13 ms·

Show HN: Polotno Studio – Canva-like design editor, without signups or ads

180 points by lavrton 6y ago

ojr 6y ago
so many features missing to be considered Canva-like, hopefully it can evolve into fitting that description but now I think it is a stretch and a little misleading to make the comparison.
- jansan 6y ago
  What is meant by "canvas"? Obviously not the HTML Canvas element, right?
  - darrenf 6y ago
    Not "canvas" but "Canva", referring to https://www.canva.com/ https://www.canva.com/
    - jansan 6y ago
      Oh, my eyes are getting bad obviously.
brtkdotse 6y ago
This is an excellent start, but the big selling point (at least for me) of tools like Canva is the myriad of templates to start from.
- canvanaut 6y ago
  Exactly, also the templates and stock photos/media are all licensed which makes it much easier for business use
moeamaya 6y ago
The Studio tool appears to be a showcase for their paid graphic library (https://polotno.dev/ https://polotno.dev/). As a designer/dev the library is definitely addressing a hole in the market where libraries like fabric.js and konva aren’t serving: customer support (esp enterprise) and feature requests. Coming from Teespring and recently at Figma, I’ve seen both sides of this problem: home rolling a teeshirt maker in canvas and also trying to use parts of an editor at Figma for marketing (wasn’t decoupled enough). I’m excited to see where this team takes this and grows.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- lavrton 6y ago
  I am creator of Polotno. Thanks for the kind words. From my view, the hole in the market is not customer support and features requests. Fabric.js and konva (that is used inside Polotno) are "low-level" libraries. They are providing a DOM-like API to the canvas. That is it. In order to make a full canvas editor, you have to write a lot of code on top of fabric, or konva, or any other library, or SVG. https://polotno.dev/ https://polotno.dev/ - is designed to solve a very narrow business need. So you can build a full editor with much less code (almost no code at all). It may be less flexible, but it is the tradeoff for solving one problem in a good way.
  - BeefySwain 6y ago
    On https://polotno.dev/#price https://polotno.dev/#price > Fof non-commercial or development usage only
  - shash7 6y ago
    Yep that's correct. Building a product is usually the easy(and enjoyable) part. Building the business logic is a slow, unenjoyable trudge.
mgav 6y ago
Looks really good!!! Consider (down the dev road) export options that optimize the image, like https://tinypng.com/ https://tinypng.com/ (I have no affiliation w/ them, other than as a user).
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
simon1573 6y ago
Really nice! It looks like there is a typo in the title of the site: "fee" instead of "free"
viviansolide 6y ago
Even on a mobile device it's neat Well done
tractorattr 6y ago
It is great, well done. error -> pdf export doesn't work as intented when canvas size changed. scales page elements to fit predefined (I think) page size.
- lavrton 6y ago
  That is a bad bug. Thanks for the feedback!
xokr8s 6y ago
Well done, mate! Truly a wonderful job.
isuckatcoding 6y ago
Actually works decently on mobile (iOS chrome)
Venkatesh10 6y ago
Really clean and good! Bookmarking the website now.
Accacin 6y ago
Potentially a bug that I found. When I add an icon and click "Flip Horizontally" or "Flip Vertically", the icon appears very blurry and a little pixilated. Using Firefox on Manjaro.
- lavrton 6y ago
  Right, that is a bug. Thanks for the feedback.
ochrist 6y ago
Very nice. However, it took a moment to realise that you cannot drag objects to the canvas but have to click on them first. Then you can move them around.
smashah 6y ago
Looking good so far! Excited to implement it in my next project
amiamigo 6y ago
Looks neat
powellzer 6y ago
After playing around with it for a bit, I really love it! One thing I found myself needing: Is there a way to manage the z-index of your layers? (e.g. send layer to back, etc)
- lavrton 6y ago
  Yes. There is cross-lines button when you select an object to change its z-index. Looks like it is not clear and I need a different icon/label.
  - powellzer 6y ago
    Oh I see! Thank you. I wasn't expecting that to trigger a 'drop-down' for some reason.
digitalmaster 6y ago
Nice.. but what makes Canva valuable isn't the tool itself.. It's the templates. Add some templates
- mc_lovin_ 6y ago
  Yes canva is a beast
Jack000 6y ago
looks good! I take it you're the developer of konva as well?
- lavrton 6y ago
  Yes.
b3n 6y ago
The title seems a little disingenuous, as Canva does not have ads or require signup.
mvind 6y ago
Why would I ever use this over figma?

180 points by lavrton 6y ago

ojr 6y ago

so many features missing to be considered Canva-like, hopefully it can evolve into fitting that description but now I think it is a stretch and a little misleading to make the comparison.

jansan 6y ago
What is meant by "canvas"? Obviously not the HTML Canvas element, right?
- darrenf 6y ago
  Not "canvas" but "Canva", referring to https://www.canva.com/ https://www.canva.com/
  - jansan 6y ago
    Oh, my eyes are getting bad obviously.

brtkdotse 6y ago

This is an excellent start, but the big selling point (at least for me) of tools like Canva is the myriad of templates to start from.

canvanaut 6y ago
Exactly, also the templates and stock photos/media are all licensed which makes it much easier for business use

moeamaya 6y ago

The Studio tool appears to be a showcase for their paid graphic library (https://polotno.dev/ https://polotno.dev/). As a designer/dev the library is definitely addressing a hole in the market where libraries like fabric.js and konva aren’t serving: customer support (esp enterprise) and feature requests. Coming from Teespring and recently at Figma, I’ve seen both sides of this problem: home rolling a teeshirt maker in canvas and also trying to use parts of an editor at Figma for marketing (wasn’t decoupled enough). I’m excited to see where this team takes this and grows.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
lavrton 6y ago
I am creator of Polotno. Thanks for the kind words. From my view, the hole in the market is not customer support and features requests. Fabric.js and konva (that is used inside Polotno) are "low-level" libraries. They are providing a DOM-like API to the canvas. That is it. In order to make a full canvas editor, you have to write a lot of code on top of fabric, or konva, or any other library, or SVG. https://polotno.dev/ https://polotno.dev/ - is designed to solve a very narrow business need. So you can build a full editor with much less code (almost no code at all). It may be less flexible, but it is the tradeoff for solving one problem in a good way.
- BeefySwain 6y ago
  On https://polotno.dev/#price https://polotno.dev/#price > Fof non-commercial or development usage only
- shash7 6y ago
  Yep that's correct. Building a product is usually the easy(and enjoyable) part. Building the business logic is a slow, unenjoyable trudge.

mgav 6y ago

Looks really good!!! Consider (down the dev road) export options that optimize the image, like https://tinypng.com/ https://tinypng.com/ (I have no affiliation w/ them, other than as a user).

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

simon1573 6y ago

Really nice! It looks like there is a typo in the title of the site: "fee" instead of "free"

viviansolide 6y ago

Even on a mobile device it's neat Well done

tractorattr 6y ago

It is great, well done. error -> pdf export doesn't work as intented when canvas size changed. scales page elements to fit predefined (I think) page size.

lavrton 6y ago
That is a bad bug. Thanks for the feedback!

xokr8s 6y ago

Well done, mate! Truly a wonderful job.

isuckatcoding 6y ago

Actually works decently on mobile (iOS chrome)

Venkatesh10 6y ago

Really clean and good! Bookmarking the website now.

Accacin 6y ago

Potentially a bug that I found. When I add an icon and click "Flip Horizontally" or "Flip Vertically", the icon appears very blurry and a little pixilated. Using Firefox on Manjaro.

lavrton 6y ago
Right, that is a bug. Thanks for the feedback.

ochrist 6y ago

Very nice. However, it took a moment to realise that you cannot drag objects to the canvas but have to click on them first. Then you can move them around.

smashah 6y ago

Looking good so far! Excited to implement it in my next project

amiamigo 6y ago

Looks neat

powellzer 6y ago

After playing around with it for a bit, I really love it! One thing I found myself needing: Is there a way to manage the z-index of your layers? (e.g. send layer to back, etc)

lavrton 6y ago
Yes. There is cross-lines button when you select an object to change its z-index. Looks like it is not clear and I need a different icon/label.
- powellzer 6y ago
  Oh I see! Thank you. I wasn't expecting that to trigger a 'drop-down' for some reason.

digitalmaster 6y ago

Nice.. but what makes Canva valuable isn't the tool itself.. It's the templates. Add some templates

mc_lovin_ 6y ago
Yes canva is a beast

Jack000 6y ago

looks good! I take it you're the developer of konva as well?

lavrton 6y ago
Yes.

b3n 6y ago

The title seems a little disingenuous, as Canva does not have ads or require signup.

mvind 6y ago

Why would I ever use this over figma?