Bold Venture

OK ... turns out the image was CMYK ... but it still seems odd ... Photoshop had certain filters that only worked in RGB ... but tone mapping??

In Photoshop, whenever I wanted to adjust brightness, darkness, white/black levels, I would just do it. In Affinity Photo, apparently, we have to switch "modes," but the screen message states: "Please select an RGB pixel later before entering [mode] mode." What am I being asked for? I assumed the entire image was RGB.

Thanks, Walt! G'MIC is nice ... some interesting filters ... but not certain I can get the results I want. I'll experiment with the program.

I'm completely lost as to how to install the Grey's thing. Can't find the Affinity plugin folder. The instructions refer to Affinity 1.0 ... since the program has been updated, where to find the folder?

Amazon usually prefers pages to be submitted as single pages, and not in the spread format.

Wow ... I didn't think the attached images would be so ... large ...

v_kyr and firstdefence, thanks for the suggestions! I'll check these out. Dynamic Auto Painter (https://www.mediachance.com/dap/) seems pretty good. You can download a free version that watermarks your images, but you can test it and see how it performs. Some photos are miraculously transformed, while others are just "meh," depending on your needs. I'm trying to create covers similar to the vintage pulp covers, like the attached examples. Dynamic Auto Painter (DAP) works wonders sometimes. A designer could create several versions and piece together the ones they like. Run the software, actions, whatever, then go in with brush and make adjustments. A few times I've sampled DAP and the results are ... well, let's just say they wouldn't understand them at the Museum of Modern Art. I'll check your suggestions ... thanks to Lagarto, too!

Lagarto, I believe they have discontinued all support for CS3. That's the part that angers me — I never needed their support. I just want the software to work. But the landing page to put in your "activation code" was removed by Adobe. It's like a particularly sleazy municipal council hiring a shady mechanic to remove the starter from your car, then threatening to tow the vehicle if you can't drive it away. Many of the pages to download the software are gone. Basically, Adobe is forcing people to get onboard with their subscription. I figured I'd pay the $20 per month for InDesign, just to keep my assembly-line going for a while. Then I realized Adobe wants to charge $14.95 per month just for a full version of Adobe Acrobat. I clicked on the link you provided ... when I sign in, it goes to the page where my CS3 is registered. But they want an "activation," which they didn't ask for in the past. But since there's no place to "activate it," I can't use it. Those pages were removed, Adobe says, because the servers are old and outdated. What the hell are they talking about?? It's a line of code ... simple ... but most people probably just fume (like me) or accept it. At this point, unless I could get my CS3 working, I don't really want to continue with Adobe.

An "oily paint" action came in handy with Adobe Photoshop. I design book covers, and the various paint actions lent a painted look to mystery and science fiction books. Especially popular with guys (and gals) who appreciate pulp fiction from the 1940s and up. Since the sinister Adobe managed to catch up with me and deactivate my legally purchased copy of CS3, I'm using Affinity Photo and Designer. But Affinity doesn't seem to have any "actions" like Photoshop. Unless I'm missing something. Can anybody point me toward a few of these handy action shortcuts for Affinity Photo?

Thanks for all the suggestions. We'll see what happens when I send files to be printed. In the meantime, exporting the illustrator/designer files as an SVG seems to retain the vector aspect. I drop files into InDesign, and I'm getting a clear background where everything should be clear.

Since "Designer" is the approximate of "Illustrator," I figured I could use these files in Adobe InDesign. Although I have no problems with Affinity Photo files, if I take the extra step of exporting them as jpg or tiff, Affinity Designer doesn't seem to import into InDesign as well. Any suggestons? (Aside from get rid of Adobe) Hopefully I'll be completing the switch to Affinity soon, but I'm using InDesign temporarily.

Hello! Okay ... In 2008, I purchased a used Adobe Creative Suite CS3 for eight-hundred dollars. For the past thirteen plus years, I have avoided upgrading. Today, I'm not certain what my options are ... my local computer repair shop replaced my dying hard drive. They preserved all of my old files (created with CS3). Unfortunately, I had to reinstall the software. Adobe gave me "activate" messages, but they've removed all the activation pages for older software. In a nutshell, I can no longer use my perfectly good program because ... well, because. Judging from tests, I believe it's possible to continue working with Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer, and just dump Photoshop and Illustrator. The program I really needed was Adobe InDesign, and Affinity Publisher seems more complicated. Not to mention, Affinity does not recognize my old InDesign files. For example: If I open a PDF file (created in my old Acrobat) with Affinity, the files has a few discrepancies. A perfectly aligned table of contents page now has unjustified lines. Opening some old PDF files in Affinity would save me a tremendous amount of time, but not if text boxes and graphics are misaligned or moved around. How can I open PDF files with minimal problems? Would it be easier, I wonder, to just subscribe to Indesign 2022 and use it in conjunction with Affinity Photo and Designer?

I have Affinity 1.10 ... My old Adobe Creative Suite CS3 software (which I had to reinstall) apparently can't be activated. I'm getting activation prompts, but apparently all the activation acceptance on the Adobe website is gone. So, with the days falling away (30 days to activate), I suppose I only have 22 days left to use my old Adobe Creative Suite software. How can I begin opening some of my InDesign Files in Affinity (and convert them to the new format) so I can keep on publishing and leave Adobe behind (more of less)?

One application makes sense. InDesign. Or Publisher. Perhaps you mean people's insistence yo put cover and interior pages in one file? I've never produced a book in that manner. Cover is one file, interior is another. I can't think of any printer/publisher that would accept a file with cover and interior placed together.

I've heard that InDesign 6 (or 7 or 8 or CC, whatever) has a feature wherein a user can create a front and back cover page (9" tall by 6" wide, let's say) ... but PAGE 2 can be 9 inches tall and .25" wide ... or .5" wide or 1" wide ... or whatever a book's spine width. They can create one seamless PDF for uploading to one's printer of choice. I don't know the accuracy of that statement, but it sure would be nice to adjust the size of a middle page designated for a book spine. Does Affinity Publisher 1.9 have a setting similar to this? Ordinarily, if I am designing a book measuring 6x9, I create a file measuring 12x9, plus the additional width of the spine.