel because snapshots are much more commonly used in photo-editing applications.

 

Would you be able to describe how you'd like to use snapshots so I could see whether our current implementation would work for you if I enabled it?

 

Thanks!

Matt

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You use it in the same way you use history. It's a way to save the state and work on multiple threads so to speak. 

 

As it is now, I still have to save multiple versions of my work, and have them open in multiple tabs. It's not very efficient, and takes away extra RAM. I can very easily use up 32GB of RAM working on a single work, even 64GB, and when I'm on a laptop I can't afford any RAM for multiple versions being open so the creative process becomes much longer. Snapshots take away RAM, but much less than multiple files.

The feature is in Affinity Photo, so there is no reason it shouldn't be in Designer. If you are working only in vector shapes there is less of an expense on time without it, but it is still very useful. It would make up for a lack of global color swatches. I would rather have snapshots than global swatches.

I know adobe illustrator doesn't have snapshots or history, but that's why it is an annoying program to use and I always start work in raster before vectorizing. Affinity Designer allows to blend the workflows, so it is much more important. I just love the history function, and I also LOOOOOOVE the fact the history states are auto saved and your file opens back up like nothing happened after a crash. In Photoshop you can run out of RAM and lose all the "threads" you had saved and it really wastes a lot of time. 

 

 

specworkfan, can you provide an actual example on how you use snapshots? I never used that feature. I don't use Photoshop, but I use Illustrator, which obviously doesn't have that.

 

So I'm wondering what would be the practical benefit.

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Snapshots aren’t something I’ve come across before but I’ll be looking out for them as a feature from now on, seems very useful! I can see myself using it to mark major revisions to a document, a little bit like code project version numbering.

 

I’d definitely like this to be implemented across all the Affinity apps, not just Photo.

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Didn't read this correctly the first time and replied to the post above.  After using the Photo Beta some I can offer some additional comments as well.

 

Firstly, are you saying that snapshots have been coded into Designer, but the interface for them is not shown?

 

Secondly, as for the implementation in Photo, it is a bit wonky, but not a deal breaker. It would be nice to stack the snapshots on top of the history. The snapshot panel on it's own is actually a nice option to have when things get deep, but it is best to have an option. I don't like the fact that you have to click twice to take a snapshot. Just do it! 

 

Here is the menu that is brought up after clicking the snapshot button:

 

dNtYD1x.png

 

Choice is never a bad thing, but if I want to rename my snapshot, I will do so after. I just want to save my states without doing more than one click. The text should default to Snapshot #1 (2,3,etc..) and the short form of the date and time. Having the time is actually nice, but writing out in long form is not as helpful as numbering the snapshot's number. If I am consulting an editor or client for choices, it's nice to have a specific number to remember when flipping through. Sometimes I have 50 snapshots to choose from when sketching.

Finally, the way the snapshots work is confusing. Does the camera icon on the history panel actually do anything when clicked? I was expecting a snapshot to automatically be generated, but this is not the case.

 

MdaQprs.png

 

Perhaps this is a beta issue? I just downloaded the newest photo beta.
 

I love the Photo beta. It's not yet near photoshop yet, but very promising. Designer has exceeded illustrator in most things I use it for. The more Designer and Photo are the same, the better. There is a huge gap between things in photoshop and illustrator. I frequently need to port existing raster art to bigger sizes and vectorize, and also rasterizing vector art to texture. It's really a dream come true.

 

It does actually have, and can use snapshots from within the history panel, but they are not currently exposed to the user. Instead, they appear in Affinity Photo's history panel because snapshots are much more commonly used in photo-editing applications.

 

Would you be able to describe how you'd like to use snapshots so I could see whether our current implementation would work for you if I enabled it?

 

Thanks!

Matt

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Secondly, as for the implementation in Photo, it is a bit wonky, but not a deal breaker. It would be nice to stack the snapshots on top of the history. The snapshot panel on it's own is actually a nice option to have when things get deep, but it is best to have an option. I don't like the fact that you have to click twice to take a snapshot. Just do it! 

 

Here is the menu that is brought up after clicking the snapshot button:

 

dNtYD1x.png

 

Choice is never a bad thing, but if I want to rename my snapshot, I will do so after. I just want to save my states without doing more than one click. The text should default to Snapshot #1 (2,3,etc..) and the short form of the date and time. Having the time is actually nice, but writing out in long form is not as helpful as numbering the snapshot's number. If I am consulting an editor or client for choices, it's nice to have a specific number to remember when flipping through. Sometimes I have 50 snapshots to choose from when sketching.

 

I would probably prefer to give snapshots meaningful names up front, so I would like an implementation as Photo does it now. Perhaps a “quick snapshot” button or keyboard shortcut could be provided in addition to the current system?

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Firstly, are you saying that snapshots have been coded into Designer, but the interface for them is not shown?

 

 

Yes, Designer and Photo are built from the same 'back-end' (the bit that does all the work) so everything about them is 100% compatible and can be enabled/disabled at will... Designer does not expose snapshots to the user, but they are there and fully functional - it was more about how much value users would get from the feature vs the amount of confusion it might generate. It sounds like there may be a case for enabling them in Designer once all the niggles are worked through in Photo :)

 

Thanks again,

Matt

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Matt, if you could make iterative snapshots, you might well revolutionise how people do iterative, illustrative design. Imagine having 30 versions of a logo design in a "timeline" of snapshots, for example. 

 

So, please, yes, consider it. Especially given the fantastic nature of your vector tools for shaping logo style art.

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If you can make a toggle in a near term beta version that would be great! I understand why things can't just go to production version now.

 

I have just spent the last two days learning the interface better of both programs. It's incredible. Beginning a project tomorrow in Designer, very excited.

 

Yes, Designer and Photo are built from the same 'back-end' (the bit that does all the work) so everything about them is 100% compatible and can be enabled/disabled at will... Designer does not expose snapshots to the user, but they are there and fully functional - it was more about how much value users would get from the feature vs the amount of confusion it might generate. It sounds like there may be a case for enabling them in Designer once all the niggles are worked through in Photo :)

 

Thanks again,

Matt

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  • 3 months later...

+1 For snapshots enabled in designer.

 

I've just spent a couple of days in designer testing different concepts for an illustration.  Most ideas were iterations on a previous design but not always in a linear direction, so I would try something then back up in the history and try something else.  If I didn't save a new document, or a copy of all the objects each time, I would lose the end result of each iteration and they wouldn't all still be available in the history after backing up.  Snapshots in photo allow me to save the end result in a snapshot which is great.

 

In photo AFAICT you still lose the history of each iteration when you back up, but at least the end result is available.  I guess a more advanced interface might record the complete history of all the branches, but I can see how that would get complicated to present to the user.  Although if it could be done well, perhaps with thumbnails rather than just labels, it would be an impressive feature to have.  It would also give the user a lot of freedom to experiment if designer saved all the branches of their history.

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  • 4 months later...

+1 for snapshots!  Please, please enable them.  I like to use them for creating blog graphics.  I add the image and then create the title over the image in various font combinations, saving each one as a snapshot.  Then I can quickly flick back and forth between the completed snapshots to decide which one is the "winning" design.

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  • 11 months later...

Trying to Undo any commands related to the Snapshot studio (Add, Restore or Delete Snapshot) does't seem to work for the latest Beta (1.5.2 B3)

 

 

Snapshots are now enabled and will be in the next beta build of Designer :)

2021 16” Macbook Pro w/ M1 Max 10c cpu /24c gpu, 32 GB RAM, 1TB SSD, Ventura 13.6

2018 11" iPad Pro w/ A12X cpu/gpu, 256 GB, iPadOS 17

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