Hi. Maybe I'm confused by the workflow or some aspect of it, but I find the current text system very clunky and confusing (as well as seemingly randomly responsive).

For a while, I was really struggling trying to figure out the intended way to do things like change text colour (...do it in 'text edit' mode, or layer selection mode?). I kept bouncing back and forth between selecting the layer, selecting the item (in the canvas area, and/or going into text edit mode, with all the text highlighted (...which, in itself, can be a struggle, too).

Feels like it could be combined more and better into a single, streamlined workflow.


Also, why isn't there some sort of Layer Styles button/menu in the layer window itself? For a while, I could not figure out how to do things like drop shadows, and only later discovered that they DO exist, but is only accessible via the Layers pulldown menu at the top.

You are correct. The text system is clunky, and quite unusable as far as I am concerned. We did just have a funding campaign to overhaul the entire text system as well as doing vector work...https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kr ... rt-awesome

That should be much better by this time next year.

For the layer styles, most people "expect" it to be in the right-click menu, so that is the fastest way to get to it. Right click a layer on the layer docker. You should get an option to quickly change the layer styles. Hope that helps.

Hello again. Well, that's good to know I'm not alone on that opinion! Ya, hopefully they revise it. Really seems things could be better combined and streamlined. I have to really read through the text section of the manual, because I'm STILL not entirely sure how things work there... almost felt random each time I did manage to complete a task. Sometimes, I'd be clicking like crazy, and things simply woudln't select or change for some unknown reason.

In Photoshop, I always used the Layer Style/Effects icon/button at the bottom of the layer window, rather than the pulldown menu at the top of the screen... so that's why I briefly got lost (...and actually thought for a while that Krita didn't even have things like drop shadows!).

Yep, pulldown menu is fine, but I personally would also like to see a Layer Style/Effect button at the bottom of the Layer window, so there's no need for so much mouse pointer travel (...the two items, the target layer and the Layer Style menu, are literally about as far apart from each other as they could be currently!). I have to check if there is a Layer Style hotkey (or if I could create one)... That would help, too. I tend to stay away from the top pulldown menus if I can, as it breaks the workflow a bit for me, personally.

Otherwise, I find the rest of the Krita interface quite awesome. I haven't tried the vectors, though, so I'll have to check what you mean about them needing some love as well.

" Ya, hopefully they revise it. "

I always find that _so_ weird to read. As if there's a nebulous, remote, unapproachable group of powers-that-be that work on Krita. In this case, as if, when the people who make Krita, that's me and bunch of other people who are around all the time, would start raising funds for reworking something like the text tool -- and then users need to hope that "they"'ll revise it.

This is not Adobe: this is not a big, faceless marketing-driven corporation. This is a bunch of volunteers, a non-profit foundation and one-and-a-half full-time developer who are together trying to do everything at a budget that Adobe would spend on the hiring process for an intern, let alone the salary for a developer

Hello again, Boudewijn!

Not sure exactly what you are saying with your post (...that's me not understanding, not me debating it or anything). Are you saying you are offended or something by the suggestion? I have no idea how the production/finances of Krita works. I just know that I am extremely impressed with Krita (I consider it possibly the best of any paid/free all-purpose drawing/painting software for me), and am pretty much abandoning Photoshop CS6 for it.

All I know, is that I found the text system a bit of a frustration, compared to the otherwise excellent workflow/interface of the rest of the program. I have to research/test it further, but unlike the rest of the program, I struggled with it (and still do). I'm just expressing my personal wishlist... the things I would LIKE to see changed/added, which would make the program even better, for me personally. Nothing else implied by my suggestions, if something more was interpreted. Certainly not a 'this sucks!' or a 'the programmers are idiots' type of thing, at all. Just me saying, this is what I personally would love to see changed... whether it be actually physically/financially possible or not... just so my vote is in.

I just got into the forum yesterday or so. I'm not familiar with the other users nor the Krita team yet. If you are one of the Krita developers, then I really want to thank you not only for the excellent software, but also the excellent software that is FREE... and all the much-appreciated efforts you and the team have put into it.

Here's how Krita's development is funded: https://krita.org/en/item/funding-kritas-development/

And what I meant to say is, well, exactly what I said: I find it weird when people talk about present people in the third person. Why would we start a kickstarter to improve the text tool if we didn't intend to improve the text tool?

Boudewijn was merely remarking on the "they'll", because it is pretty strange to be talked about if you aren't there. It is also a little dangerous, as it implies that there's a big segregation between users and developers. Krita is an open source project you see, and many of us started out as users and are still users of Krita. Not realising that can imply that you do not realise you have certain freedoms(like you are always allowed to have a copy of the Krita code or binaries on your system without signing a weird license, and you can make a difference by contributing code or helping out), which would be sad.

It might be more helpful if you could append your suggestions to other similar topics on the forum(there's one in extensions about text, for example), or to the existing wishbugs.

Hello, TeraHedwig. Sorry, your post seemed to get in as I was writing the previous response.

I'm starting to get the feeling I'm in the wrong thread! There seems to be some assumptions about my post or status or something, as I am seriously confused by what is being said. Quite honestly, I still don't get the 'they'll' thing. My intention was simply a 'Hello users and possibly makers of Krita... I personally found this part of Krita a bit clunky/confusing... Might just be me. Wanted to mention it, in case you guys might want user feedback (Hear what users would like changed/added). I hope they (the, unknown to me, team) end up addressing it at some point.'..... So, this whole thing of talking about him when he's not there is a complete unknown and unintentional thing. At that point in the thread, it was just me and the other user (...I'm assuming he's just a regular user... I don't know. I just got here). I wasn't even aware Boudewijn was part of the team. I had only heard from him in one of my first posts, which was just yesterday, as I literally just got here yesterday or so.

So, appologies if I unintentionally did something here... I seriously don't understand this 'talk about if you aren't there' and have no idea what you mean by the 'implies a big segregation' and all that. I think we are thinking at vastly different levels on this. I'm just a regular user, signed up yesterday or so, making a post (...possibly in the wrong thread?).

So, I should make any suggestions (as a regular, non-programmer, non-team member user) at this Wishbugs location? (Sorry, I hadn't seen it previously in the Forum menu)

Isn't that just for bugs? Or can I make suggestions there, too?

Hey ladlon,

Don't worry about it. It just sounds weird to us when we hear "hopefully they revise it" because these forum posts are addressed directly to the team a lot of the time and scottpetrovic is part of the team as well. But you couldn't have known that so

Anyways, I understand you are not aware of our recent kickstarter campaign https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/krita/krita-2016-lets-make-text-and-vector-art-awesome. In the campaign people donate in order for us to fund the development of a specific goal we have in mind. The goal for this kickstarter was to make the Text and Vector tools in Krita awesome. Thankfully it succeeded and so we will spend the coming year on doing that.

We welcome any suggestions on which improvements to make regarding to these tools. You can so do like you have done here or by making a reply to one of the existing threads for suggestions on the text tool (I don't see a relevant thread to add on to at the moment though). If you want you can also report a specific wish you would like us to implement in this list. You can make suggestions there by making an account, pressing New at the top, searching for Krita in the list of products, filling out the form and setting the severity of the 'bug' to 'Wishlist: Request for new feature or enhancement'.

Thank you for your post!

Hi, Nim.

Oh! Now I understand! Ya, I think we had a bit of a comedy of errors happening. I felt like a person visiting a hospital, trying to get a cup of coffee, only to wander in a 'restricted' area, and being mistaken for a surgeon, and all the hillarity and confusion that follows... 'All I wanted was a coffee!'

The previous explanations just confused me further, as there were a number of contexts there that I myself was completely unaware of.

Ha! Funny that you guys have done a kickstarter for the very thing I was commenting on! Now that I know about it, ya, it must have looked weird, me suggesting that the text should be worked on!

Okay, my mistake. I was also confused about where to post, overall, as there's also a separate little area for Krita For Windows, outside of the regular Krita section.

I'll refrain from posting in this section.

Thanks for clearing that up, Nim!

I've had a lot of problems with the text tool too. First impressions on 3.0 is actually worse. I

can't seem to make a new style/preset for the document I'm working in (so that the font, color and alignment are a specific set). Even though this was do-able on the last version it still required highlighting and clicking around for each set of text. Furthermore, every time I opened a new document I had to re-set this new preset style to use it again. That gets SUPER ANNOYING when you're trying to add in a lot of little texts (for comic pages). If the same process had to be done for something like brushes I wouldn't ever use this program.

I just want to know how I can set a permanent default for fonts, size, alignment, and color of multi-line texts. It seems like a big oversight not to be included in something like preferences. Any suggestions?

sarau wrote:I've had a lot of problems with the text tool too. First impressions on 3.0 is actually worse. I

can't seem to make a new style/preset for the document I'm working in (so that the font, color and alignment are a specific set). Even though this was do-able on the last version it still required highlighting and clicking around for each set of text. Furthermore, every time I opened a new document I had to re-set this new preset style to use it again. That gets SUPER ANNOYING when you're trying to add in a lot of little texts (for comic pages). If the same process had to be done for something like brushes I wouldn't ever use this program.

I just want to know how I can set a permanent default for fonts, size, alignment, and color of multi-line texts. It seems like a big oversight not to be included in something like preferences. Any suggestions?

Yes, we haven't spend any time on text for quite a while because it is going to be fully rewritten coming year. For now, we recommend using Inkscape or Scribus.

read the forum comments above. The text tool IS probably worse in 3.0. It is getting updated in a later version.

You know... I'm wondering _why_ you're telling us this? Let me restate the glaringly obvious once more, in the hope that it'll prevents others from restating the glaringly obvious to us even more often...

Yes, we know the text tool sucks. It is essentially a failed experiment, partly spoiled by the wrong premises, partly by too many cooks.

Since we know that, and since we know the code intimately, we know it's not possible to just fix stuff. It was done the wrong way, it must be done over.

We are aware of that, and plan to do that.

That's why we collected money to work on the text tool.

This work hasn't been done yet, so it isn't in 3.0.

That's why the text tool in 3.0 is still really bad and really unusable.

That is why we tell people who work on .e.g. comics, to use inkscape in their workflow until we have written a new text tool.

Which we know is necessary, and plan to do but haven't done yet.

So, these posts were in....2016.... 4 years ago as of this writing.

Sorry for necroing, but the text tool in Krita is still absolutely horrible. What happened? You collected funds to fix it, why weren't these funds spend on fixing such a extremely important feature?

I wonder how many users get frustrated and turn away from Krita for this missing feature. It might be better to just switch off the text tool and replace it with "use GIMP for text to avoid extreme frustration"

What is so hard about it? Just go look at how GIMP or photoshop does it and copy that, you don't have to reinvent the wheel.