78deluxe

Yep, done this for years. Not only for NIK but many of the other programs that work as a plugin in AF (Portrait Pro, Topaz Labs, Luminar Neo, Aurora HDR, etc)

if you want to give Serif more money I'm sure you can buy a few extra licenses and hand them out as gifts, or put them in a drawer as un-used. As for me, I'm hoping we see years worth of updates on the v2 platform we all just paid for after the upgrade from v1. The competition made some revolutionary changes in their products in the last year, and AI is taking hold on virtually all other platforms than Affinity (and Capture One) so I'm expecting Serif to continue the update path to remain relevant as the price went up substantially over time.

This was a feature in V1 but removed in v2. Grouping is still possible but you have to remember a short cut or go into the top menu system

Yeah, inpainting is a lifesaver. Love that thing.

It isn't anywhere close to what some other "AI" driven options can provide today (let alone tomorrow). But yes, I'm aware of the Selection brush tool that was developed with some context aware parimeters working in the background.

There are many monotonus tasks that AI can speed up the workflow so you can spend more time on the more creative aspects of a project. Single click selection of a subject for example. This uses AI to accomplish. Do you really feel that spending an hour on an extremely complicated selection and refinement process is time well spent, when it could be done in a single click? Does it take away artistic merit of your final image if you made the selection manually or of the computer assisted in the process? AI as individual adjustable tools are fine with me. That said, I think Affinity needs to focus on adding to the core of the product (and make sure to squash any bugs along with way for stability), but AI in different capacities is here to stay and I expect it to continue to improve and provide addiitonal value to people that do not have unlimited time.

Downloaded first day of release, but wanted to say thanks for the update! The unexpected unsplash changes which caused the crashes are thankfully working properly again in a production version!

Why would you promote a policy that is far worse for the customer than what Affinity has already given us historically? I realize you are a "noobie" but Affinity hasn't asked up to pay for new features in 4+ years. Yes they are likely on the verge of doing so, but for those of us that are not new, a yearly update price would effecitivly start to look like the standard yearly upgrade/update pricing model most consumers are not a fan of. Lots of software companies have gone the route you suggested Sonar when Gibson owned them for example - and they went belly up. Affinity is at the point where they can charge an upgrade again and not allienate the user base. And if these sales are any indication, the upgrade price should be pretty reasonable.

The generate revenue comment isn't speculation. We know Affinity has over 2M users across the apps, a figure they shared a while ago. As I said, even with a small upgrade cost to get the majority to upgrade, that would mathematically generate a ton of revenue. If you work in software development as you claim. Kind of shameful you propose any upgrade cost wouldn't be worth it to you, even to maintain and receive modest new features for a few years. (they haven't had an upgrade charge in over 3 years)

Talk about speculation. Who's to say they don't offer extremely low price upgrade costs to encourage the entire base to upgrade (even if the new feature set seems minor at launch), which would generate a ton of revenue and help fund larger updates over the next phase of development.

While I frequent this forum (eagerly awaiting the official 1.9 drop for example)...and own the trilogy suite of apps and books - as well as some extra content (which are really 3rd party developed products in the Affinity store). I'm thankful I got the email this morning. I sent notes to friends and also posted on an unrelated to visual arts forum where I'm a trusted member, and got multiple responses of "thank you and just purchased the suite." Some of these purchases were also combined with I didn't even know these apps were on the market. Not everyone has a sense of loyalty. I do. Affinity made these fanatstic apps and offered them with free updates and at a price point virtually anyone can afford (at least one of them). That breeds loyalty. If you don't have some urge to say thank you and pass on the info to others that would benefit from these amazing products, I pitty you and whatever crewl childhood you had to make you the way you are today. 😂

Only sad part of this news is it also likely coincides with an expectation that 1.9 isn't coming out until next year. 😥

Well it appears the new book sold so well that shipments for many of them is delayed. Congrats on the over abundence of sales, but also frustrating for the pre-order as I hoped to have it this week to dive in during vaction.

Depends on the video tutorial. Many of the Affinity made video tutorials are great. However, most seem to be more in the context of a particular function. The workbook walks you through steps of an entire project that touches on many "functions." When you consume video tutorials you are frequently having to piece things and ideas together for yourself. There is value to both approaches and I think they compliment each other. The book may outline a few steps for a particular tool...that might open your eyes for a more indepth search on what all that tool can do (which you might find a video on). Videos can also be difficult to skim through and have unwanted downtime. I haven''t used the books as much as I should have, but there is value to them. I've learned things from video tutorials as well as the workbooks. Why limit your knowledge with one or the other? 😀 I think the book chapters are more similar to a 3rd party tutorial for a project (not how to use a particular tool or funciton). Not all of those are as professionaly condensed and edited as what the workbook provides.

While it isn't intitive, it is VERY usable. I had no idea that function existed and it is as efficient as I could imagine. Once you know the function it is as easy as can be.