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Complicated Swatches palette


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InDesign's swatch method is the preferred method, as described by thomaso. Color swatches behave more like they are objects, and if they are being used in your document they become "linked" to those objects so copying and pasting means they come along for the ride. It's simply the quickest, least confusing and most professional way.

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I did not know about this function in indesign, sound interesting! And you use indesign to create the maps as well? It sounds more like a job for illustrator or Designer?

Actually I could imagine creating the maps in Designer, each as a separate artboard. You would have all the swatches in one place, and could use symbols which would also be convenient for maps I imagine. Assets can also be embedded with a document, so even if you would open it on a different machine, they would still be there (I am not sure if symbols do the same, as I don't normally use them) 

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6 minutes ago, Jeremy Bohn said:

InDesign's swatch method is the preferred method, as described by thomaso. Color swatches behave more like they are objects, and if they are being used in your document they become "linked" to those objects so copying and pasting means they come along for the ride. It's simply the quickest, least confusing and most professional way.

In some cases I agree, and Publishers method is more complex for sure. However I like the distinction between global swatches and regular ones, and both have their specific strengths. Indesigns swatches are always global colors, which might not always be the best option. In Publisher, objects can have their color changed without them becoming a swatch, this is not possible in Indesign. Were Publisher to have this swatch management, I guess it would cause problems opening the file with the other Affinity apps?

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9 minutes ago, postmadesign said:

Were Publisher to have this swatch management, I guess it would cause problems opening the file with the other Affinity apps?

That is one issue that would come up, yes.

 

28 minutes ago, thomaso said:

Because I would not have to toggle around with different kinds of palettes

If you don't need the other types then don't use them.  There is no rule saying that you must use every feature of the program on every project.

 

I do agree that it would be nice to be able to directly copy swatches from one document to another (copy+paste).

 

As to copying a layer from one document to another and having an associated global swatch follow it, while I like the idea in general, I can foresee a possible complication here in defining the behavior of this feature.

If you have the same global color assigned to multiple objects in document A and you separately copy several of those objects from document A to document B, do they become as many copies of that global color in document B?  How would Publisher know to match it up so that they were still sharing the same one in document B?

Also, if both documents had a global color named "cool color" and they were two different colors, would you wind up with two global colors named "cool color", would the "cool color" in document B get replaced by the color from document A, or would the layer being pasted into document B be conformed to the color already assigned to "cool color" in document B?

Those are all potentially valid behaviors and each of them could be advantageous over the other in different situations...  it might be nice to come up with a reasonable way to incorporate more than one of them somehow without cluttering or over-complicating the interface.  A preference might actually be sufficient...

[X] When pasting layers with global colors from another document, copy the global color also
      If there is an existing global color with the same name in the destination document:
        (*) Conform the pasted layer to the existing color in the destination document
        ( ) Use the existing swatch if the color matches exactly, otherwise create a new swatch with a duplicate name
        ( ) Create a new swatch regardless, giving it a unique name
        ( ) Update the existing global color to use the color from the source document

 

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16 hours ago, thomaso said:

If I copy an object with a document-swatch assigned and paste it into another .afpub, then its swatch is missing.

This! In other apps like InDesign I often copy an element with a defined (corporate) color into an empty document just to obtain the color. Quick and dirty, sure, but works as expected.

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47 minutes ago, fde101 said:

Also, if both documents had a global color named "cool color" and they were two different colors, would you wind up with two global colors named "cool color", would the "cool color" in document B get replaced by the color from document A, or would the layer being pasted into document B be conformed to the color already assigned to "cool color" in document B?

Scenario 1: It could simply be named “cool color 2“, even if it’s identical.

Scenario 2: The user gets prompted what to do with those two competing swatches – a) replace the old one or b) keep both. Just like the macOS Finder works with two identically named files.

If you go with scenario 1 or 2b and now have swatches 1 and 2, you could still decide at any time to delete one of the two swatches, in which case Publisher/Designer/Photo would ask you with which swatch (or none) you want it to be replaced.

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21 minutes ago, Matthias said:

This! In other apps like InDesign I often copy an element with a defined (corporate) color into an empty document just to obtain the color. Quick and dirty, sure, but works as expected.

This is because objects don't neccesarily have a color attribute which is a swatch. You can go to the color picker and change an object to any color you want, but this would not create a swatch or alter a swatch. This is different from indesign, where the color of an object can only be done by picking, creating or altering a swatch. A color in a document would always have an associated swatch. Perhaps this could be a preference, but as @fde101 described, this could have unforeseen consequences, in a case where a swatch with the same name already exists.

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15 minutes ago, Matthias said:

If you go with scenario 1 or 2b and now have swatches 1 and 2, you could still decide at any time to delete one of the two swatches, in which case Publisher/Designer/Photo would ask you with which swatch (or none) you want it to be replaced.

replacing swatches with other swatches would be a very useful feature, and I have requested this before. Deleting a global color should always bring up a dialog to ask me to replace the color of the affected objects IMO.

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11 minutes ago, postmadesign said:

This is because objects don't neccesarily have a color attribute which is a swatch. You can go to the color picker and change an object to any color you want, but this would not create a swatch or alter a swatch.

Right.

But once a global color swatch has been assigned to an object, this attribute should travel with the object. I don’t see the possible consequences here (as they are unforeseen, of course :)). Because once the global color is an attribute and a possible conflict with a second document emerges, macOS Finder behavior as described above could kick in and ask the user what to do.

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40 minutes ago, Matthias said:

I often copy an element with a defined (corporate) color into an empty document just to obtain the color. Quick and dirty, sure, but works as expected.

Dirty? – I know that term as opposite of clean or failure-free. – At least concerning pixel waste, in times of climate ;), it appears more dirty to export/import a palette first. And even after doing so, a copied object would not have the imported swatch assigned.
 

15 minutes ago, postmadesign said:

 as @fde100 described, this could have unforeseen consequences, in a case where a swatch with the same name already exists. 

So what? – Then this could get a solution, too. (as @Matthias described already)

macOS 10.14.6 | MacBookPro Retina 15" | Eizo 27" | Affinity V1

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2 hours ago, postmadesign said:

This is different from indesign, where the color of an object can only be done by picking, creating or altering a swatch. A color in a document would always have an associated swatch. Perhaps this could be a preference, but as @fde101 described, this could have unforeseen consequences, in a case where a swatch with the same name already exists.

This isn't true. It's possible with InDesign to assign a color using the Color palette, and not have it as a swatch. Of course when you copy and paste the item into another document, no swatch will be in the new file either.

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2 hours ago, postmadesign said:

replacing swatches with other swatches would be a very useful feature, and I have requested this before. Deleting a global color should always bring up a dialog to ask me to replace the color of the affected objects IMO.

THIS exactly!

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