Why don't you develop the product?

[Ben]

ok. I think this thread has gone far enough.

 

@Jowday - as has been pointed out, the OP is not particularly constructive and suggests that no work has been done, at all, in the past years.  That is absolutely not the case, and the evidence is clearly documented on this forum.  Numerous items from our road map have been completed since our initial release - these have also been balanced with ever changing industry expectations. The OP alludes to basic features being missing, but does not state what these basic features are.  Without such information, it is nothing more than a rant, and gives us no insight into what this particular user expects.  That is helpful to no one other than the person letting off steam.

 

I'd also add that what many people view as "basic features" are often those that didn't appear in other software for many, many years, or are actually quite niche, or very often are not actually that "basic" - certainly not in terms of their implementation.  It takes considerable time to implement any tool from point of view of performance, precision and usability.  Our decision not to put out half-baked solutions is one we stand by.  There is plenty of evidence in other software where features have been rushed out and bad choices have become entrenched.  It's easy to make blanket statements about how we are not meeting your expectations when you don't have the complete overview of what we currently have and where it has to go in the future.  We also have many customers who are very happy with the direction we have chosen.

 

As has been stated - you are ready to compare our performance to other development teams that are ten or even fifty times the size, and with software that costs more than ten times as much.  While the comparison is flattering, I'd ask you to consider how your expectations of parity with those you are comparing us to can possibly be realistic.

[CLC]

31 minutes ago, Ben said:

ok. I think this thread has gone far enough.

 

@Jowday - as has been pointed out, the OP is not particularly constructive and suggests that no work has been done, at all, in the past years.  That is absolutely not the case, and the evidence is clearly documented on this forum.  Numerous items from our road map have been completed since our initial release - these have also been balanced with ever changing industry expectations. The OP alludes to basic features being missing, but does not state what these basic features are.  Without such information, it is nothing more than a rant, and gives us no insight into what this particular user expects.  That is helpful to no one other than the person letting off steam.

 

I believe you misunderstand what OP says. He states that no basic features (ie Select by Attribute - first requested in 2014 , Offset Path, Mesh Warp Tool in case of Designer) are still missing.

It's nice that beta development goes well and the betas are updated frequently, but the production (stable) versions weren't been updated in ages. Some people don't have time nor energy to use betas in production (they bought the product to produce stuff, not to join a public beta test) and those are obviously unsatisfied since features mentioned above are really basic features that every professional design tool has. Even some free ones. All they get is workaround tips (time consuming for someone in production) or are informed that such basic features aren't on the roadmap.

Don't get me wrong, i'm not a hater. I bought Mac versions of AP+AD first in 2014 and lately PC versions as well and am still hoping team will focus more on polishing the products and add such basic features that many need daily, instead of constantly adding new flashy features that people use once a year (and that's my feeling so far). But hope is all I have.

To me it seems that Serif focuses more on new sales than old customerss but I might be wrong, I don't see what's going on in their offices actually.

Take care.

[Ben]

Obviously, we have to consider new customers.  We don't have a subscription model, so if we don't get new sales - existing customers don't get updates either.  There is far too much overlooking of "basic" features that we have added.  It's so easy to spot the few things we haven't yet done, and ignore the many things we have.

 

We have refined many tools in 1.7.  There are a lot fo internal changes - many that average users will miss, but professionals and experienced Affinity users will spot.

 

There is a balance that we need to strike.  Refining existing tools, adding people's wish list for replicating tools from other apps, and most importantly innovating and moving software forward.  As @JET_Affinity says - what's the point in us just cloning your other favourite software??  You probably already own/use that anyway.  And, as I've said many times in the past, if all you want form Affinity is a cheap clone version of Photoshop or Illustrator, you are going to be disappointed.

[CLC]

34 minutes ago, Ben said:

Obviously, we have to consider new customers.  We don't have a subscription model, so if we don't get new sales - existing customers don't get updates either.  There is far too much overlooking of "basic" features that we have added.  It's so easy to spot the few things we haven't yet done, and ignore the many things we have. 

Got that.

34 minutes ago, Ben said:

We have refined many tools in 1.7.  There are a lot fo internal changes - many that average users will miss, but professionals and experienced Affinity users will spot. 

Indeed.

34 minutes ago, Ben said:

There is a balance that we need to strike.  Refining existing tools, adding people's wish list for replicating tools from other apps, and most importantly innovating and moving software forward.  As @JET_Affinity says - what's the point in us just cloning your other favourite software??  You probably already own/use that anyway.  And, as I've said many times in the past, if all you want form Affinity is a cheap clone version of Photoshop or Illustrator, you are going to be disappointed.

Yeah, ballance. Well, from my POV I would like to have and use a professional graphic design software and after 5 years of waiting it's clear I'm not going to get it here since as you said, more focus is put to attracting new customers and not satisfying current ones.

Shame, since the happy current customers are the best ad. Word of mouth is and always was the best advertisement.

Edit: Thank you, @Ben, and all the devs working for Serif for awesome and almost incredible job they do. The software is quite good considering its price. If mentioned basic features happen to be part of the 2.0 update, I will happily pay £250 per a product without blinking an eye. If they're missing, I'll pass though.

[Alfred]

9 minutes ago, Ben said:

It's so easy to spot the few things we haven't yet done, and ignore the many things we have.

A large part of the problem, as discussed elsewhere, is that newly implemented features are taken off the published roadmap (assuming they were ever on there in the first place). If you were to leave them on the list but mark them as implemented, it would be clear to everyone just how much has been added to the apps over the past few years.

[chakko007]

On 5/8/2019 at 1:15 PM, B13eL said:

You haven’t had updates for a long time, but before that you did the update twice a year.

The last "official" update for APhoto was pretty much half a year ago... apart from, as has been mentioned, the beta updates. 

[chakko007]

On 5/8/2019 at 1:15 PM, B13eL said:

The community in forum offers so many cool ideas to you. And you have not done useful tools for a long time.

TBH, the least "cool ideas" come from communities, but from people who know the market, and who know what the professionals want.

The "community" in most cases has no idea about that.

[Ben]

23 minutes ago, CLC said:

Yeah, ballance. Well, from my POV I would like to have and use a professional graphic design software and after 5 years of waiting it's clear I'm not going to get it here since as you said, more focus is put to attracting new customers and not satisfying current ones.

That is precisely NOT what I was saying. That's what "balance" means.  We realise that both old and new customers want the same things.  So, features that existing customers want will also appeal to new customers.  You need to understand that it is those new customers that are essentially funding the continued development that you expect.

While filling out the road map, we also need to keep a firm eye on the changing world, and look to add features that will set us apart.  If we stop innovating, we will stop attracting new customers, and the development of the features you want will also stop.

[CLC]

Just now, Ben said:

That is precisely NOT what I was saying. That's what "balance" means.  We realise that both old and new customers want the same things.  So, features that existing customers want will also appeal to new customers.  You need to understand that it is those new customers that are essentially funding the continued development that you expect.

My apologies for misunderstanding and misquoting you. You are right.

[Mithferion]

1 hour ago, CLC said:

I believe you misunderstand what OP says. He states that no basic features (ie Select by Attribute - first requested in 2014 , Offset Path, Mesh Warp Tool in case of Designer) are still missing.

I think some of the most requested features are not basic, but common. The difference?

• Well, without the Move Tool you could do almost nothing in Designer.
• Without the Shape Builder Tool you have to spend time to do some things. Commonly used, but not really a basic thing to do. More like "intermediate", in my opinion.

Also, how many of these commonly requested features are "basic"? Note that I pasted a colorful note to the right about the status I know about it.

Designer

• Bleed area guides [Already in Beta 1.7]
• Mesh Fill tool [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Mesh Warp/Distort tool [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Knife tool [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Calligraphic line styles [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Arrowhead line styles [Already in Beta 1.7]
• Export slices with previews [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Pages (like the ones in Fireworks) [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle. But not quite sure if they will work the same way]
• Multiple Effects/Fills/Strokes per shape [Already in Beta 1.7. Not available for text until later]
• Replicate/Blend [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Convert Bitmaps to vectors (Auto traicing) [Promised for the future. Possibly in the 2.x cycle]
• Select same Color/Fill/Attribute [Promised for the future]
• Blob tool
• Spiral tool
• Width tool
• Paint Bucket tool
• Vector Eraser tool
• Vector Crop tool to do actual vector cropping
• Shape Builder tool [Promised for the future]
• Scripting/Extensibility [Promised for the future. Possibly by the end of this year]
• Text Hinting support
• Prototyping capabilities [Promised for the future. Possibly in the 2.x cycle]
• Vector patterns
• Fixing the convert to curves problems at small sizes [Promised for the future]
• Fixing problems with Boolean operations [Promised for the future]
• Saving custom workspaces
• DXF/DWG Import/Export
• ICO Export
• BMP Export
• WMF Export in Mac
• TGA with alpha Channel Export
• CDR Import/Export
• PSD Export with editable text [Something that the Dev Team wants for the future]
• "Layered" PNG (from Fireworks) Import
• AI Import/Export
• Right-To-Left languages support

That's a lot to cover, and not all of them are needed by all the customers, current and future.

Best regards!

[CLC]

1 minute ago, Mithferion said:

I think some of the most requested features are not basic, but common. The difference?

• Well, without the Move Tool you could do almost nothing in Designer.
• Without the Shape Builder Tool you have to spend time to do some things. 

Also, how many of these commonly requested features are "basic"? Note that I pasted a colorful note to the right about the status I know about it. 

Designer

• Bleed area guides [Already in Beta 1.7]
• Mesh Fill tool [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Mesh Warp/Distort tool [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Knife tool [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Calligraphic line styles [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Arrowhead line style [Already in Beta 1.7]
• Export slices with previews [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Pages (like the ones in Fireworks) [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle. But not quite sure if they will work the same way]
• Multiple Effects/Fills/Strokes per shape [Already in Beta 1.7. Not available for text until later]
• Replicate/Blend [In Roadmap for the 1.x cycle]
• Convert Bitmaps to vectors (Auto traicing) [Promised for the future. Possibly in the 2.x cycle]
• Select same Color/Fill/Attribute [Promised for the future]
• Blob tool
• Spiral tool
• Width tool
• Paint Bucket tool
• Vector Eraser tool
• Vector Crop tool to do actual vector cropping
• Shape Builder tool [Promised for the future]
• Scripting/Extensibility [Promised for the future. Possibly by the end of this year]
• Text Hinting support
• Prototyping capabilities [Promised for the future. Possibly in the 2.x cycle]
• Vector patterns
• Fixing the convert to curves problems at small sizes [Promised for the future]
• Fixing problems with Boolean operations [Promised for the future]
• Saving custom workspaces
• DXF/DWG Import/Export
• ICO Export
• BMP Export
• WMF Export in Mac
• TGA with alpha Channel Export
• CDR Import/Export
• PSD Export with editable text [Something that the Dev Team wants for the future]
• "Layered" PNG files from Fireworks
• AI Import/Export
• Right-To-Left languages support

That's a lot to cover, and not all of them are needed by all the customers, current and future. 

Best regards!

Well, except for a few I scratched out, I believe all those on the roadmap are basic and many of them even essential for a professional vector graphic app.

Have a nice day

[Mithferion]

2 minutes ago, CLC said:

Well, except for a few I scratched out, I believe all those on the roadmap are basic and many of them even essential for a professional vector graphic app.

Have a nice day

It depends on what you do. For Identity Design, for example, the current features are more than capable.

Even more, with Designer you have the essential tools to do almost all of the works shown in this little guy here:

Best regards!

[CLC]

6 minutes ago, Mithferion said:

It depends on what you do. For Identity Design, for example, the current features are more than capable.

Even more, with Designer you have the essential tools to do almost all of the works shown in this little guy here:

Best regards!

All tools to achieve such results I can get for free with Inkscape, and much, much more @Mithferion.

Not good enough for a professional paid product, don't you think?

Swiss-design style logo creation is quite a niche, despite looking fancy and very cool these days, if I was doing just that, I might be happy, indeed (would still miss select by color/stroke width and mesh warping and offset path features for this anyway).

Take care.

[Mithferion]

11 minutes ago, CLC said:

Not good enough for a professional paid product, don't you think?

And that's the reason why the Developers work right now as we write. Of course Designer can be much more, but downplaying it doesn't sound right to me.

 

11 minutes ago, CLC said:

Swiss-design style logo creation is quite a niche, despite looking fancy and very cool these days, if I was doing just that, I might be happy, indeed (would still miss select by color/stroke width and mesh warping for this anyway).

And there are other niches that are already covered by Designer. That's why many people have left other products behind (or they coexist in their workflows).

I, again, insist that "Basic" is something that's needed by all (Move Tool), and "Common" is something that's needed by many (Shape builder Tool). And at the level of complexity of the task, Moving and object is "Basic", and making operations in a fast way, is "Intermediate".

I wish your specific niche needs are covered sooner than later, by the commonly used tools that are still missing.

You too take care.

Best regards!

[Mithferion]

By the way, I'd be happy with these ones:

• Bleed area guides
• Mesh Warp/Distort tool
• Replicate/Blend
• Blob tool
• Width tool
• Shape Builder tool
• Text Hinting support
• Fixing the convert to curves problems at small sizes
• Fixing problems with Boolean operations
• PSD Export with editable text

But still, it works for me.

Best regards!

[JET_Affinity]

Quote

I will happily pay £250 per a product without blinking an eye.

I won't. And I doubt that Serif is offended by my saying that, because...

Serif is changing the 2D graphics game in many ways, a large part of which is cost and value. That in itself is a long overdue aspect of innovation in this software segment.

I've long held that the historic "big four" of the 2D vector graphics world (Illustrator, CorelDRAW, Canvas, FreeHand) are grossly overpriced for what they are. Their vendors desperately cling to an outdated pricing model that stems from the heady days when it was all a major paradigm shift. But that was almost four decades ago. I see Adobe's take-it-or-leave-it subscription licensing scheme as a manifestation of that desperation.

Many product categories enjoy "they'll pay anything" pricing when new technology disrupts whole industries. But fervor settles as the new way become the new standard. I remember paying $650 for the first HP color inkjet DeskWriter. That's CMY. No K.

Competition is what gets prices back in line, and 2D graphics, much as we love it, is not rocket science anymore. Goliaths do fall when they can't conform to the times. Serif seems to know what it's doing in more than just coding very promising software.

JET

[predick]

I understand that you are small team, and have many tasks to do.

In my opinion, I think that fixing bugs have to be more top priority than new features. The Expand Stroke bug is the one weird thing since the app has been launched and make the product so unprofessional.

By the way the new added features are awesome.

Cheers.

[SrPx]

On 5/15/2019 at 1:37 PM, CLC said:

Not good enough for a professional paid product, don't you think?

Well, a "paid product" can be a lot of things. An android app that costs me 22 cents of an euro is a paid product, if I purchased it. Now, wouldn't be expectations at least slightly matching what one paid for ? Not to bring the usual saying of "you got what you paid for" (but...), as here there are other factors, like, the clear desire of the company and team to  provide  advanced (it is. Is quite more advanced than Photoshop Elements, and that one is more expensive. 2x last time I checked)  software despite the super low cost. But hey, at the moment of complaining, I think the price should be indeed a factor.If I purchase a Fiat Panda you wont hear me complaining for it not being a Ferrari. Yes, "some" of the desired ones (I do not agree with all being basic), might be basic (as mentioned, never basic to implement,also, here's all about common engine for several platforms, keeping the format compatible among apps, etc), but it is implicit  in the actual price not covering (or not expecting them immediately) all possible "basic" features. As that fact (covering everything) is indeed what defines a very high end product, when the range to cover is super wide. And it is super wide because you people are all comparing it to your experience of the 30 years Adobe  products, full of peaks and valleys (nobody remembers now the valleys) that had a ton of time for adding all that with a lot of trial and error, and constant customers anger, I remember all that very well, and I wasn't one of the angry ones.

Any low cost app of almost every field offers you a limited product, in one way or the other. You can check this in every Walmart (for all I know, as am Europe based). It is of course their choice what number of basic and advanced features would it cover, but wont be, or at least, not in the first years of it, as extensive in number of features as what is provided by a 132'65 billions net worth (and 2018's revenue of 9'03 billion, net income of 3.62 billion. Yep their apps are good, but trust me, they should be WAY better -without ie, being resource hogs, very clear case of A. Effects and PS-  with that kind of money! But is better to bitch around the underdog with no money (also because actually cares about answering constant complains) that is doing great for what they have...) , and all those income lines of the giant climbing crazy.  I don't know if people realize that Affinity is getting us a large percentage of that range of features in much shorter times that took the giant to develop. (also, providing iPad versions, full apps, not some toy, like the giant have been making until feeling slightly threatened, recently, guess by whom...).

The comparison in power is just ...I don't know, absolutely ridiculous. And yet in quite advanced use (quite more than the average user around here, for all what I have been able to check and realize during years), I still prefer them to Adobe's. So... being a paid tool (the quantity is absolutely key) is not a guarantee to get a top of the line high end product. Just think how far do 50 bucks get you in about anything.... in life. That is, in our selfish first world. As in second and third world countries, this is yet a ton of money, but something a big percentage of those individuals can FINALLY afford, even if needing several months of savings. A lot of people do not see the huge social value in a pro app at this price. And no, is not like open source is the only answer to that. Is ONE of the answers, but it often can't compete with a team of paid professionals. The most successful apps in FOSS actually have some sort of income. You NEED to pay the programmers,  machines, etc. So, a low price of one time purchase that neither forces you to have a permanent connection is outstandingly good.  Just that here 50 bucks do provide a lot more than what you get putting that kind of money in anything else (almost). This is why IMO we're actually stealing Serif (by its own will). You get many extras while you shouldn't, just due to how Serif has always dealt with things (in their past legacy, how they always gave older versions with magazines, complete versions),etc. And for that I'm definitely thankful. A tool like Photo that costs less than a bunch of painting tools , that can only actually paint, just to make an example, you get a lot for mere 50 bucks... I mean, I believe we're not being very realistic, here. All that said, I also hope many of those features get included. I just realize what can be the only realistic pace. Meanwhile I'll deal with alternatives in stuff not reached yet by Affinity. (am using the customer betas, so, that number of things is getting tiny....  )

[JGD]

I will just link to this, in a slightly bigger font but not so big that it will get me banned/reprimanded for my insistence:

Universal layers.

There are various different ways of achieving this, in increasing degrees of complexity and interdependency between the various components of the suite, and achieving the most complex ones would be awesome, but extremely hard and unlikely in v.1.x, sure. But failure to even put it in the roadmap and addressing it, right now (v.1.7.x) in the… safest and simplest way possible will inevitably result in me not recommending Affinity Designer to maybe hundreds of people until it finally is.

That is a basic and common feature that trumps many others already crossed-out on the list. The document/layer/artboard model is the very heart of the application, really, and it is oh-so-broken, weird, unintuitive and inflexible at the moment. It works for basic projects only (and yes, before you bring up all the cool demonstration artwork from reputable artists, from a production standpoint even the most complex of illustrations is, well, basic, whereas an apparently basic map or diagram is insanely complicated), and only a checkbox and a few lines of code separate it from being a veritable powerhouse for all things vector.

@Ben, you mentioned current vs. new users, and I completely get it. However, when developing for some current users, especially teachers, you're also developing for many other future, potential users. We know in advance what kind of projects they will be faced with, so we can most certainly predict the issues that will arise in mostly any app our students use, and we will adjust our software requirements to our curricula and definitely not the other way around, as you may understand. We're talking volume licensing and entire classes buying this thing during their attendance or right after graduation, here. And the next window of opportunity may close this summer/around September. Please bear that in mind, guys. Take care!

[JGD]

Bonus: if you want to take type designers into the fold as well (a niche of a niche of a niche, I know, but one can dream), try and test direct copy/paste PostScript compatibility with Glyphs.app (I can put you in direct contact with Rainer Scheichelbauer, one of the Glyphs devs, if you want), FontLab VI (I don't have Adam Twardoch's contact but I know someone who probably has) and RoboFont (same). It's not a basic thing, but there's something wrong/non-standard with your vector specification.

Maybe Adobe didn't document its spec well enough and you had to reverse-engineer it, or something, and maybe it's too late to fix it, but if you ever do so, extra kudos for that.

Well, what do you know, I may have spoken too soon. I did some quick tests and it seems to be fixed already, so maybe I'll be able to recommend you to my type design students after all. It's a really small market but, production-wise, type design is so basic that you don't need to work in the Artboard model and can just use a gigantic one-artboard document and be done with it. It basically consists of setting up a grid and some parameters, drawing curves and copying and pasting. Cool.

But now you'll have to deal with my nit-picking regarding all things node-, curve- and grid-related. I may even ditch Ai for my personal modular type design-related needs sooner than I thought (Ai's node selection is getting worse and worse by the day, so when it comes to type design any current shortcomings in AD will probably still be offset by those, ha). And it's just too bad that our classes are a wee bit small (5-7 people at most for workshops, and 15 at most for MA classes)… and also students usually have to purchase Glyphs.app anyway if they want to carry on working in the field afterwards, as their licenses are always time-restricted. Oh well.

As for the others, September is still the timeframe, yes.

[Petar Petrenko]

On 5/11/2019 at 3:01 PM, Jowday said:

Just look at their replies.

Having a bad day? It's raining outside and you feel sad? Having a migraine attack?

Maybe it's better keep "Waiting for Godot" instead for something new happen to you.

[Petar Petrenko]

On 5/14/2019 at 12:06 AM, Jowday said:

We'll I am a paying customer just like other "complainers".

Why complaining? You had a trial period to try the program. Why you bought it if you didn't like it at all? You had to search through the forums at first, to see the frequency of new versions and then make your decision.

[Petar Petrenko]

I think the only problem here is that Affinity didn't included in their roadmaps they will work on iPad versions of their software and on Publisher before they are going to finish the 1.x cycle. Once they do that, new versions will come faster.