Control brush flow with shortcut...

[MancDan]

You are able to control opacity, but I cannot seem to control flow? is there anyway to do this bar manually changing the brush dynamics?

[Gabe]

Hi @MancDan,

I'm afraid we do not have a shortcut for Flow. You can map the flow jitter to different "actions", but not to a key. 
Thanks,
Gabe. 

[MancDan]

Thanks for your reply.

What would be the best way of imitating the control of flow in PS? In terms of brush settings? I use a soft brush a lot, so it would be good top set one up that emulates one I have in PS

[MancDan]

If I can save a brush setting I'm happy with, is there also way to make this brush the default brush when I press 'b'?

[Gabe]

58 minutes ago, MancDan said:

I use a soft brush a lot,

Is that controlled by Flow or Hardness? What is it exactly that you want to achieve? 

[SrPx]

Maybe mouse wheel could control flow, if you don't zoom with wheel (for me would be  a big loss) . And probably you can map Wacom Intuos Pro or Xp Pen Deco 03 disc to the mouse wheel for Affinity Photo ( or I guess, any other tablet which disc that can be mapped per every app) 

As gabriel is asking, if what you really meant is not flow, but softness/hardness instead of flow, there's a mouse + keys shortcut built-in for changing both size and hardness in the same mouse + keys gesture (one with horizontal drag, the other vertical drag. I don't remember the keys + mouse combo now). As Is a bit more complex combo shortcut than in PS, I did the test to replace all that just with middle button drag, using X-Mouse Button Control. It worked superbly. But have had deactivated  that ,as, well, that's really not my workflow (if I paint, I always use hard brushes to better simulate actual painting or at least, my style. If I do ink lines, I use always the same hardness, something I just set for the full session at the beginning)

Quote

If I can save a brush setting I'm happy with, is there also way to make this brush the default brush when I press 'b'?

I believe it does remember the last brush you used from your library. You can create a new brush (hamburger hidden menu button at the left of the brush library X closing icon) by hitting "new round brush" (for example) . Then, double click on your new brush in the library to fine tune your brush settings. Set there your wished softness, flow, size, etc. And that's it. It remembers I believe even if restarting the app, the brush you were lastly using, unless it only happens so in my machine....You can create a new brush category (from same hamburger icon) and you could have even one only brush there, if you do things uber simple. Just remember, it seems to remember latest brush selected (not necessarily used, but last which you selected in the brush library), so, if you selected one in a custom category, and go back to the  basic category, you still will have the brush selected from the newly created category, and not the last one you selected in the Basic library. One thing I'd recommend is just create your favorite brushes (or use some of the included, or some fabulous third party ones) and reorder the list so that your 4-5 favs are the first five. Way more handy. Also, if you just do this in the Basic category, seems that's the category it always loads by default at app start in the brush library, so there's that.

If you mean you do not see a way for a brush to retain brush softness, maybe is you are using somehow only the top bar "more" button of the brush. Try instead going this route with the brush library.

I mostly draw/paint outside Affinity and import files into it (that will surely change soon) , so, am no expert in specific brushes usage in Affinity.

[hifred]

2 hours ago, SrPx said:

Maybe mouse wheel could control flow, if you don't zoom with wheel (for me would be  a big loss) . And probably you can map Wacom Intuos Pro or Xp Pen Deco 03 disc to the mouse wheel for Affinity Photo ( or I guess, any other tablet which disc that can be mapped per every app)  

The scheme Photoshop uses to control flow works perfectly and should be very easy to learn by Affinity users: It's the same numerical entry as for brush opacity, but with Shift held down while typing numbers.

[SrPx]

I was actually referring to RMB + LMB +ALT key, in Photo. What it does is dragging those kept held horizontally, it varies size. Dragging vertically with all those holding, it varies smoothness. I don't remember well, but I think PS has that only with dragging RMB + ALT hold pressed, dragging so. When I draw, I'm one of those who still have the hand mechanically dancing between mouse and wacom pen( I don't use the pen for all), I almost don't even notice now, but the mouse operation mostly for some specific tasks where the lizard part f my brain knows am faster, and for navigating (wheel zoom + middle click pan). Mostly I only use the pen for drawing, but while am drawing, the mouse is kindda static navigator.

What I meant in the previous post is that while not planning to use that, I thought in its day that the combo was a bit too complex for those of us handling already too many devices at a time, so I provided that workflow in a thread where they where complaining somehow about that. I did it through that free utility which I like so much, and replaced the full combo with just dragging middle button (MMB). And it worked nicely. Still , as mentioned, is not my workflow to vary smoothness constantly, so, I don't use the trick.

Edit: Sorry, it seems you only referred to my mention of the wheel being mapped to the Wacom disc. Yep, shift +1 or so is comfortable, but some prefer to depend less on the keyboard.

[hifred]

8 hours ago, SrPx said:

Edit: Sorry, it seems you only referred to my mention of the wheel being mapped to the Wacom disc. Yep, shift +1 or so is comfortable, but some prefer to depend less on the keyboard. 

I just wanted to be realistic here. As Affinity has the numbers combo already in place from opacity it should not take them long to create a variation of the same principle for Flow. It was very helpful if someone sat down and hooked this badly missing stuff up.

I am all for elegant, minimalist onscreen controls for the brush, which even do different things, depending on the drag direction. Unfortunately Affinitys current implementation for interactive brush control is so clumsy and conceptually flawed (in particular for pen users) that I find it practically unusable. Adding Flow to what already works badly sure would not help me.

A consistant key mapping that's familiar to PS-converts and logical to Affinity users would be very useful, without causing a lot of work.

[Singapored]

The day that I see Affinity align a keystroke to flow, is the day that I abandon Photoshop. Till then, unfortunately, AP will always be my second fiddle. 

[GZA]

I know that this is an old topic and there is a way to control Flow with keyboard shortcuts now, but is it possible to change the keystroke ?

Now the keystroke to change brush flow in Affinity is "ctrl + numeric key"
In photoshop however is "Shift + numeric key" 

 

I know the difference is negligible and I'm gonna get used to it, but at the moment there are a lot of things to get used to and I'm trying to minimise them as much as possible