RNKLN

The current empty state of the beta forum is therefore quite ideal - you can complain about absolutely everything. Hopefully they don't start filling it with something, because it will reduce our room for complaints 😞

There are a few other minor improvements to mention in 2.5:
1. Some new cameras have been added to LibRAW:
FujiFilm X100VI Leica SL3 Pentax KF (Rioch) Samsung Galaxy S23+ Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra Sony ILCE-9M3 (A9 III) [improved] 2. As was requested in a few places before and on the last beta, when you have "Transform objects separately" checked and have a multi-selection, if you type a value in either the width or height field and precede it with an equals sign (e.g. H: '=100px') then it will set all objects in that selection to have that specific width or height value entered. This is opposed to scaling the other objects in your selection proportionally based on the key object which is he result you get without the equals sign.
3. DWG polylines import improvements
We have made some substantial improvements when importing polylines, which now ignores the cached points which AutoCAD creates. This simplifies the resulting curves substantially.

😢

😢

😢

😢

Perhaps it would be a good idea to require the builder of this application to include other standard and perspective formats as well.

i enjoyed reading  TidBITS   take on the issue:
Canva Acquires the Affinity Suite
 
 
 
 
;

But constant pessimism will eventually propagate into a person's overall mood and attitude.
Not necessarily wanting to end up as a "grumpy old man", my preferred method of facing life is what I call "adaptive pragmatism" (after all, I was born and grew up in Prague, y'know… ) with focus on the now and the near foreseeable future. That has worked for me pretty well since several decades.
And that's how I'm facing this takeover as well, after absorbing and processing my initial Tuesday Shock™:
Why worry now about highly hypothetical things that may or may not happen in a distant future?

As a devoted user and enthusiast, I've always shown immense loyalty to the apps I use, sticking with them through thick and thin. It took a significant amount of frustration for me to even consider switching platforms. My journey with Adobe began in 1994, but the introduction of Creative Cloud (CC) marked the beginning of my dissatisfaction. After a year of using CC, I was troubled by the realization that discontinuing my payment would mean losing access to all my cloud-saved documents and apps. This felt like Adobe was coercing me into a perpetual subscription, prompting me to explore alternatives.
I experimented with several apps like Graphic for vector work, Pixelmator for raster graphics, Rapidweaver for web development, and iStudio Publisher, but initially, they didn't quite measure up. However, when Adobe bluntly announced a price increase, essentially forcing users to accept the hike or lose their data, it was the last straw for me. I canceled my subscription and began a frantic search for replacements. Options ranged from CorelDraw to running Adobe CS6 on older Macs—I was desperate. Serif, at the time, had a tarnished reputation, known for dated design apps that seemed more suited for crafting clipart or printing business cards on home printers. Everything changed with the debut of Affinity Designer.
Though I approached it with skepticism, it became clear that this was the lifeline my business needed. Affinity Designer, alongside Pixelmator, allowed me to continue servicing my clients, gradually integrating other Affinity tools until my business regained its footing. While many flock to Canva, viewing it as user-friendly, I find it lacks the professional robustness necessary for serious design work, often yielding amateurish, uniform results. The acquisition of Affinity by Canva was an astonishing development, raising concerns that the excellence I had come to rely on might be diluted by Canva's more populist, less professional approach. Yet, part of me hopes that perhaps Affinity's influence could steer Canva towards becoming a formidable contender to Adobe, reshaping the landscape of design tools.
Despite these uncertainties, my commitment to Affinity remains unwavering. These tools have been indispensable to my livelihood, and I'm prepared to stand by them until given a reason to do otherwise, much like my eventual departure from Adobe.

What tangible reason(s) do you have to think Canva is evil? It can't just be because they are a for-profit company because that would mean almost all companies including Serif & a bunch of Affinity users who make a living using that & other software also are evil. Surely it can't be because you don't like the output users of their software produce. If that was true it would mean a zillion people, myself included, were evil because they produce output with Affinity or many other apps that may not be to many people's liking.

I think it could depend on the level and nature of the AI services being offered. For 'from-scratch' AI content generation, yes, there will be an ongoing cost which could require continuing revenue / licensing.
But what about much smaller scale AI logic attached to 'everyday' editing capabilities: masking, fill, error-fixing, etc.? It seems those capabilities could be supported under a perpetual license, as (from what I understand as a non-AI-expert) they're ultimately more logically oriented. Once algorithmically-seeded, they would seem to be less reliant on continual 'feeding'.
I, for one (and I've seen the same expressed by others here), would greatly welcome AI-assisted editing but have no interest in wholesale AI-based content generation.

Well said, I share your sentiments, especially at how this thread has been derailed with personal attacks on both the Serif employees and those with differing opinions from the vocal dissenters. I particularly appreciate Ash's contributions, and the patience shown in letting this thread rumble on as a shock/anger venting mechanism for many, when so many other companies would have shut it down.
Quite frankly, some growing up is required. Worth bearing this in mind:

For the past few years, the Affinity products have been great for me, for what I do, and have been incredible value. I've trusted the Serif team in that time and they haven't let me down; I'm willing to trust them going forwards too.

If they say nothing people say "silence is very telling..!".
If they say something people say "dont believe them!"
Plus the amount of simply ludicrous ideas like that one about making our own software in India...
Plus outright insults towards devs, telling them to "f off".
Plus childish "change icon to cat to show devs how you feel".
I have never seen such overreaction, such hate towards devs of software you supposedly like. Even when ZBrush was acquired by Maxon and there was panic it didnt reached that levels.
Very few posts with even remotely positive attitude like that of @Rodi . Instead we have screaming mob that no matter what you say (or dont say), whatever you do (or dont do) - it will not be satisfied and will keep on chanting the same thing. At this point I wouldn't be surprised if in protest somebody sprayed some painting in museum with soup... Same energy.
Over the years this devs were always there to listen. I dont have a single post with problem here that wasnt answered by somebody from the team. At the very beginning of Affinity and recently alike. I dont know what future brings and none of those who claim that "THEY KNOW!!!" knows what will happen. However, if anybody of those screamers had some actual brain cells to use they might come to realization that Canva most probably didnt paid that much for Affinity to just kill it. Its not their direct competition. Neither they want to change Affinity into Canva - it makes zero sense. Their reasoning on the other hand makes perfect sense. Canva wants to expand into more professional area. People want that dreaded "AI" in Affinity. These companies complement each other. But noo, screamers will keep on screaming.
Silence is telling and when they tell you something - dont believe them.
Honestly its surprising how many outright stupid people exists on this planet and how so many of them purchased Affinity. Many here is quick to offend devs based on their imagination of whats going to happen, even if nothing of it happened yet. So dont be feely-touchy about being called stupid. Or be, doesn't matter really.
BTW - Canva bought two free photo stocks in 2019. Pexels and Pixabay. 5 years later - both are still there, both under same names, both still free - just button to canva tools was added...

To address some of what is being said on this thread...
Firstly to be clear I'm not a founder, but have been with the company for 25 years. I'm officially appointed as Managing Director of the company, but also use CEO as my title as that is my role in terms of how other countries would view it.
Both Canva and us have made 100% clear we are committing to perpetual licences always being available. That will include V3 or any other future major upgrade of our apps which are released. What's more I will say with Canva's backing we are not under the same financial pressure we would have been to release a V3 anytime soon, meaning those of you using V2 will actually benefit from more features as free updates which may previously have been held back for a V3 if that makes sense. This is of great benefit from an engineering standpoint too as we are far better testing and releasing features in smaller chunks than saving them up to package up as a sellable upgrade. 
https://www.canva.com/newsroom/news/affinity-canva-pledge/
https://www.theverge.com/2024/3/27/24113423/affinity-canva-acquisition-pledge-license-price-subscription
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/press/newsroom/affinity-and-canva-pledge/
As we have made clear there will at some point be a subscription option also which people can take if they choose to. I'm sure there will be additional benefits to that subscription in the future such as asset and document sync, sharing and collaboration and other things which naturally require a subscription as they are features which incur ongoing cost. It may also include other things which can be leveraged with a Canva subscription such as greater stock libraries of images, graphics and fonts. Hopefully that would just be considered reasonable and understandable. There will certainly not be any cynical cutting down of features or limitation of ongoing support in our existing apps just to force a subscription play.
I understand examples of previous acquisitions can make some of you fearful, but they are just historic examples - it has no bearing on what will happen in this case and we are genuinely doing something here which is very different and special. Everything I said on Tuesday, and what both Canva and us pledged yesterday, is 100% true and we are going to stand by it. That includes keeping our entire team here with no layoffs, and continuing to be based in Nottingham. 
If you want to believe this or not is up to you, I'm not sure what more we can say at this point to convince those who doubt it. We'll deliver on this over the coming months and years so whatever is being said right now I know it's going to be all good and assuming you are still using Affinity apps you will be happy with how they have developed and that we have continued to be fair and inclusive with our pricing.
Also to follow on from Patricks point - I can take some of the personal attacks on me, but I have to say some of the conduct on this thread with some of you being very quick to attack other community members just because they hold different opinions is really disheartening to see. You can absolutely give your opinion on this deal for sure, and we are happy to leave this as an open forum within reason, but that does mean being courteous to other forum members and not just repeating the same points over and over.
Thanks,
Ash
 

To All Readers of this thread. Forum users (other than staff) can be ignored so you do not see their posts. The easiest way is using a desktop browser you hover over the avatar for the user and a pop-up shows some details for the user including an ignore option bottom right

@AffinityMakesMeSad
You need to stop telling everyone that they are wrong. Just let others say what they think about this. There are many people private messaging staff saying that they do not dare say what they want to because you are being so aggressive. Lots of people are not up for rough and tumble discussions and that is not what these forums are for. If you want an argument go elsewhere.
Express your opinions, fine, but do not tell others they cannot feel the way they say they do.
To other readers
As I am asking @AffinityMakesMeSad not to respond I would appreciate you not quoting their posts either, or I may have to hide them

Regarding the purchase of Affinity by Canva all I can say is I have not seen a reaction like this since Tom Cruise was cast as Jack Reacher.
And some advice (from a different movie); could we all just "Chill, Winston".

Ash is and has been one of the four Directors of Serif, and is the Managing Director. 
He has been the public face of Serif for major announcements since I've been an Affinity user. 
I'm not sure they even have a CEO.
https://rocketreach.co/serif-europe-ltd-management_b5c6e74df42e0d20

@Patrick Connor In that case I honestly apologise, that is not how it came across in the newspaper article I read, which gave the impression that they bought the company when it was cheap, waited until they could make a huge profit, and then left. That just proves that you should never take newspaper reports at face value! Again - apologies.

I cannot allow this to stand. Gary Bates and Jim Bryce were both very long term employees in Sales and Development for well over 20 years long before they took on Director roles. They dedicated their careers to both the Serif Legacy range and the Affinity range. Please stop this

You mean Ash founded Serif when he was 9 years old? That would be… impressive! 

Take the Sonic Foundry sellout to Sony and then MAGIX. The original Sonic Foundry studio is basically the same and still developing the same set of apps. So not all mergers and buyouts result in fundamental changes to the products being offered.

On the subject of trust, one thing I trust implicitly is that nobody can predict the future with any certainty. Consequently, all these comments about what Canva and the Affinity staff will or won't do in the future is nothing more than speculation & should be treated as such.
Personally, I think the sanest course is to wait & see how this plays out over the next several months, particularly if they deliver on the promise of the accelerated update schedule with more critically needed bug fixes so many of us are aware of & hopefully some new often requested features, but if you think otherwise, so be it.

And that's exactly why Canva made a deal with Serif. With Serif's expertise, Canva also wants to win over professional designers.
If you have little experience in an area, it's easiest to buy this experience rather than spend a lot of time developing it yourself.