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Scale tool


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I was hoping for a dedicated scale tool in this version, like Illustrator I guess. I use the scale tool to symmetrically scale node handles or to scale a selection of nodes or curves with a custom center, click center and drag to scale. I don’t see that functionality here. I bought Photo and Designer hoping to replace Adobe’s apps but until these basic functions are in place it’s not possible. I know there is an ambition to reinvent everything but sometimes you just have to give people what they are used to. A dedicated scale tool would not have to replace the bounding box drag-to-scale feature but would be a supplement.

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4 hours ago, Claus said:

I was hoping for a dedicated scale tool in this version,

+ 1

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It would probably be more useful to add some of these scaling methods as improvements to the current move and node tools as optional settings or modifiers. 

Illustrator has become bloated and a sheer pain to use lately pretty much due to the huge amount of redundant tools.

The perfect example is plotting, moving and editing nodes...

Illustrator has these tools:
   Selection Tool
   Direct Selection Tool
   Pen Tool
   Add Anchor Tool
   Delete Anchor Tool
   Anchor Point Convert Tool
   Curvature Tool
   Line Segment Tool

Affinity has:
   Move Tool
   Node Tool
   Pen Tool


The 3 tools in Affinty can accomplish everything the 9 Illustrator tools above can AND do more AND do it faster and more efficiently.

There's no need for the the add and delete anchor point tools. Node tool click on a line to add a node, delete key to remove it. Simple.
There's no need for an anchor point converter tool, click the node and click the type of curve on the properties bar. Simple.
There's no need for a line tool. Hold shift to constrain and plot 2 points with the pen tool to make a line. SIMPLE!
There's no need for a curvature tool. Grab a segment with the node tool and bend it to shape. SIMPLE!
The white arrow is so half baked that it can't decide if it's a node tool or a move tool, and it doesn't do either job well. 

Illustrator's toolset is looking like a kitchen full of single use cooking items from blue-screen-1-800-commercials on daytime tv... like bread makers, egg steamers, banana slicers, pizza scissors, electric spaghetti twirling spoons, hot dog and bun toasters, quesadilla irons, corn de-kernelers, avocado slicers and all of the other redundant clutter tools with one single use that could ALL be replaced by a really nice set of cutlery, pans and an oven. 

I'm sorry this set me off on a tangent, haha.

Affinity is awesome because it's as simple as it is powerful.
They make their limited toolset as robust as possible and cut out the bloat.

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ok, so playing with Illustrator... from what I can tell the scale tool has a few nice toys:

  • There is an option to scale the stroke while scaling the object.  This could be added as an option on the context toolbar of the existing move tool.
  • If you double-click the tool in the toolbar, you can type in a size to scale the object(s) by.  This can be done in Affinity Designer by entering % values (ex. "150%") in the Transform studio panel; the chain icon to the right of the W/H boxes determines whether it scales uniformly or independently.
  • There is a method of setting a custom anchor point at an arbitrary location and scaling selected object(s) relative to the anchor point.  Affinity Designer uses the rotation center for this - turn on "Show Rotation Center" on the context toolbar with the move tool selected and the rotation center shows up at the center of the selected object; you can then scale against that rotation center by holding down the command key while dragging a handle.  The rotation center also works for scaling using % values in the transform panel.

 

What besides the ability to scale the stroke does the scale tool in Illustrator do that I am missing out on how to do with the move tool in Designer?

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With the "Transform Mode" of the node tool in 1.7, as demonstrated by @TonyO above, it looks like you can do everything you asked for except to set a custom center to scale from - that can be done for shapes/objects as a whole using the move tool, but not for node selections.  It looks like that is what I missed.

There does not appear to be an option to set the rotation center when using the node tool; I think that is what is missing.

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Sorry for the triple-post here, but things just keep coming to me...

 

It would also be great if the move tool had an option to transform selected objects individually instead of as a group.  For example, with that option on, if I scaled an object around its center, then each individual object would stay where it was (center stays in place) but would be similarly resized around its own individual center.  If I rotate one of the objects around its center, the others would correspondingly rotate around their centers, instead of the whole group of objects rotating around the center of the group and thus moving out of place.

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You're not scaling the nodes, but the control points.  I had to watch that a few times to finally figure out what was happening.

Using the node tool you can command+shift+drag on a control point to get a similar effect (with the transform mode turned off) but it only seems to have an effect on that one node, so you would need to do it separately for each one right now.

It would probably be better if all selected nodes were to be effected while doing that, at which point I believe it would do the same as what you are showing here.

 

EDIT: there is also an option on the context toolbar to "snap all selected nodes while dragging" - so to match up what you are doing between two nodes you can enable that option then after adjusting the control points for the first node, with both selected, the control points for the second one will snap to a matching position.  I guess that is better than nothing, but I do think there should be an option to cause the control points of all selected nodes to move together like what you are showing in that video.

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Hi fde101,

I appreciate all the input and suggestions. However I blame this on the general idea that we must dismiss all conventions and reinvent everything to prevent bloat. The first two things I tried when testing the app was to join curves like Illustrator (average and join) and scale control points (like on the video). In Designer it takes more steps to achieve. When you do this kind of vector work for 25 years it’s like playing the piano or driving a car. And it’s a bit like, well, for the sake of keeping our car simple you can only take left turns. And for sure, you can get anywhere you want to go even if you can only turn left, but you have to make a lot more turns and drive a lot more road.

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  • 4 months later...

I'd really like to have a scale tool in affinity designer. Sometimes I work with maps, and it happens I need to define 2 different forms that share 1 border. These items often have different scale, and to allow borders to perfectly match, the scale tool in illustrator is perfect:

1) I match 1 point of the 2 shapes;

2) I select the scale tool;

3) I center scale in the matching point;

4) I grab a 2nd point in 1 of the 2 shapes, and I drag it to match the same point of the other shapes.

2 minutes job, easy in illustrator, impossibile in affinity designer. I'd really like it.

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Have you trie the new Point Transform Tool in 1.7???

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Ben, as I pointed out in this thread the point transform tool is basically broken. It will not work on selections that don’t have two dimensions, like two points on a curve that are aligned vertically or horizontally, the handles don’t show up.

Claus

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I was referring to the Point transform tool, it's flawed. While it may work on some point configurations it's useless if the points you work on are aligned. Thevru asked for a proper transform tool and I simply try to examplify why it's needed.

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@Ben, if I understand correctly what @Claus is trying to do (based on his video), I think the piece that is still missing is an option to cause corresponding control handles of all selected nodes to be adjusted in sync when you are manipulating them on one of the selected nodes.  I can mimic what he is doing if I control+shift+drag the control handles, but it is only having an effect on one node at a time instead of on all of them.

 

 
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While advocating for a more general and versatile transform tool I'm going to throw in the idea of implementing this kind of gizmo in the attached video. This is kind of standard in 3d applications. You have move, scale and rotate handles coming out from the origin and you can position the origin and enter exact values for the transformations if needed. The screencast is made using SharkCad but you get the same in Rhino or Fusion 360.

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On 4/21/2019 at 5:42 AM, Claus said:

You have move, scale and rotate handles coming out from the origin and you can position the origin

Not sure what this would cause us to gain.  I'm familiar with the type of "gizmo" you are referring to, and it makes a lot of sense in 3D space, but consider:

  • We don't need handles to move things now (we can just drag the object).
  • We already have handles to scale and rotate.
  • Simply enabling the option to show the object center allows us to move the center point (for the entire layer at present - it was indicated somewhere that they are planning on adding this for selected nodes at some point in the future).
  • We can already transform numerically using the transform panel.
  • We can move just past the existing side scaling handles to shear, which means we already have MORE functionality readily available than what these tools tend to offer in other applications.

 

I don't have any particular objections to having an *option* to present such an interface, but the only situation I can come up with that might give it a meaningful use case for the current Affinity products (no 3D support) is if there is a layer whose handles are scrolled out of the window but which you can still see in the window and wish to manipulate; in that case, it could allow you to transform the object graphically without needing to zoom out first.

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The only feature missing is setting a custom rotation center for node based operations.

I assume this will come in a future update.

Other than that, everything you ask for is already easily implemented with the current familiar interface.

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1 minute ago, Aammppaa said:

The only feature missing is setting a custom rotation center for node based operations.

 

That, plus this:

On 4/20/2019 at 11:09 AM, fde101 said:

I think the piece that is still missing is an option to cause corresponding control handles of all selected nodes to be adjusted in sync when you are manipulating them on one of the selected nodes.

 

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