Layer shape selection not working with 1.7.0

[Dan.ko]

Hi guys,

yesterday I've updated to the latest version and now all of a sudden I'm not able to select what's in the layer. With the older versions I was able to hold Ctrl + click on the layer icon and it would select the shape of what's in the layer (no matter pixel or vector shape). After that I can do whatever I want to do with that selection, cut it from another layer, etc.

Is there something I'm missing? There is no way to make this selection now and I've tried whatever came to my mind. Still nothing.

I'll appreciate any help

[MEB]

Hi Dan.ko,
Welcome to Affinity Forums.
Does it still happen if you restart the app? If so press and hold ctrl while launching the application until a Clear User Data dialog appears. Keep the first three checkboxes ticked (only) and press Clear. This should fix the issue. Let us know if you still have problems after this procedure.

[Dan.ko]

10 minutes ago, MEB said:

Hi Dan.ko,
Welcome to Affinity Forums.
Does it still happen if you restart the app? If so press and hold ctrl while launching the application until a Clear User Data dialog appears. Keep the first three checkboxes ticked (only) and press Clear. This should fix the issue. Let us know if you still have problems after this procedure.

Hi @MEB,

and thank you for your fast reply! Unfortunately still no luck. The only way I'm able to select everything is by top menu Select > Invert Pixel Selection. This way I can see the selection moving lines. Ctrl + D deselects and works normally, but I'm not able to select anything. When using Ctrl + click on the layer icon it only selects the layer and on the second click in deselects the layer, but this is only in the layers panel. No selection in the canvas area, no flashing/ moving selection lines showing.

[MEB]

Hi Dan.ko,
Sorry I misunderstood your first post - that procedure/reset has nothing to do with this. Regarding your issue you have to press cmd (not ctrl) while you click the layer's thumbnail in the Layers panel to select the content of a layer (to get the marching ants around the layer's content).

[Dan.ko]

2 minutes ago, MEB said:

Sorry I misunderstand you. You have to press cmd (not ctrl) while you click the layer's thumbnail in the Layers panel to select the content of a layer.

@MEB, I'm working under Windows and my keyboard does not have CMD button. Basically yesterday the Ctrl + click was working for selection, but today with the new version it's not. I don't know what to try more

[carl123]

I assume you are using Designer

If you switch to the pixel persona can you then CTRL+CLICK on the thumbnail and get a selection?

[Dan.ko]

9 minutes ago, carl123 said:

I assume you are using Designer

If you switch to the pixel persona can you then CTRL+CLICK on the thumbnail and get a selection?

Hey Carl!

Yes, I can do it without issues in pixel persona Thank you for helping me out!

Can we just have all of the tools we want on one place (one persona) and without the need of changing it to make a simple selection? It's not too much trouble, but big enough when you need to cut hundreds of photos

[carl123]

It's the same for me on 1.7

I'm not sure if it's a bug, they changed it, or what

But for now you can do the selection in the Pixel persona then change back to the Designer Persona and the selection will remain

[LonnieK]

Concerning this same issue, I too was surprised that it only works in in the Pixel persona now. However, I was pleased that by using Ctrl + Shift + click now allows ADDING additional layers to the resulting selection. (In 1.6 only a single layer could be selected.) But, I still find no way to SUBTRACT a layer from the resulting selection. Have I missed something or is this still not possible?

[MEB]

Hi LonnieK,
That's not possible. We run out of modifier keys to implement subtract.

[R C-R]

On 6/6/2019 at 5:53 AM, carl123 said:

It's the same for me on 1.7

I'm not sure if it's a bug, they changed it, or what

 But for now you can do the selection in the Pixel persona then change back to the Designer Persona and the selection will remain

FWIW, I am seeing the same thing in the Mac 1.7 version of Affinity Designer: in the Designer Persona, CMD-clicking on a layer thumbnail no longer creates a 'marching ants' selection. In fact, it does not do anything at all that I can see & there is no new step added to the History panel.

But in the Pixel Persona it works just like it did in the 1.6 Mac version, including adding a "Selection from layer" step to the History panel.

Seems like a bug to me.

[v_kyr]

AFAI recall those have always been plain pixel selections just usable for pixel layers and no real vector based selections, thus the distinction is now more clear (pixel vs vector sel).

[R C-R]

6 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

AFAI recall those have always been plain pixel selections just usable for pixel layers and no real vector based selections, thus the distinction is now more clear (pixel vs vector sel).

That isn't the issue. I am reasonably sure that in the 1.6 versions, in the Draw Persona we could use vector shapes to create 'marching ants' selections on the canvas that were exactly the size & shape of the vector's path -- IIRC, the stroke was not included. So for example, a closed vector shape could drawn with the Pen Tool & CMD-clicking on its thumbnail in the Layers panel would create a 'marching ants' selection that could be used for copying a part of any layer (except maybe Image layers) & pasted back into the document as a new layer, used with the 'new from clipboard' option, used to limit painting on pixel layers to the selection, etc. -- all the things we regularly use 'marching ants' selections for.

We can still do that in Affinity Designer 1.7, except now we have to switch to the Pixel Persona to do that, because that functionality no longer seems to be included in the Designer Persona.

[v_kyr]

30 minutes ago, R C-R said:

That isn't the issue. I am reasonably sure that in the 1.6 versions, in the Draw Persona we could use vector shapes to create 'marching ants' selections on the canvas that were exactly the size & shape of the vector's path ...

And? As I already said ... you can in Designer do so on the Pixel Persona side now, just not on the Draw/Vector Persona side, that's all. Also before any such selection and copy/paste usage from the Draw Persona side always yielded to a pixel layer as a result. Same for Photo, you can create such pixel selections from vector objects there, but any use of such a selection is just again layer wise a pixel based result. - So I don't see any relevance here for that behavior on the Draw Persona side like in the previous version. Further the Publisher beta doesn't support to create such 'marching ants' selections at all.

As said before, now it's a clearer distinction between a pixel or vector based selection operation on the therefor associated persona.

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, v_kyr said:

And? As I already said ... you can in Designer do so on the Pixel Persona side now, just not on the Draw/Vector Persona side, that's all.

Say I have a pixel layer that I want to select a part of, based on the exact size & shape of a vector object. Like I said, I may want to do that simply to use copy & paste to add a new pixel layer to that document that contains only that part of the pixel layer, or to use the the 'new from clipboard' option.

Why should I have to switch to the Pixel Persona to do that? 

[DOhr]

I used Timemachine to downgrade back to 1.6.1. I often use this function and have to get some work done in the next days - always switching to Pixel Persona slows my workflow down.  :-(

 

 

[Dan.ko]

On 6/9/2019 at 7:00 PM, DOhr said:

I used Timemachine to downgrade back to 1.6.1. I often use this function and have to get some work done in the next days - always switching to Pixel Persona slows my workflow down.  :-(

 

 

Same for me. I'm hoping to have it working with the next versions.