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[Updated with better link example and nicer language]

The number one reason I have given Affinity Designer a 1 star rating is for not having a complete set of ALL the path finder tools that you would have in Adobe Illustrator or Corel Draw. It's unimaginably disappointing. 

Of all of the path finder tools from Illustrator I, and every other designer, uses the most is "TRIM". And, NO, divide is not "TRIM". Divide is not a proper or reasonable replacement for "TRIM".  I beg of you and your developers to watch this youtube link and copy EXACTLY this "TRIM" feature: 
 


I was working on a critical design project that needed "TRIM" to happen and no work-a-round could alleviate the problem.

Please fix this, please make this happen on the very next update.
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I've personally never used any of the secondary pathfinder tools, not a single time in my 17+ years as a designer. I've found the core few (unite, minus front and combine) could pretty much do everything the others could with a few extra copy/paste actions. 

Though a tool may be a vital part of your workflow, it's also good to keep in mind that your workflow may also be uncommon. I certainly have a few open threads on this forum for tools i'd like to see incorporated, but when i don't get a huge following of people agreeing with me, it doesn't surprise me one bit. I design and illustrate in a way that is unique to me and my tool/app ideas might not be geared for the vast majority of users, and it's important when creating an app to get the main points down before focusing on the smaller details.

I would recommend taking a more humble and polite approach to requests. If i were a developer, I'm not sure I'd want to invest the time and effort into a niche request if the first sentence of the thread was a description of why they gave me a one star rating.

Art director by day, illustrator by night: Check Out My Shutterstock Gallery

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Hey kaosartist, I've read your post twice because I couldn't believe it. Poor you, what a f....d up person you must be. I hope the developers will not respond to your post.

Keep the software you like and get out of here...

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4 hours ago, TonyO said:

I've personally never used any of the secondary pathfinder tools, not a single time in my 17+ years as a designer. I've found the core few (unite, minus front and combine) could pretty much do everything the others could with a few extra copy/paste actions. 

Though a tool may be a vital part of your workflow, it's also good to keep in mind that your workflow may also be uncommon. I certainly have a few open threads on this forum for tools i'd like to see incorporated, but when i don't get a huge following of people agreeing with me, it doesn't surprise me one bit. I design and illustrate in a way that is unique to me and my tool/app ideas might not be geared for the vast majority of users, and it's important when creating an app to get the main points down before focusing on the smaller details.

I would recommend taking a more humble and polite approach to requests. If i were a developer, I'm not sure I'd want to invest the time and effort into a niche request if the first sentence of the thread was a description of why they gave me a one star rating.

Well first off Trim is NOT a niche request. It is a standard in EVERY top rated vector app that we have been using in the past 20+ years; Freehand, Corel Draw, Illustrator..ect. Pathfinder tools are must in production work in Illustrator. If you have never used it in Illustrator please try it out, you would be amazed how much this little "niche" tool makes your life SOOOOOOO much easier. I posted a better video on the subject: see OP. 

Now, that being said. I am open to new techniques. If you can show me a video where you can get the same "TRIM' results, as the one I posted, in Affinity Designer for iPad I am all ears and eyes! Personally I can't imagine how a designer of 17 years has never ran into a situation where this tool was necessary. Like you said everyone's experience is different. But I do stand by the one fact that TRIM is NOT a NICHE tool. 

Regarding my composure in my OP, I hope my edit is a little more nicer to you all. I probably should have started with what I feel about Affinity Photo. Here is a portion of an email to Affinity regarding Affinity Photo:

"Affinity Photo succeeded at being the Pro Photoshop replacement iPad artists and designers could ever hope for, and that was already established BEFORE it's most recent update. Affinity Photo already had everything that was needed to match the current version of Adobe Photoshop. Since the last Affinity Photo update Affinity Photo as literally surpassed Photoshop with features and capabilities that out strip Photoshop in it's current version. Unbelievable!!! Going back to Photoshop from Affinity Photo is like going back to a dinosaur.  Affinity Photo, especially for iPad, has made Photoshop obsolete thanks to the most recent update. "

Because Affinity Photo for iPad was so damn good coming out of the gate (bought it when it first came out), I was expecting the same level of commitment from Affinity to give us an Illustrator competitor with as much dedication and detail to giving us designers, with so many work flow styles, the same experience as what we got with Affinity Photo. The only thing I expected Affinity to omit from the Illustrator experience was a proper bitmap to vector conversion, (which BTW Affinity told me is coming out).  By comparison Affinity designer needs more work. I have looked at the amazing list of requests on here and ALL of them are not just reasonable but literally, if implemented, would make Affinity Designer the same Platinum standard as Affinity Photo. If the developers would roll out a new update which included each and every request every two weeks or so, that would make Affinity Designer the same quality product as Affinity Photo. IMHO this software is far from completion and needs a ton of updates. 

I hope this helps you understand where I am coming from. 
 

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3 hours ago, kaosartist said:

Holy crap! The dude deleted the video. Oh well. I found a better one. Updated in my OP and here it is for you: 

 

Thanks.

If I understood correctly, the only think that you could use in Designer to achieve the same effect, is the Subtract operation, but you would need several more steps, like this:

  • We start with 3 objects.

image.png.19261353def7953e9d71ee1474bfa5b0.png

  • Then we duplicate the Circle and the Star.

image.png.c2851658daa34af5ce1e5e5928be6576.png

  • Then we make the Subtract operation with onw of the Stars and the Circle.

image.png.efb8ebe417c7febe7c50a94ec6f1794b.png

  • Now we do the same with one of the Green Circles and the Blue Shape.
  • Adter that, we Repeat the Subtract operation with one of the remaining Green Circle and the Black Star.
  • Finally, you make the Divide Operation with the Blue Shape. And here is the end result.

image.png.e320f353bc0406b7ab01dd9a4bbdbec2.png

It's doable but this examples shows that getting the same result uses considerable more time and care. I suppose that internally, Illustrator does something similar but with one button click.

Best regards!

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By the way, sorry if I could not provide an example using the iPad version (I don’t even habe one of those devices), but it should be the same steps, I guess.

Best regards!

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15 minutes ago, Mithferion said:

Thanks.

If I understood correctly, the only think that you could use in Designer to achieve the same effect, is the Subtract operation, but you would need several more steps, like this:

  • We start with 3 objects.

image.png.19261353def7953e9d71ee1474bfa5b0.png

  • Then we duplicate the Circle and the Star.

image.png.c2851658daa34af5ce1e5e5928be6576.png

  • Then we make the Subtract operation with onw of the Stars and the Circle.

image.png.efb8ebe417c7febe7c50a94ec6f1794b.png

  • Now we do the same with one of the Green Circles and the Blue Shape.
  • Adter that, we Repeat the Subtract operation with one of the remaining Green Circle and the Black Star.
  • Finally, you make the Divide Operation with the Blue Shape. And here is the end result.

image.png.e320f353bc0406b7ab01dd9a4bbdbec2.png

It's doable but this examples shows that getting the same result uses considerable more time and care. I suppose that internally, Illustrator does something similar but with one button click.

Best regards!

You nailed it! This is exactly the problem of NOT having a proper trim tool. When you are forced to go through so many steps to do something so simple yet, is so damn critical, when you are working with very tight tolerances, this type of work around is a terrible idea. There are too many ways to mess up your work. Yeah, I'm harsh but let's get real here. This is a feature that is not propitiatory to Illustrator. You have this same ability in Corel Draw and in Aldos Freehand, yeah, back in 1998! This is the year 2018 and a developer can't implement a simple piece of code that similar software has had for over 20 years? Seriously?

Affinity Photo on the other hand is a match for match point to point Photoshop replacement for iPad that as of, September 2018, now has newer features Adobe has never thought of yet. When Affinity Photo first came out it was easily equal to Photoshop 6-7 before the CS series. It had the basic functionalities of masking and channels that for a pro-user, is everything you could ever need. Not having this pathfinder set/trim tool is sorta like releasing Affinity Photo with no masking layers and channel masking capability at all. BTW some idiot release an Affinity Photo challenger that did just that, NO MASKING!   

Anyhow, It's nice that they have Affinity Publisher they are working on. But really, they need to go back, and finish Designer till it is at least a proper match for match, point for point Illustrator replacement for iOS that Affinity Photo has been for Photoshop. I'm not even asking for the complete masking, welding and pathfinder tools. I need just the one tool; TRIM. Please, just, add that! 

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6 hours ago, kaosartist said:

Now, that being said. I am open to new techniques. If you can show me a video where you can get the same "TRIM' results, as the one I posted, in Affinity Designer for iPad I am all ears and eyes! Personally I can't imagine how a designer of 17 years has never ran into a situation where this tool was necessary. Like you said everyone's experience is different. But I do stand by the one fact that TRIM is NOT a NICHE tool.

After watching the video on TRIM that you added, i still don't really see the reason for a dedicated function. I'm not sure if it has some hidden use that I'm just not seeing, but I was able to replicate the OP video above by just duplicating the top layer so it persists after the front-minus-back combines with the lower layer (video).

I get there might be some specific uses that this tool would make easier (and I'm always open to seeing a video of the function being used in actual practice and not a sample scenario - please change my mind!) but from what I saw in the sample video, most people with a decent vector background could emulate this effect with creative use of the core geometry functions and an extra copy/paste or two.

This is not like the absence of a vector eraser or envelope distortion, 2 effects that are currently IMPOSSIBLE to replicate currently in Affinity.... The effect you're looking for is still POSSIBLE, it's just a few more steps.

I agree it's an inconvenience, but it sure as heck isnt a deal breaker. I don't think the goal of Affinity is a point to point reproduction of Illustrator with the sole purpose being so that Adobe purists can get out of paying a monthly membership. Affinity is it's own tool with it's own audience and own roadmap, independent and different from Adobe's suite. I for one think it's an amazing accomplishment that a company like Serif can literally ditch 20 years of it's own platform to start fresh and re-enter the market as strongly as they did. 

Bi-weekly updates is way too much to ask of the development team, they have put together in 4 years something comparable and in most cases better than a tool that Adobe has been working on for around 30 years. Keep your demands in check.

 

 

 

 

Art director by day, illustrator by night: Check Out My Shutterstock Gallery

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1 hour ago, TonyO said:

After watching the video on TRIM that you added, i still don't really see the reason for a dedicated function. I'm not sure if it has some hidden use that I'm just not seeing, but I was able to replicate the OP video above by just duplicating the top layer so it persists after the front-minus-back combines with the lower layer (video).

I get there might be some specific uses that this tool would make easier (and I'm always open to seeing a video of the function being used in actual practice and not a sample scenario - please change my mind!) but from what I saw in the sample video, most people with a decent vector background could emulate this effect with creative use of the core geometry functions and an extra copy/paste or two.

This is not like the absence of a vector eraser or envelope distortion, 2 effects that are currently IMPOSSIBLE to replicate currently in Affinity.... The effect you're looking for is still POSSIBLE, it's just a few more steps.

I agree it's an inconvenience, but it sure as heck isnt a deal breaker. I don't think the goal of Affinity is a point to point reproduction of Illustrator with the sole purpose being so that Adobe purists can get out of paying a monthly membership. Affinity is it's own tool with it's own audience and own roadmap, independent and different from Adobe's suite. I for one think it's an amazing accomplishment that a company like Serif can literally ditch 20 years of it's own platform to start fresh and re-enter the market as strongly as they did. 

Bi-weekly updates is way too much to ask of the development team, they have put together in 4 years something comparable and in most cases better than a tool that Adobe has been working on for around 30 years. Keep your demands in check.

 

 

 

 

Trim.mov

You obviously have not worked digital pre-press and production, but that's okay. Not everyone has. If you don't agree with the update recommendation then please don't bother commenting. One thing I never do is go on to someone else's feature request and try to explain how it's not necessary or niche or unrealistic. "Oh it's just a few extra steps"...really?  I go on to other peoples feature requests and SUPPORT their recommendation. Customers should be doing more of that and less criticizing others posts. I post the way I do because I believe in Affinity design products and am willing to keep on their ass to continue to do better be superior, which they are on the road map to be.

Don't mean to put you on blast but your response was really not supportive and of little help.

 

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7 hours ago, kaosartist said:

You nailed it! This is exactly the problem of NOT having a proper trim tool. When you are forced to go through so many steps to do something so simple yet, is so damn critical, when you are working with very tight tolerances, this type of work around is a terrible idea. There are too many ways to mess up your work. Yeah, I'm harsh but let's get real here. This is a feature that is not propitiatory to Illustrator. You have this same ability in Corel Draw and in Aldos Freehand, yeah, back in 1998! This is the year 2018 and a developer can't implement a simple piece of code that similar software has had for over 20 years? Seriously?

I always say that simple is not the same as easy. Since I'm not a member of the Dev Team, but having worked in IT for 8 years, I know that something might look easy, but developing said feature would impact many places.

I understand how that Trim feature works, but just with the sole purpose of knowing, what do you use it for? Can you provide a real example?

 

6 hours ago, TonyO said:

This is not like the absence of a vector eraser or envelope distortion, 2 effects that are currently IMPOSSIBLE to replicate currently in Affinity.... The effect you're looking for is still POSSIBLE, it's just a few more steps.

I balieve you could do something in Designer, but as with this Trim feature, would require more steps. And depending on the number of cases you use it, would mean you spend considerable more time to achieve your results.

Best regards!

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10 minutes ago, Mithferion said:

I always say that simple is not the same as easy. Since I'm not a member of the Dev Team, but having worked in IT for 8 years, I know that something might look easy, but developing said feature would impact many places.

I understand how that Trim feature works, but just with the sole purpose of knowing, what do you use it for? Can you provide a real example?

 

I balieve you could do something in Designer, but as with this Trim feature, would require more steps. And depending on the number of cases you use it, would mean you spend considerable more time to achieve your results.

Best regards!

Thanks for the feedback Mithferion. I have to be honest in saying that asking what the trim feature is used for is really quite puzzling to me actually. I mean, I'm scratching my head trying to understand how this tool is so lost on you and the rest on this forum. It's like the easiest and most intuitive tool in any vector program ever made for PC or Apple. But okay, I'll try to explain it. In regular fun creative sense you can use shapes to cut out other shapes with ease and KNOW with CONFIDENCE that there is no other pieces of the object to mess with. It is a solid interaction unlike divide (which is in here BTW but sometimes works in wonky ways). When you hit divide you then have to pic out all of these other pieces which is not only a pain in the ass but is very time consuming. For production and pre-press in silk screen and vinyl cutting, trim is critical. For tshirts you use trim to make your screen separations and in some cases is very helpful for over print outlines. In vinyl work, where this is the most critical, you cant risk having all of these extra vector lines in your image because that is what the cutter will see and cut in your vinyl piece. So trim is very important in helping to make proper cuts in your piece when developing a a sign with 2 or more colors. In print there are just many techniques in getting many image results in your design using the trim function. 

Ultimately, to understand what I am talking about, go into your illustrator create a few shapes and use the trim tool to see for yourself how valuable this feature is. I hope this helps. 

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4 hours ago, kaosartist said:

You obviously have not worked digital pre-press and production, but that's okay. Not everyone has.

Yup, 5 years of prepress as my first job at a silkscreening/vinyl shop. Great entry level work for sure before i got into agency work. Everyone i knew in Prepress lived and died by Corel Draw - no application can match Corel for feature count. I'm not sure how you would hope to do separations and trapping in Affinity, but i guess if you really want to change workflows, you can try to make it work.

 

4 hours ago, kaosartist said:

I post the way I do because I believe in Affinity design products and am willing to keep on their ass to continue to do better be superior, which they are on the road map to be.

The way you post is rude and overly demanding. Good luck with your request. I'll consider myself done here.

Art director by day, illustrator by night: Check Out My Shutterstock Gallery

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My Design experience is more on the screen side, so there have been not need for me to use a cutter.

Thanks for the time you spent explaining this to me.

Best regards!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Come to this thread looking for exactly this.

I want to be able to trim an imported image by putting an object, rectangle, around it, selecting both and clicking one/two keys to slice the picture.

Xara Design Pro does this very well .. also does it will a single line drawn across the image..

I like Affinity products very much but this is a glaring omission. 

Please can something simple like this be implemented? Thanks.

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8 hours ago, RichardM said:

Come to this thread looking for exactly this.

I want to be able to trim an imported image by putting an object, rectangle, around it, selecting both and clicking one/two keys to slice the picture.

Xara Design Pro does this very well .. also does it will a single line drawn across the image..

I like Affinity products very much but this is a glaring omission. 

Please can something simple like this be implemented? Thanks.

Thank you for your input. I just checked out the Xara site. The main are of where Affinity is KILLING the competition is that fact this is a pro design app available for iPad that is a complete match to its desktop version. While Designer fails dramatically in having proper pathfinder tools it is still the best Illustrator replacement. If some how Xara does create an iOS version that is 100% fully purchasable (NO subscription) I'd be happy to take a look at it. The main goal here is that developers need to let go of the desk and lap tops and focus more if not all their attention to the future; iPad.  Affinity Photo has succeeded in freeing Photoshop artists from lap tops and computer systems...can't wait till Affinity does the same for Illustrator artists. 

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17 hours ago, RichardM said:

Come to this thread looking for exactly this.

I want to be able to trim an imported image by putting an object, rectangle, around it, selecting both and clicking one/two keys to slice the picture.

Xara Design Pro does this very well .. also does it will a single line drawn across the image..

I like Affinity products very much but this is a glaring omission. 

Please can something simple like this be implemented? Thanks.

Do you mean something like this?

image.thumb.png.7a907ab4ab2efd2992a4cb8b8f281f60.png

Best regards!

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Besides the rude and patronizing tone of the OP, I agree with the suggestion that a trim tool would be a very useful implementation in AD. What AD does, like the above copy-inside function, is just perfect, but I think trim tool is much more important than that and indeed would make certain tasks a breeze, versus what we have to do now to accomplish the same results other softwares (worst than AD in almost every aspect) are doing with a simple click. 

I don’t understand however why certain users are coming to these threads just to downplay the importance of certain very good additions, when these forums are just (I believe, at least) about this: to make AD a better experience in the future. No one has the right to say that these tools, or changes, have to be implemented now or next year, and I don’t think this is even possible when there are enough bugs in the iPad app (and some of them a real pain to work with) that haven’t been addressed in months. I have no problem with them now, for everything is a work around, and I wait patiently for the next update — but I like to think that, in a distant future at least, better pressure curve for pen, trim tool, exporting vectors files with all my effects in place as vectors and not rasterized, etc, etc  — are possible.

Seeing in so many threads old members coming and smashing almost any good suggestion because it can be done with extra work, or because they don’t need it so no one should, or because we should leave affinity if we need tools that other softwares have (I’ve seen this in a topic regarding AI) is, to be honest, discouraging. I know some of these features aren’t even in discussions to be implemented in the desktop version, let alone the iPad, so it will take years to work with them in AD, but just knowing there’s a tiny chance to have them, eventually, makes my waiting more... bearable?

iuli

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On 10/12/2018 at 9:53 PM, Mithferion said:

Do you mean something like this?

image.thumb.png.7a907ab4ab2efd2992a4cb8b8f281f60.png

Best regards!

Hello

Thanks for that example but does not really help me. 

What I mean is to just cut an image down in size, in half, trim unwanted bits off it, or even punch the middle out...

I can not actually see how to do that, however hard I look in the WorkBook or the Help file.

For instance, if I place a .jpg and then put a shape over it, say a circle, select both and click on Subtract, Intersect or Divide, (which are logically the best options) all or one or other of the objects disappear, but no holes are punched!!

How do I achieve this with Designer?

 

PS .. Re Xara DesignPro... I have been using it for a good few years to do graphics and posters and it is overall pretty good, but I can see that Affinity Designer knocks spots off it in many ways ... except this one (so far!)

Xara has a real problem printing edge to edge properly (with Brother InkJets)  which is why I am here.

Thanks

Richard

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20 minutes ago, RichardM said:

For instance, if I place a .jpg and then put a shape over it, say a circle, select both and click on Subtract, Intersect or Divide, (which are logically the best options) all or one or other of the objects disappear, but no holes are punched!!

How do I achieve this with Designer?

Hello RichardM,

If I understood what you were looking for, @Mithferion gave you the answer. He did not do a Boolean operation, it is enough in the layers to drag the thumbnail of the photo into the one of the cog in order to obtain a horizontal blue rectangle to the right of it.

Découpe.gif

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22 hours ago, Iulisvectordesign said:

Besides the rude and patronizing tone of the OP, I agree with the suggestion that a trim tool would be a very useful implementation in AD.

Same here. I had a lot of times where I needed this feature too for illustration work. Now everytime I accomplish this by duplicating a layer first and than using subtract, but a lot of times I need to trim on multiple (sometimes to a hundred) different layers and than all those extra steps really count up in the time you need to accomplish this.

So a trim function would be very welcome here as well and I would definitely use it a lot!

I understand for a lot of people masking tools may come in handy to do this, but in my job I always need to have destructive output in the end.

On 10/3/2018 at 12:51 PM, Mithferion said:

Since I'm not a member of the Dev Team, but having worked in IT for 8 years, I know that something might look easy, but developing said feature would impact many places.

Just think of it this way instead: if we can do this manually by duplicating a shape and subtract one from the other, it could be automated. As a developer myself for like 20 years, I learned that customers should not think in solutions and how to implement things, because they don't know what Affinity knows. Only their developers could really tell if something is difficult to implement in their system or not. So just ask what you need and want as a user and they decide how they do it. Sometimes things that look difficult and complex to a customer/user are in fact easy to implement or visa versa.

[edit] Like @reglico I now see this is not for Designer on Desktop but for iPad. So I get out of here ;) Although on the Desktop version the same feature is missing... and still very welcome :)

 

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41 minutes ago, RichardM said:

Hello

Thanks for that example but does not really help me. 

What I mean is to just cut an image down in size, in half, trim unwanted bits off it, or even punch the middle out...

If you want to cut an image in a rectangular shape, you can use the Crop Tool.

image.thumb.png.b8fecf27474306d340a8fd77002bcd37.png

image.thumb.png.74d04a923e2376ba95a26a2178df6dcc.png

If you want to do something else, like a circle, follow the example I showd before. Plus, if you want to have the image in a single pixel obbject, just Rasterize it.

image.thumb.png.696ec6c82ed4bd70ff6e16bc41fd35d4.png

image.thumb.png.3ceb4403260b4bf36b1c38338d6908a0.png

image.thumb.png.70901e73946140efcbddd972f6090aed.png

image.thumb.png.37f32080abd1e9cd6d4b75e4b4f37b39.png

Sorry if I misunderstood, maybe an example with screenshots could make me realize if I can help you.

Best regards!

 

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