Layers (Photo and Designer): Solo Button

[JeffreyWalther]

I wished there was a "solo" button as you can find in any DAW software to just show
the solo-selected layer (or two or three.... solo-selected layers).

This is way faster than disabling single layers one by one.

[ashf]

That's so called Isolating mode.
Option/Alt + click the layer you want to show.

https://affinity.help/designer/en-US.lproj/index.html?page=pages/ObjectControl/isolating.html?title=Isolating

[JeffreyWalther]

4 hours ago, ashf said:

That's so called Isolating mode.
Option/Alt + click the layer you want to show.

https://affinity.help/designer/en-US.lproj/index.html?page=pages/ObjectControl/isolating.html?title=Isolating

This is only temporarly for a short view. This is not the same.

A "solo" button hides all other layers while editing as long they are in that state.

[Tom4D]

I second that feature request!

I know this thread is two years old but unfortunately it still doesn't work.

An Alt-click directly on a layer check mark should turn all the other layers off and another Alt-click on that same hook icon should turn them on again like in Photoshop with their eye symbol.

[Old Bruce]

Here on Mac if I Option click on the Thumbnail in the Layers panel I get that layer visible only. Perhaps it is Alt click on Windows.

[Tom4D]

Yes thank you, I know that, but that's not the same. 😉

Please take a look at the other three posts above and you'll see that this was mentioned two years ago as well.

But that's actually a different feature.

[Old Bruce]

If you select everything you don't want in the layers panel you can click on one of the check boxes and they will all turn off visibility. the way I work with it is to choose everything then Command Click on what I want to see then click on one of the check boxes.

Cumbersome but doable until an 'isolation button' is developed.

[carl123]

If you need/use this functionality a lot you can create a small macro that will hide all other layers except the one you have selected in the Layers panel

 

[Tom4D]

@ Old Bruce:

Yes, of course that's possible, but unfortunately it's a bit cumbersome because, in contrast to Affinity Designer where you can select all layers with a hotkey, it's unfortunately necessary in Affinity Photo to first go to the "Select" menu to choose "Select All Layers" to accomplish the same.

I wouldn't call that a workflow.

Yes, of course you can define a custom shortcut but to be honest I also prefer to avoid non-standard hotkeys.

 

@ carl123:

Maybe worth a try. As a workaround for now.

Although I'm of the opinion that this should actually be an out-of-the-box standard functionality.

Hence the feature request.

[Gunny]

+1

This is one of the small things that I still miss. Alt-clicking to temporarily display only one layer (or group) works but I often need to display two or three layers for a while and then display all (30+) layers and that's quite a lot of clicking. Grouping helps a bit but it's not the same.

[kirk23]

+1

 

I could be fine  if Alt+click  isolate not single but selected layers at least .  

  But better be  layercomps/ tags  or whatever  panel  we we could set    document states  based on layer names and color tags .  Inside  embedded docs  too like what Photoshop does with its layercomps.

 

Very much missed feature indeed

[mrbarefoot1013]

+1M

I too am from the audio world and the solo feature has been available on analog mixers well before DAWs were common place. I've always been surprised this feature was missing and/or not fully functional from layered visual apps (though I'm just now moving off Adobe CS6 so maybe Adobe added in the last few years).

Affinity apps should add a second "solo" column of check boxes (with key/click shortcut) next to the layers>layer visible check boxes (equivalent to channel/track mute button in audio mixing) which would allow multiple layers to be soloed. Also there should be a master solo defeat option at the top to restore original visibility. See png example of DAW soloing below.

Affinity folks: If you don't know what we're talking about audio wise, let us know. You all seem to be into workflow enhancements. This is a big one. I use it in audio ALL THE TIME and would the same in visual.

From a coding standpoint, compared to many other feature requests, this would be pretty simple, as most of the necessary code is already there: gui visibility column, layer visibility functionality, etc. It's just a matter of adding a field (or similar) to the layer>is_visible array/object and displaying that column in the GUI using a variation/instance of the GUI visibility column code.

Edited February 2, 2022 by mrbarefoot1013
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