Proposal to change color behavior for new layers

What color system would you prefer?

    1. Current System
    1. Background/Foreground (Regions shaded with background color)
    1. Outline/Fill (gradient fill->outline)
    1. Other (please specify)

0 voters

The current color system uses has background and foreground colors. They are used in various ways to set the colors of newly created layers. There are inconsistencies, so I have come up with some alternatives. My main problem with the current system is that checking/unchecking the “Create Outline” box changes the color of the region being created.

All of these suggestions behave illogically to a certain degree, but I feel that the current system needs reconsideration. Please vote/comment on what you feel would be the best idea from the user’s perspective:

  1. Current System.
  • All new layers are shaded with the foreground color (except Solid Color, which is shaded with the bg color)
  • When an outline and region are created together, the region is shaded with the background color
  • Gradients are in the direction bg->fg.
  • Counterclockwise curve gradients have the same behavior as regions
  1. Current System with modifications
  • All new layers are shaded with the background color (except Outlines, which are shaded with the fg color)
  • When an outline and region are created together, the behavior does not change
  • Gradients are in the direction bg->fg.
  • Clockwise curve gradients have the same behavior as regions
  1. Outline/Fill color system
  • All new layers are shaded with the fill color (except Outlines, which are shaded with the outline color)
  • When an outline and region are created together, the behavior does not change
  • Gradients are in the direction fill->outline
  • Counterclockwise curve gradients have the same behavior as regions
  1. Please suggest any other ideas you have

It seems to be the natural way of usage of the vector applications. I voted for the option 3. A big change though. It needs also modifications in the wiki.
-G

OK. Thank you for implementing it.
I can do the wiki changes (though it’ll take some time). Should I wait for the next Synfig release to modify it? After all, the wiki is mostly designed for new users – who are more likely to pick up the latest official release. On the other hand, the next release could be in quite a while…

I prefer you update the wiki as soon as possible. New added features would be reflected to the wiki to encourage users to join to synfig and to install from svn. :slight_smile:
I have pending some updates of the wiki, though :confused:
-G

A quick grep of the source directories also showed a couple of other things that still need to be updated:

  • synfig-studio/po/*.po
  • synfig-studio/images/set_*_color.sif (both content and filenames)
  • synfig-studio/images/Makefile.am
  • synfig-studio/src/gtkmm/iconcontroller.cpp
  • synfig-studio/src/gtkmm/dialog_color.cpp

I also noticed some background/foreground mentions in synfig-core that probably should be updated, or for now at least be added to the bugtracker…

G.