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I can’t speak to that as I do not have Photoshop, only Elements and LR. I have not found Catalina to be more buggy than previous versions for anything other than Affinity. The biggest change that affected me and perhaps many others was that 32 bit apps will not work on Catalina. Before upgrading users are encouraged to confirm whether any of the apps they use would be incompatible with Catalina. The two Affinity extensions which have issues with Catalina are Affinity Develop, which does not work with raw photos but does work with jpg (which don’t need developing) and Edit in Affinity, which in some circumstances for some photos does not want to save the edit. There are a number of threads on the bug forum and the desktop forum on this. The other extensions seem to work ok. I suspect part of the problem with them solving the Affinity bugs in Apple Photos is that it only seems to affect some users.

I'm running Photos 5, the version that comes with Catalina. Using Affinity within Apple Photos has been hit and miss, sometimes the work arounds work, sometimes there are surprises. So I don't use it with Apple Photos anymore. If I need to use Affinity, I'll use it in stand alone mode or with the External Editors for Apple Photos app, an app that dates back to High Sierra times but still does the job with Catalina. I knew before upgrading to Catalina that LR and my older version of Adobe Elements would be problematic as 32 bit applications do not work with Catalina. Although LR 6.14 (which is 64 bit) can work in Catalina as long as it was installed before upgrading to Catalina, it is not supported by Adobe and components such as the installers and the application manager are 32 bit, so ever anything went wrong, it would have been impossible to re-install LR. My initial plan was to switch to Apple Photos for the DAM and basic edits and use Affinity Photos for more advanced edits. That worked for a couple of weeks with Mojave but fell apart with the upgrade to Catalina and the subsequent issues between Apple Photos and Affinity (unlike some, I didn't have any issues with Mojave, they started with Catalina). I then discovered On1 and it pretty much does everything I need for now as both my DAM and my main editing application. I'm not a power user so it works for me.

With regard to Lightroom like products, I switched to On1 Photo Raw in early 2020 as a result of incompatibility between LR 6.14 and Catalina. I am very pleased with On1 Photo Raw to date. As a DAM it is very similar to LR, the migration of edits worked better than I expected, and with its layers capability it also takes care of the relatively light Photoshop-type tasks I used to do with Adobe Elements.

Very much regret to confirm that there are still problems with Affinity Photo extensions in Apple Photos, in particular Edit in Affinity Photo and Affinity Develop. It seems unlikely there is a fix in line anytime soon, indeed, it seems to be very low on the priority.

Hello GeorgP, as Cecil has mentioned, there are innumerable reports of this dating back quite some time, with a number of suggested work arounds, some of which work some of the time for some users. Regrettably no suggestion by the developers that a fix is likely anytime soon. One of the simpler ways to edit photos (jpegs especially) with Affinity in Apple photos is via an app called External Editors for Photos. It is still available on the App Store at a very low cost ($1.50 USD). Although the app was developed for High Sierra, it works with Catalina and facilitates doing edits with Affinity in Apple Photos.

I have not had this error message but whenever I attempt to develop a raw photo in Affinity Develop by way of Apple Photos I get the all too familiar (to some of us) "Unable to edit with ..." error message. The only way I have been able to develop raw photos (including Olympus ORF) from Apple Photo using Affinity is by using the Edit in Affinity Photo extension (which has its own problems as noted in many many threads). To the best of my understanding, the Affinity Develop extension has a known bug which leaves it unable to Develop raw photos but allows it to develop jpg (which, of course, do not need developing per se). I opened a thread on this around mid-March in the Bugs in Mac OS forum, one of the moderators (MEB), noted that this was a known issue. Doesn't help your situation but may be related. My experience, which is admittedly limited, is that Apple Photos develops raw photos just as capably as Affinity.

This bug has been noted in several threads in the bugs in Mac OS forum. Last comment that I am aware of was from MEB on 19 March stating that the development team are aware of the bug. If you are lucky enough to have a working version of the Edit in Affinity Photo extension to Apple Photos, you could try developing the raw photo using that. The Édit in Affinity Photo extension is also better suited than the Develop extension for jpegs. Be aware, however, that there are issues for some Mac users with the Edit in Affinity Extension resulting in similar error messages. That said, Apple Photos does as good if not better job than Affinity in developing raw photos.

There are a number of threads about this bug with numerous work arounds some of which work some of the time for some of the people but none of which work for all of the people all of the time. The only certainty is that in a week or so another new thread will be started as someone else “discovers” that Edit in Affinity Photos does not work well with Apple Photo. And arguably, as time moves on, so too perhaps the likelihood that there is no fix. Surely it is well past time for the Affinity staff to be more transparent and open about this and include a warning on both the Apple store and Affinity store about this long standing issue. Judging by the number of recurring threads, far too many users of Apple photos are getting needlessly bitten by a bug which they should be warned about before buying the product. Even if only a minority (as we are led to believe) are impacted. How many users, like myself for instance, have simply given up on using Affinity Photo extensions within Apple Photos? And in fact, because of this, discovered another photo editing application which meets most of their needs? Surely part of the process for finding a fix should also include making more of an effort to determine if there are any common factors at play with those affected. I see very little attempts by developers to ask any follow on questions of those of us that are affected.

It sounds like you are experiencing the same bug with Edit in Affinity Photos extension that has been reported in several threads in this forum and In the bugs in Affinity Photo forum (Mac OS). Not all users are affected. It also does not seem to affect extensions such as Haze Removal. Affinity Develop also has reported problems for raw photos.

I did not intend my frustration about these bugs to disparage Affinity overall. While the lack of obvious progress in fixing these issues is frustrating, there are still a lot of good things that can be done with Affinity. The extensions other than Affinity Develop and Edit in Affinity work well within Apple Photos. There are also work arounds for the Edit In Affinity extension and Affinity does work well in stand alone mode. It is still a good product .... but would be much better once these bugs with Apple Photos are fixed.

Can the dev and marketing staff take into consideration the possibility of (a) including a warning with the product description of the Apple Store and Affinity Store to the effect that the Affinity Photo extensions might not work with Apple Photos for some users and (b) adding a prominent sticky note (or whatever it is called) to the appropriate fora describing these long standing problems between Apple Photos and Affinity. Indeed, I am wondering if this is ever going to be solved and would suggest that it might even be time to pull the Affinity Develop and Edit in Affinity Extensions from the app altogether. The fact that it is only a "select group" (as one moderator described it) who are experiencing these bugs should not minimize the importance of fixing this sooner rather than later.

I am unclear as to how the AP team came to a conclusion that there does not appear to be a common factor here.

A frustrating aspect of all this is, despite the fact the AP developers acknowledge that these issues affect « a select group of users », there does not seem to be much effort to follow up in any detail with users in this select group to try and see if a common element can be found. Failing that, can we at least be assured that the AP team have been able to replicate these problems in-house?

Hi vincenthird, there are several workarounds that work for some but there doesn’t seem to any one single fix-all solution. I suggest search through some of the threads on Affinity and Apple Photos here and in the bug forums and look for workarounds that relate to your work flow. Some have had success with Edit with Affinity Photo instead of Edit in ...., others have used an older but still workable app External Editors for Photos (it only costs a dollar or two), still others use variations on exporting the edits and saving back to Apple and so on and so on.

My apologies if my comment implied that Affinity was not at all compatible with Catalina. As a user, I was referring to the challenges some have had when using Affinity with Apple Photos, not to the overall compatibility of Affinity with the Mac OS. I may also have interpreted too broadly your statement that the issue with Apple Photo was fixed. Obviously you were referring to one set of issues (or just one issue); I was referring to others. It is encouraging to hear that these are being worked on. And on a positive note, I confirm that I have had no problems to date using Affinity both as a stand alone and in conjunction with my main photo management and editing app (which is not Apple Photo) on a Catalina Mac.

This statement is contradicted in several threads, with issues acknowledged by other AP staff. The Edit in Affinity Photo extension has several major issues requiring work around for some users. Affinity Develop does not, for some users, work with raw photos. Discouraging to read that some AP staff apparently believe the issues with Apple Photos have been fixed while other staff members have acknowledged in other threads that there are problems with Apple Photos that the dev team is trying to fix.

All versions of Catalina up to and including 10.15.4, Photos 5 (the current version with each iteration of Catalina), Affinity Photos 1.7.3 and all versions of 1.8 up to and including 1.8.2. Reported in Affinity with Apple Photos bugs (several threads there) so will not go into more detail here. I have decided to not expend any more time and effort trying to use AP within Apple Photos until the issues have been reported fixed in an update. Not interested in exploring any more work arounds either. I will monitor from a distance, keep an eye on upcoming updates to AP, and await a fix. Until that moment comes, for my needs it's much easier and time effective to use AP outside of the Apple Photos world.

I should add that my issues are not related to the Cloud as I do not use the Cloud.

I am on record as having experienced many of the frustrations discussed above and in several other threads concerning AP when used with Apple Photos. Multiple workarounds have been suggested, some work some of the time, few work all of the time. The Edit in AP extension is so frustrating and unpredictable that I gave up using it with Apple Photos altogether. Affinity Develop extension is equally dysfunctional as it does not work for RAW photos. Why include these two extensions if they are known to have major issues that seem all but unresolvable? I appreciate that some, perhaps even many, have been more fortunate. I also appreciate that AP staff are working on it. They have been saying this for a year. AP is a good product used as a stand alone. It is, however, less than reliable when used with Apple Photos.

Not sure I follow you on this one. My edit and save process is pretty much as you described above and in the screen recording. After saving the changes in Apple Photos, all I have is the edited image as per the Edit in AP process. There are no duplicates unless I created one in Apple Photos. Nor is there a copy of the original (although I could make one by creating a duplicate and reverting if I wished). The issue with saved edits in AP for me, at least, is as follows. If I re-open the previously AP edited image in Edit in AP, without doing any in between edits using the Apple Photo edit functions, Edit in AP opens the photo as the original, with none of the previous edits showing. This is also happening with Affinity Develop. On the other hand, if I make even a small edit in Apple Photos before attempting to Edit in AP again, AP will show the image with the previous edits when I open it in Edit in AP. It is all becoming a bit moot in my situation as I have adopted another app to meet my post-LR day to day editing and DAM requirements instead of Apple Photos. AP integrates very well with this other app (much as Photoshop did with LR), and I mostly now use Apple Photos for viewing and sharing jpgs and a few other things. That said, I do recognize that for those who use Apple as their main DAM, it would be good to see these issues fixed and I also do understand and appreciate that the AP folks are working on it.

Purchased from Affinity Store in October 2019. Initially used with Mojave, then with Catalina. If memory serves me well, I did not have any issues with Mojave but I upgraded to Catalina soon after.

When I attempt to develop a RAW photo using the Affinity Develop extension in Apple Photos (Catalina), save changes results in Error message. Have tried with Olympus and Panasonic RAW photos with identical results, also with referenced and managed photos in Apple. Am able to edit jpgs in the Affinity Develop extension but that of course is not the point of the extension. I have also been able to develop RAW photos in the Edit in AP extension, but when I re-open the image in Edit in AP extension, it reverts to the original in AP (as do jpgs). The Mac is on Catalina and it is AP 1.8.2. Had same issue with 1.8.1

If you immediately re-open the edited photo in the Edit in AP extension, without having done any edits with Apple Photos, does it open with the edits or in the original unedited image? The only way I have been able to re-open in Edit in AP to do any further editing is to first bake the edit in by doing a minor edit with Apple Photos before re-opening in Edit AP.

Does anyone know if AP have acknowledged that Affinity Develop does not work - for some of us at least - with RAW and identified this as a bug to be fixed? As far as I can see from perusing the various bug threads, several of us have mentioned this but there has been no feedback from AP.

I, and several others, are on record in this and several other threads in noting concerns on this longstanding bug so I think it's fair to assume it is not constrained to the German version alone. Unfortunately it is difficult to know if the AP dev team are still trying to fix this or if it's been relegated to the back burner assuming its "fixed for most" as for the most part they have remained apart from the discussion. A relatively easy temporary fix can be obtained by installing the very inexpensive if somewhat dated External Editors extension. I have no personal interest in this app, but I can say that it works. There are other work arounds but the External Editors is the least painful fix. A couple of us have also noted that the Affinity Develop extension for Apple Photos does not work for RAW but as far as I am aware, there has yet to be even the slightest acknowledgement of this by AP.