General Discussion

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  Gap Tool - best use case?
  16 Mar 2022, 18:00 • Victor Vector   16 Mar 2022, 20:42

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  16 Mar 2022, 20:42

  @vectoradmin Ah, thanks for teaching me about that proportional option. It would have taken me a while to find that. @b77 I can see how it would be handy for text boxes. Seems like it really shines when the text boxes and images are already lined up in columns or rows and you wish to move the whole gap between a number of elements. Like @vectoradmin said, good for a desktop publishing workflow. Cool! I appreciate your perspectives, thank you.
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  Inspiration: Inkscape vs Affinity Designer review
  4 Mar 2022, 18:48 • Ingolf   6 Mar 2022, 09:25

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  6 Mar 2022, 09:25

  Also related when speaking of b-spline and spiro, the good old Bezigon tool from Macromedia Freehand: Bezigon demo (YouTube) Can also be found in the free to try Gravit Designer that as I understand is created by former Freehand users: Perhaps the bezigon tool is better explained here: Gravit Designer basics. Bezigon tool (YouTube) Explained in documentation (Gravit Designer homepage) Bezigon tool in Gravit Designer (Facebook video)
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  Repeater obsession
  2 Mar 2022, 16:39 • Boldline   2 Mar 2022, 21:46

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  2 Mar 2022, 21:46

  @Boldline said in Repeater obession: Most designs I do, we're trying to keep the number of ink colors down to a minimum and so doing patterns is one way to add more with less, so to speak. Great tip
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  Sharing a Success- exported separations perfectly
  22 Feb 2022, 18:49 • Boldline   23 Feb 2022, 15:21

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  S 23 Feb 2022, 15:21

  @Boldline said in Sharing a Success- exported separations perfectly: @Subpath Thank you! It's so much fun to see a definitive victorious result and to know it came from the dedication and hard work we all have put in our own ways and of course, @vectoradmin in a MASSIVE way. Looking back to early last year, VS was not close to being something I could use full time. I could do parts of things and enjoy the many features, but never take projects to completion. Now I can do so much more - including many full designs. There's always more to improve upon but that makes me excited to see what the next year holds. I'm grateful you share your ideas and observations as well. We all have the same goal to see VS continue to develop and be more and more amazing. I appreciate your contributions to that end goal. Having robust conversations even when we occasionally disagree can be a good thing! We're all respectful of each other, even when we have times of disagreement and that makes this group special. Agree 100% with you and if i see ho far VS is coming, even in that short time that i know VS. Then the Future seems nothing than promising. Best wishes.
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  Small suggestion for improved clarity in Pattern Brushes documentation
  22 Feb 2022, 15:09 • Boldline   22 Feb 2022, 16:24

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  22 Feb 2022, 16:24

  @Boldline yes, I think this can be clarified. But the idea remains the same: first object repeats, second and third are for start / end. And a fourth can be used as a spacer.
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  No new Version in the Apple-Store
  18 Feb 2022, 16:58 • Wurstkäs   21 Feb 2022, 15:07

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  S 21 Feb 2022, 15:07

  @Wurstkäs @vectoradmin sleeps well only when the updates are delivered
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  Contex Menu bar icons
  1 Feb 2022, 12:24 • Jayanta Das   21 Feb 2022, 09:07

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  J 21 Feb 2022, 09:07

  Fixed in build 1.1.016.
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  Dimension of artboard in Document setup
  14 Feb 2022, 15:17 • Jayanta Das   14 Feb 2022, 15:39

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  J 14 Feb 2022, 15:39

  @vectoradmin Yes doing that for now. Thank you.
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  Limiting detachment options for top panel bar
  12 Feb 2022, 19:29 • Boldline   13 Feb 2022, 13:12

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  13 Feb 2022, 13:12

  @vectorstyler I defer to you on proper UI pattern. I like the idea of moving arrange views to the view menu and adding the lock panels submenu to the view menu as well. Thinking ahead, if and when you add the options to reset panels to a default position, add the ability to save panel layout presets, and option to close out all panels not in the default or chosen preset layout, I'd think those could all go under the view menu
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  Align and distribution
  10 Feb 2022, 18:13 • Jayanta Das   11 Feb 2022, 06:56

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  J 11 Feb 2022, 06:56

  @vectoradmin Thank you. It works now.
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  Getting rid of a transparency artifact on screen (white hairline edge)
  31 Jan 2022, 15:47 • Boldline   31 Jan 2022, 15:47

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  Honest Question....
  2 Jan 2022, 21:38 • Boldline   29 Jan 2022, 13:37

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  29 Jan 2022, 13:37

  The programs are very different and essentially build for different purposes allthough Serif might not understand it. Or perhaps they do but try to sell the maximum amount of licenses they can anyway. They have a 30 years old history of aggressive selling and marketing but they seem to be more serious about their products after the Affinity line took over. But they really should relax on the marketing. They do not have a vector beast in Designer. They best explanation is that VectorStylers name is brilliant - it really is a program for drawing with vectors and manipulating vector objects as vectors. Affinity Designer should in that context be named PixelStyler. You can create beautiful things in Affinity using their very basic vector toolset - and inferior, bugged boolean algoritms (!) - but you can in every other vector program as well. The difference is that Serif hit a sweet spot with their new user interface. It just bloody works and does so fast. They also offer a very interesting mix of vectors and pixels that many artists just love. Me included. The problem is that manipulating the vectors like it is possible in VectorStyler is all manual work. But they seem to aim at artists that use Affinity to CONTROL bitmaps (textures and brushes) with simple vector tools; PixelStyler. In the case of Affinity Designer I came for the vectors and stayed for the bitmaps. The vectors just being "control shapes". Serif also created a success by investigating what many actually need to create even complex visual designs: Simple shapes and vector effects. And all the classic FX from Photoshop that creates effects we know from photography and the world: inner light, outer light, glow, shadows, blur, bevel, emboss and a few more. It was a wise early start but somehow they never seemed to be able to deliver more. But Serif did deliver the essentials implemented the right way from the beginning. Coming to VectorStyler - and many who learned drawing vector in Affinity but eventually hit the feature roof will - you will encounter the difference. Much slower workflows in certain areas. In Affinity I create tons and tons of vector objects and assign FX to them. Shadows, blur, emboss. Hundreds of times. It is FAST in Affinity and results in rasterized output. But I can create huge, complex works of art blazingly fast. I have read hundreds of time how artists praise Affinity for this artistic freedom and how fun it is to be able to work so fast, creating amazing effects and art. I would suggest to look at Affinity and investigate what works so well for their customers that didn't for them in Illustrator. Simply because you can learn from their succes. Former succes. I don't see them innovating anymore. Their contribution was a modern, well thought out, easy to use interface and the vector-pixel mix. VectorStyler is a different beast and if @vectoradmin aims at picking up veteran and educated Illustrator and CorelDRAW customers mostly with an attrative, very similar and much cheaper product, that is fine. If also picking up the millions of Affinity users is a dream - looking at workflows like they were implemented in Affinity is key. If you look at what some are able to produce with their iPad apps using the very simple toolset of Affinity you really realize people want to create with more organic, natural workflows. Not instructing a machine how to cast every shadow. It takes too long, it is boring and not creative. Personally after some getting used to VS I use it as a supplement to Affinity - perspective, envelope distort mostly - and for some drawings I get printed on physical objects. But I always start in Affinity - not Illustrator, VS and CorelDRAW I all own - even though the feature set is small and the boolean algoritms are inferior - because I simply work blazingly fast there and it is fun as well. And because I do not need pure vectors for my work. In conclusion two different products for different use cases - but both can learn so much from each other. I will never be able to pick one of the two and ditch the other. But I like them both very much. That being said I am lost likely to abandon Affinity Designer for something better should something pop up. Serif do not have the specialists and knowledge in-house for creating something better (after 30 long years in the business also with DrawPlus with the same lead vector developer as in Affinity) and it shows. Especially vector-wise. And I am NOT going to stick with it if the lack of tools continue. Because I can't.
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  Unpredictable changing the value by dragging.
  25 Jan 2022, 17:38 • encart   27 Jan 2022, 14:22

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  B 27 Jan 2022, 14:22

  @encart said in [ I have a problems with changing values with scroll wheel as well. My scroll wheel needs to make 4 steps to change the font for 1 point. With Shift key down it's 9-10 steps, CTRL3-4 steps. Do we have any setting responsible for that? Do you have similar experiences guys? Edit: I found Number Scrolling Speed in preferences, and increased it to 300%, helped but have feeling that is not based on mouse wheel steps, but about some kind of value. Now every 4th change needs two steps . 100,101,102,103,103,104pt Each value represents one step. Yes, I do. I would prefer a value change (a tenth of a unit, a unit or a ten with the corresponding modifier keys) with only one mouse wheel step (like in Affinity).... @vectoradmin if at all possible of course thanks in advance.
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  Lock Shortcut
  20 Jan 2022, 18:27 • Boldline   22 Jan 2022, 20:38

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  22 Jan 2022, 20:38

  @Boldline After I check the cheat sheet again, I'll include the VS icon somewhere in a corner, and post it on the forum. (Btw, I used the BBEdit app and its Find & Replace with Grep and the Sort command to reverse the location of each command name with its shortcut from the list generated by VS, then sort everything alphabetically. So I didn't make or alphabetize the list manually. Same with the PDF — I used the CheatSheet app to extract the shortcuts grouped by menus, it's just that there I had to add a few of them manually, as CheatSheet doesn't extract all shortcuts of commands that don't apply to the current selection).
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  Windows short cut for send to back / front
  20 Jan 2022, 13:44 • mickrose   20 Jan 2022, 13:49

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  20 Jan 2022, 13:49

  @mickrose Yes, this is the shortcut in VS. I will try to find a better one!
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  If you feel like name dropping Vectorstyler to an audience of vector feature craving people...
  16 Jan 2022, 15:00 • Ingolf   16 Jan 2022, 15:59

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  16 Jan 2022, 15:59

  https://www.facebook.com/groups/affinity.designer/about
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  Shortcuts for Boolean operations
  15 Jan 2022, 01:24 • Boldline   15 Jan 2022, 19:22

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  S 15 Jan 2022, 19:22

  @b77 Well icons are not always clear either. In VS I just made experiments and looked at the results. Then I knew which icon to use and when. It is true that the terminology does not really have to bother, it just eases the learning process in some circumstances.
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  Straight Line Tool
  13 Jan 2022, 21:33 • Inspiredmac   13 Jan 2022, 22:15

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  13 Jan 2022, 22:15

  @Boldline When in shape editing mode (shortcut: A), you can create an arc from a parametric ellipse if you drag the control point on the outside the shape. To create a pie shape, drag the control point on the inside of the ellipse. Or you can click the canvas and adjust the start and end points of the arc in the properties window. (Once a parametric ellipse is converted to curves, the control point that does this is gone).
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  Exporting Final Art from VS for others including non-VS users
  31 Dec 2021, 00:44 • Boldline   7 Jan 2022, 21:11

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  S 7 Jan 2022, 21:11

  @Boldline said in Exporting Final Art from VS for others including non-VS users: @Subpath Awesome! I'll have to play around with it. I think I found the website https://concepts.app/en/ Yes, that is the Website. Have to say that the Windows Version is a bit limited, no Watercolor Brush and a few other things i dont remember. But has the Airbrush and the Pencil. You could try the free Demo. I own the iPad Version. Also if you deciced to buy the App, look carefully it seems subscription based. But there is also an Non-subscription version (i own this Version). I have this: Essentials 14,99 € (the non Subcription Version) PDF-Essentials 4,99 € ( for PDF Export ) Shape Library 1,99 € ( Kind of Clipboard/Asset Browser )
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  Developing the technical and artistic side of VS
  24 Dec 2021, 19:53 • Boldline   30 Dec 2021, 22:35

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  30 Dec 2021, 22:35

  This is an interesting discussion… for next year. Planting 'Le Dot' here.