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Show HN: Graphite, a Blender-inspired 2D procedural design Rust app

(graphite.rs)
783 points Keavon | 8 comments | 15 Oct 24 22:32 UTC | HN request time: 1.174s | source | bottom

For the past three years I've been building what I hope will be the next Blender, tackling the lack of any good 2D design or image editing tools outside the Adobe monopoly. This was our first year participating in Google Summer of Code and this Q3 update includes the big payoff from that, covering the most progress we've made so far as a project. If you're a Rust dev, consider getting involved as we apply for the next GSoC in the new year— you could be our intern next summer :)

Q3 progress report: https://graphite.rs/blog/graphite-progress-report-q3-2024/

1. egypturnash ◴[15 Oct 24 22:55 UTC] No.41853957[source]▶
This looks neat. I’ve been using Illustrator for twenty five years and have been wishing for a node-oriented replacement of the Appearance stack a lot lately. I will have to check it out when you have binaries, I hate web apps.
replies(2): >>41854031 #>>41854127 #
2. egypturnash ◴[15 Oct 24 23:07 UTC] No.41854031[source]▶
(Looking at the videos: global color swatches please, it’s super powerful to be able to change everything drawn in a color - fills, strokes, effects, etc - with a few clicks.)
replies(1): >>41854098 #
3. Keavon ◴[15 Oct 24 23:16 UTC] No.41854098[source]▶
I'm eager for that feature too! The node graph engine recently got the ability to represent that concept, so now I just need to find the time to design and build the UI for it. I utilize that feature a lot in other software so it'll be really helpful to have in Graphite as well.
replies(1): >>41859150 #
4. skavi ◴[15 Oct 24 23:22 UTC] No.41854127[source]▶
Is Electron really so different in your experience than a PWA?

Personally, I always try to use a PWA when the app is otherwise offered via Electron.

If it’s going to depend on a browser engine, it may as well be the one I already have open and update regularly.

replies(3): >>41854934 #>>41858501 #>>41897666 #
5. dumbo-octopus ◴[16 Oct 24 02:03 UTC] No.41854934[source]▶
I’d prefer it to be one that the developers have specifically targeted and developed/tested against, especially if there’s any GPU involvement.
6. egypturnash ◴[16 Oct 24 12:51 UTC] No.41858501[source]▶
I want my applications to live on my computer and be able to do things like say “this new update breaks my workflow, I am rolling back to the last good version until they get this shit fixed”. This has happened multiple times with Illustrator.

Also they say "native" apps are coming which I am assuming means "actually talks to the OS properly instead of going through a web browser", I have loathed Electron apps ever since Evernote got rewritten as a pile of webshit.

7. egypturnash ◴[16 Oct 24 14:03 UTC] No.41859150{3}[source]▶
If you don't have a way to bundle up a collection of nodes and apply it to another object or bring it to another document with just a few clicks, that's super powerful too. I rely on that constantly in Illustrator. And constantly grumble at the fact that there's no way to have folders in the Graphic Styles palette where these collections of nodes live, since I can easily have a dozen styles for one character when I'm doing comics.

----

although I just played with it and judging by the state of your layers palette there's clearly a lot of stuff to do in terms of organizing the elements of the document in general - to me, documents contain one of more layers, that contain paths, compound paths, groups of paths, and/or layers, and I can choose to place new paths at the top or bottom of any layer (or inside a clipping path); Graphite just calls every path a "layer" and this becomes very unwieldy within a few seconds of drawing shapes.

8. ktm5j ◴[20 Oct 24 19:00 UTC] No.41897666[source]▶
This is a webapp via web assembly, when they have a desktop app Electron will have nothing to do with it.