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[Designer] Is it possible to work on multiple artboards that are different sizes, simultaneously?


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Is it possible to work on multiple artboards that are different sizes, simultaneously?
 

My goal is to speed up work flow by working on multiple artboards at once.
So if I create a circle, the circle should be created in 7 different sizes. If I style the circle, every artboard will add the same style to their respective sizes. The style should also be calculated for the respective size.
I.e. If I create a 1px stroke for the largest size, the smallest size shouldn't be 1px but rather something like 0.2px 


> I know I can simply resize into those sizes but if I have to make a change to 1 then I have to make a change to all sometimes resulting me having to resize everything several times.
> Not going to hold my breath but if it's possible I would like to know how to do this, and thank you in advance! :)

For a reference of what I am doing..

emojitest3.png

Edited by MetraKrow
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Hello and welcome to the forum.

Yes what you ask is possible using Symbols, and Scale with Object on the stroke thickness.

1. Create three square artboards - 100px, 200px, 400px.
2. Draw a square on the smallest artboard, and with it selected click Create in the Symbols panel.
3. Copy your Symbol to the other two artboards, resizing it to fill the artboard.
4. Draw a circle inside the symbol on artboard 100px.
5. Add a 1px stroke, and ensure that Scale with Object is checked.

Result: Circles on all artboards, scaled in size and stroke weight (1px, 2px, 4px).

See attached file.

Symbols Scale Stroke Thickness.afdesign

Edited by Aammppaa
Added file.

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6 hours ago, Aammppaa said:

Hello and welcome to the forum.

Yes what you ask is possible using Symbols, and Scale with Object on the stroke thickness.

1. Create three square artboards - 100px, 200px, 400px.
2. Draw a square on the smallest artboard, and with it selected click Create in the Symbols panel.
3. Copy your Symbol to the other two artboards, resizing it to fill the artboard.
4. Draw a circle inside the symbol on artboard 100px.
5. Add a 1px stroke, and ensure that Scale with Object is checked.

Result: Circles on all artboards, scaled in size and stroke weight (1px, 2px, 4px).

See attached file.

Symbols Scale Stroke Thickness.afdesign

Thank you for your response, although this is a alternative way it's not what I am looking for. For example.. If I make a square on 1 art board, it'll make a square on all 3 artboards at the same time. Unless I'm missing something, your method did work just not the way I was looking for. And thank you for the welcome! :) It's good to be home!

Edited by MetraKrow
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Why not do everything in one artboard & then as a final step, duplicate it as many times as is necessary & then resize each duplicate to the desired final size?

I guess I am not clear on how you are using multiple artboards for your final design.

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On 8/2/2019 at 3:17 AM, R C-R said:

Why not do everything in one artboard & then as a final step, duplicate it as many times as is necessary & then resize each duplicate to the desired final size?

I guess I am not clear on how you are using multiple artboards for your final design.

This is what I'm doing currently but would like to know if there is a less redundant way. It's complicated to explain but it would help my work flow drastically. 

On 8/2/2019 at 5:16 AM, Palatino said:

Sometimes it is already practical to be able to see a graphic in different sizes at the same time. And you could work in any window.

1306158852_ModulareFensteransichten.thumb.png.beb6f4b705d5924e6e88fc9fdafec6ac.png

Although this is a step in the right direction I don't think it's what I need or at least what I'm looking for. Thank you for the idea though!

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On 8/2/2019 at 7:23 AM, MetraKrow said:
On 8/2/2019 at 1:12 AM, Aammppaa said:

what you ask is possible using Symbols, and Scale with Object on the stroke thickness.
(...)
Result: Circles on all artboards, scaled in size and stroke weight (1px, 2px, 4px).
Symbols Scale Stroke Thickness.afdesign

Thank you for your response, although this is a alternative way it's not what I am looking for. For example.. If I make a square on 1 art board, it'll make a square on all 3 artboards at the same time. Unless I'm missing something, your method did work just not the way I was looking for. And thank you for the welcome! :) It's good to be home!

 

Can you explain why the symbol suggestion does NOT work for your needs?

To me the description in your initial post and the suggestion of Aammppaa are quite the same.
You had answered "not what I am looking for (...) If I make a square on 1 art board, it'll make a square on all 3 artboards". – So you do NOT want to get every of your actions simultaneously transferred to the other artboards? – In the beginning you wrote:

On 8/1/2019 at 11:50 PM, MetraKrow said:

So if I create a circle, the circle should be created in 7 different sizes.


Alternatively to words could you show it with a sketch? You posted an image with the line "For a reference of what I am doing.. " – Where would the artboards be in this picture? Do you see all of it as 1 artboard (with background text) and the circled objects each as different artboard as parts on the larger one?

 

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

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11 hours ago, thomaso said:

 

Can you explain why the symbol suggestion does NOT work for your needs?

To me the description in your initial post and the suggestion of Aammppaa are quite the same.
You had answered "not what I am looking for (...) If I make a square on 1 art board, it'll make a square on all 3 artboards". – So you do NOT want to get every of your actions simultaneously transferred to the other artboards? – In the beginning you wrote:


Alternatively to words could you show it with a sketch? You posted an image with the line "For a reference of what I am doing.. " – Where would the artboards be in this picture? Do you see all of it as 1 artboard (with background text) and the circled objects each as different artboard as parts on the larger one?

 

Can you explain why the symbol suggestion does NOT work for your needs?
Sure, I still need to be able to change the icon should I need or want to make a change to it. Unless I am not using symbols correctly or using them properly this doesn't work for what I am trying to achieve. 

I don't know how to show a sketch but another way of putting it, I would like each artboard to be live as I make a change to 1 artboard it would make the change to all artboards. For example I'll use the square example above. If I make a 100x100px square in a 100x100px artboard it would create a 50x50px square in another artboard that is 50x50px. So if I give a 2px stroke to the 100px square then it should give the 50px square a 1px stroke (considering that's half of 2px and because the artboard is also half the size of 100px.) 

In other words all artboards are connected and live at all times.. I know it's a long shot but I figured it was worth a try to at least ask. I know I can just resize but this is a on going project and will become redundant and taxing eventually. I.e. It's easy to do this for 1 icon but when the 1 turns into 150 it's going to turn into a real mess if you get me

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On 8/2/2019 at 5:16 AM, Palatino said:

Sometimes it is already practical to be able to see a graphic in different sizes at the same time. And you could work in any window.

1306158852_ModulareFensteransichten.thumb.png.beb6f4b705d5924e6e88fc9fdafec6ac.png

I misunderstood what this was, this is actually want I wanted, thank you! :) 

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4 hours ago, MetraKrow said:

Can you explain why the symbol suggestion does NOT work for your needs?
Sure, I still need to be able to change the icon should I need or want to make a change to it. Unless I am not using symbols correctly or using them properly this doesn't work for what I am trying to achieve. 

Have you tried something like this Symbols, no artboard.afdesign example? To make changes to any of the symbol's shapes (like to change the shape of the nose) select that shape in any one of the symbol's instances & edit it there.

812086137_Layerselection.jpg.038f44e825383042f6bd079ea8254088.jpg

Note that in this example, the eyes themselves are symbols so changes to either one will apply to both. That may not be what you want.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
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1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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25 minutes ago, R C-R said:

To make changes to any of the symbol's shapes (like to change the shape of the nose) select that shape in any one of the symbol's instances & edit it there.

Now I finally realize how symbol works. Thank you.

Thanks to DeepL.

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On 8/4/2019 at 9:02 AM, R C-R said:

Have you tried something like this Symbols, no artboard.afdesign example? To make changes to any of the symbol's shapes (like to change the shape of the nose) select that shape in any one of the symbol's instances & edit it there.

812086137_Layerselection.jpg.038f44e825383042f6bd079ea8254088.jpg

Note that in this example, the eyes themselves are symbols so changes to either one will apply to both. That may not be what you want.

Thank you for this, I assumed like Photoshop it would have just combined all the shapes into one so I wouldn't be able to modify it later. Although this does help a ton, it wasn't what I was looking for. Palatino actually showed me with the screen shot above and that was what I was trying to do.

Symbols do help but I was trying to avoid having to be redundant with every small change I make. If that makes any sense.

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On 8/1/2019 at 11:50 PM, MetraKrow said:

working on multiple artboards at once.

42 minutes ago, MetraKrow said:

Palatino actually showed me with the screen shot above and that was what I was trying to do.

Wow, a hard way to get there.

With your finally sufficient solution you are not "working on multiple artboards at once" as you requested in your initial post but simply on 1 single artboard in multiple zoom views. – In that case you might be interested in using the save view point option, too. (Navigator panel > Advanced > Add)

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

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On 8/7/2019 at 2:55 AM, thomaso said:

Wow, a hard way to get there.

With your finally sufficient solution you are not "working on multiple artboards at once" as you requested in your initial post but simply on 1 single artboard in multiple zoom views. – In that case you might be interested in using the save view point option, too. (Navigator panel > Advanced > Add)

No, I want/need this single graphic on multiple artboards in multiple sizes. (1 graphic on 1 artboard). It's all the same graphic but in various sizes. 
But if I made a change maybe instead of green it would be blue then it would change for all of them. If I made a change in stroke size then it would change for all of the graphics in all of the artboards. I'm not sure if that makes sense. As for view I can just zoom in/out via scroll wheel. But when it comes time to saving the artboads, I need it to save in multiple sizes. For example... When I click export slices It'll give me 7 slices of the 7 graphics. 

Which I had no problem resizing I was just trying to speed up my workflow by being less redundant on having to resize each time i made a change because if I decide to change the stroke on 1 then I'd have to figure out the stroke size for the other 7 or resize. 

So as I have been trying to explain
> 1 change to 1 graphic on 1 artboard would make the same change for all 7 artboards and honor their respective sizes. (So if I gave a 1000x1000px graphic a 2px stroke then a 500x500 should automatically get a 1px stroke.)
> Additionally if I changed that 1 graphic from green to blue then the other 6 will make the same change with it.

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5 hours ago, MetraKrow said:

No, I want/need this single graphic on multiple artboards in multiple sizes. (1 graphic on 1 artboard). It's all the same graphic but in various sizes. (...)
If I made a change in stroke size then it would change for all of the graphics in all of the artboards. (...)
When I click export slices It'll give me 7 slices of the 7 graphics. 

That describes quite exactly a workflow using symbols – as responded in the first post by Aammppaa, additionally with a step-by-step description + a well prepared sample document.
Whereas you reacted this way ...

On 8/2/2019 at 7:23 AM, MetraKrow said:

it's not what I am looking for. For example.. If I make a square on 1 art board, it'll make a square on all 3 artboards at the same time. Unless I'm missing something, your method did work just not the way I was looking for.

Compare the two orange sentences above: What is described as request in the 1st becomes commented in the 2nd as unwanted.
Whereas you wrote about the option, simply to open various windows of 1 file (and 1 artboard only), posted by Palatino:

On 8/4/2019 at 1:40 PM, MetraKrow said:

this is actually want I wanted, thank you! :) 

 

That gives the impression you possibly confuse "multiple windows" with "multiple artboards".

But if it is solved for you with Palatino's hint (as I understand your reaction in green), the multiple window workflow, it is fine.
I just was wondering and curious about your way of thinking and describing. It might be my fault that it sounds contradictory to me.

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

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2 hours ago, thomaso said:

That describes quite exactly a workflow using symbols – as responded in the first post by Aammppaa, additionally with a step-by-step description + a well prepared sample document.
Whereas you reacted this way ...

Compare the two orange sentences above: What is described as request in the 1st becomes commented in the 2nd as unwanted.
Whereas you wrote about the option, simply to open various windows of 1 file (and 1 artboard only), posted by Palatino:

 

That gives the impression you possibly confuse "multiple windows" with "multiple artboards".

But if it is solved for you with Palatino's hint (as I understand your reaction in green), the multiple window workflow, it is fine.
I just was wondering and curious about your way of thinking and describing. It might be my fault that it sounds contradictory to me.

I apologize it came off confusing and at the time I wasn't familiar with symbol's. Which if I'm not mistaking still isn't what I was after. Although it helps or I'm still illiterate with what they can do I would still have to size each symbol to each artboard and their respective size and height.

If I need to make a change then it becomes redundant. 

So maybe saying artboard is a bad way of explaining. If I can do all this on one artboard then that's just as fine even though it can get really messy really fast.

So for what I wanted artboards weren't essential but preffered.

I'm still fairly new to Affinity so in my head it made sense vs to someone who is more educated and literate. Im not really familiar with all the terms. So I apologize if I explained I wanted to go right when I really wanted to go left. :S

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1 hour ago, MetraKrow said:

I would still have to size each symbol to each artboard and their respective size and height.

If I need to make a change then it becomes redundant. 

What do you mean with "I would still have to size"? – In each possible workflow you will have to define a size for either an object or its export. You must define somewhere that you want different sizes and what their dimensions should be. There is no application that can do that for you if you are not willing to tell to the app what you want. So I don't see why you mention "I have to size" here as a disadvantage.

If you have arranged your artboards as symbols only once – as Aammppaa already prepared for you – you don't have to touch their size again, not even for export. So neither an initial symbol set of different sizes nor "a change" will become "redundant". It appears you haven't even tried yet but prefer to talk about it instead in pure theory. As if being afraid of using the app.

Possibly it will be more use- and successful if you play and experiment a bit more with the UI and its features before judging about missing options or not working suggestions. Just my guess.

 

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

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1 hour ago, thomaso said:

What do you mean with "I would still have to size"? – In each possible workflow you will have to define a size for either an object or its export. You must define somewhere that you want different sizes and what their dimensions should be. There is no application that can do that for you if you are not willing to tell to the app what you want. So I don't see why you mention "I have to size" here as a disadvantage.

If you have arranged your artboards as symbols only once – as Aammppaa already prepared for you – you don't have to touch their size again, not even for export. So neither an initial symbol set of different sizes nor "a change" will become "redundant". It appears you haven't even tried yet but prefer to talk about it instead in pure theory. As if being afraid of using the app.

Possibly it will be more use- and successful if you play and experiment a bit more with the UI and its features before judging about missing options or not working suggestions. Just my guess.

 

You're missing what I said so I'll put it this way. I'm making over 500 emoticons. I have defined the proportions once already and would like to keep it at once. But since each emote is has 7 different size I now have to resize at least 3500 times and more if I need to make changes for what ever reason.

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16 minutes ago, MetraKrow said:

You're missing what I said so I'll put it this way. I'm making over 500 emoticons. I have defined the proportions once already and would like to keep it at once. But since each emote is has 7 different size I now have to resize at least 3500 times and more if I need to make changes for what ever reason.

If you use symbols, you will still have to set up each of the 500 & their 7 sizes individually, but you won't have to resize anything if you change the contents of each emoticon's symbol(s) because changing any one instance of a symbol will change them all (as long as they remain synced).

To understand how symbols work it may be helpful to watch the Symbols video tutorial.

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If you learn to use the export persona and define there some setting to export at once in multiple files of different size, you'll only have to save this setting (for example, I have one called "PNG_SVG_PDF" that'll export to the 3 format each design if I select this setting in my Export persona, but it could have been only PNG at different sizes, or or PDF and PNG at different sizes, etc.).

As suggested by @thomaso, try playing first with symbols and Export persona, it'll save you time for other projects.

https://affinity.help/designer/en-US.lproj/pages/ExportPersona/exportPersona.html

https://affinity.help/designer/en-US.lproj/index.html?page=pages/SymbolsAssets/symbols.html?title=Symbols

 

From what I understand of you project, you can have multiple artboards with the same symbol you'll export at size 1:1 or one artboard you'll export at multiple size.

But since it's emoticons, you'll perhaps need basic/repetitive shapes able to be modified all at once if you decide this stroke isn't large enough, or should be darker: symbols again.

If someone can find this video using symbols to design game characters (a bear with a transparent belly where we can see its heart), it would be a good example.

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21 minutes ago, R C-R said:

each of the 500 & their 7 sizes individually,

In my imagination it would be possible to have 1 'empty' template document with prepared artbords/symbols in 7 sizes.
And then use this document to place 1 copy of the 500 and get the other 6 generated automatically.

That way the work would be without sizing any of the 500 manually.
And it would result in 500 documents, if 1 document contains 1 icon in 7 sizes.

Another option could be to create 1 size only, export it and use an application with a batch feature do the different sizes automatically by itself.
As I understand Wosven you can use Affinity in a similar way.

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

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On 8/4/2019 at 1:40 PM, MetraKrow said:

I misunderstood what this was, this is actually want I wanted, thank you! :) 

Sorry if I ask again, but did you find your request solved yet? This quoted response from you sounds that it is, isn't it?

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

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Interjection

I have just changed a rather nested favicon file to symbols. Up to now it took a minute to open the file, if it could be opened at all. With symbols (also in different colors) the file opens in one second.

Before: 56 MB
After: 1.8 MB (and no linked files)

Hard to believe - when I move a single path point, it moves into twelve favicons simultaneously.

Great!

Thanks to DeepL.

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