befehr

I've created some custom brushes of lines with arrowhead. Any thought as to why the ends are distorted? The one on top should be a perfect circle.
I have noticed with in the current version as well as beta. 
 

Hi befehr,
Yes, you are downloading the latest Beta available (1.6.7 Beta 1) however it's now old and have expired (they are set to last one month). A new one should be made available soon.

Hi Puffin,
It's also happening here. The current Beta (1.6.7 Beta 1) has now expired. Andrew will probably release another one soon.

Currently many raw converters do not only do highlights recovery but also highlights reconstruction. Lightroom does it to some extent, and so does Capture One but the best results I've seen in my files were with PhotoNinja. Free converters like RawTherapee and darktable also offer this capability (and they uniquely allow you to see raw histogram [RT] or raw over/underexposed areas [dt]). I think it's reasonable of me (a paying client) to expect of Affinity that they take note of what competitors do in this respect and learn from them.

Hi befehr,
 
For the same reasons as yours, I have tested, a lot of, if not all the Mac photo softwares on the market. Some are quite goods, some do not stand longer than a 24-hours testing (like Pixelmator pro for instance). It would be very long to detail the pro or cons of each software, but the only one that has stayed on my computer is Affinity Photo. It's the most complete, and the most powerful alternative to Photoshop, in my sense.
In a side by side comparison, you have to adapt your way of working  for each software, and, most of all, going through the whole processing, to achieve a final result that suits you.
Your concerns are justified, and it is always good to point out things that could be improved. But If you want to get rid of Lightroom, just stop trying to compare.
 
For information, I use Photo Mechanics as a DAM, Iridient Developer, or Affinity for the raw files, and Affinity and sometimes Nik plugins for the finishing work. After a few weeks to learn all of these software (I still have work), I do not regret switching from Lightroom.
 
All the best,
Fx

True, we advise to NOT use the Beta for commercial/critical work as it's intended for testing purposes only. But that doesn't stop anyone to try it for comparison purposes on non-critical/production work. I suggested it because i do believe the results are quite better now in particular in shadows recovery and since you were comparing it with other software it would be nice to know how these improvements stand and how or if they could be improved based on the latest code we have. 

@HVDB Fotografie True, clipped highlights are not recoverable – not with any program. However, @befehr's concerns are justified and I think it's no secret that Affinity's RAW development module lacks the quality of the rest of the app.
 
I did a comparison myself (see attached file). The original photo has both, overexposed and underexposed parts. I simply pushed the shadows slider all the way up (+100) and pulled the highlights slider all the way down (–100) in Lightroom, Luminar, and Affinity Photo. I'm aware that, in a normal post-processing workflow, one probably wouldn't go all the way with those sliders. But... the results in this little test still speak for themselves. 
RAW.pdf

I get very poor results with Affinity’s RAW development module, especially for highlights and shadows adjustments. Lightroom and Luminar are waaaay better for RAW development.
 
However, it seems like I get superior results with Affinity Photo for iPad compared to the desktop version! Anybody experiencing the same? And if so, why is that? Is the iPad version using a different/better algorithm?

Oh for gosh sakes. That was it. I knew it was simple. 
I don't know what it is but the most simple things tend to get by me in the this program. :-)
 
Thank you all. You're awesome!

Almost fun to create this one if it wasn't for some program bugs and refreshing issues. 
Is anyone else out there having problems with slow refresh rates on their mac? I have some FXs going on but I can't imaging it would slow things down so much. 

Hi MEB, back in the day and if memory serves, I had good luck exporting Xara files to either ai or eps. I also remember export CorelDRAW file to ai with some success. In both cases I believe they were exported as an earlier version of Illustrator, perhaps as early as 7. Would it be possible to have that as a export option in AF, to select an version, like Illy has?

Almost fun to create this one if it wasn't for some program bugs and refreshing issues. 
Is anyone else out there having problems with slow refresh rates on their mac? I have some FXs going on but I can't imaging it would slow things down so much. 

Almost fun to create this one if it wasn't for some program bugs and refreshing issues. 
Is anyone else out there having problems with slow refresh rates on their mac? I have some FXs going on but I can't imaging it would slow things down so much. 

Almost fun to create this one if it wasn't for some program bugs and refreshing issues. 
Is anyone else out there having problems with slow refresh rates on their mac? I have some FXs going on but I can't imaging it would slow things down so much. 

Is it possible now, or will it be possible in the future, to create tints and shades of a global color which are linked to the global color in a way that when you change the global color the tint and shade change as well?
This would be extremely helpful when giving an object a single color that can be changed at any time. I know there is the FX tool to change colors but when that is exported to another file type the effect is rasterized.
 
Illustrator has this now, but with tints only I believe.
 
 

It's indeed possible to create linked shades of a global color.

Hi Bill, I create illustrations for stock sites (Shutterstock, iStock, Fotolia and many others) entirely in Affinity Designer (since March 2017). I don't use Adobe Illustrator or any other vector editors no more. I can not say about gradients and transparency because I use only flat colors - and all works fine. Now a little about my workflow:
1) You can see my export options on screenshot attached.
2) Sometimes Shutterstock by mistake doesn't accept my illustration saying "EPS Format -- EPS file must be compatible with Illustrator version 8 or 10", so I upload it without changing anything once or at most twice again (without choosing "Previously submitted content" from "Notes for Reviewer" dropdown) - and they accept it.
3) Importantly, I use vector canvas 400 px on the largest side and 400 px or fewer on the smallest side, otherwise they say at Shutterstock that the canvas is too big or too small (see about this requirement in this article).
4) EPS created in Affinity Designer is small compared to the one created in Adobe Illustrator, so some microstock sites check it's size and give the error message. So, to get illustration accepted on all sites, I add some abstract text into the EPS file to grow it's filesize. I attached here the file with my "text for size". I open EPS with text editor (I use Notepad++).
5) I use Irfan View instead of Adobe Bridge to add metadata for JPG files.
So, Affinity Designer is the best choice for me. It's so cheap compared to Adobe Illustrator. Moreover, it's faster, more handy and more customizable. Additionally, Affinity Designer is great for isometric illustrations. You can look at my portfolio at Shutterstock.

textForSize.eps

So far as I can see tints / shades of global colours are not present. Which is a shame as it is a feature I used in Xara Designer in the past.
 
It is possible to use an adjustment layer to recolour, but this is not ideal as it is only a raster effect, not affecting the true colours of the vector image.

And here it is a fine explanation

Affinity Photo - Raw Conversion Quality

Thank you for the screenshots/details. I'm now able to reproduce this here and will pass it to the dev team. This is a bug.
Meanwhile there's a workaround you can use to select the objects: press and hold ⌥ (option/alt) and drag the marquee selection around them - make sure the background image is NOT selected already, otherwise this will not work. If you are zoomed in and accidentally clicked the background selecting the image layer press ESC to deselect it then press and hold ⌥ (option/alt) and then proceed to draw the marquee selection around the objects you want to select.
The ⌥ (option/alt) modifier described above is usually used to select objects laying above another bigger one (not locked) without selecting it, but can be used here as a workaround for this issue while it's being fixed.
 

It's already June 2017, any thoughts here from the team about an Adobe Bridge replacement?
I am really looking for a tool to replace Bridge which will allow me to view thumbnails and add/edit metadata for illustrations and photos. This is a requirement for stock image uploads.

It's already June 2017, any thoughts here from the team about an Adobe Bridge replacement?
I am really looking for a tool to replace Bridge which will allow me to view thumbnails and add/edit metadata for illustrations and photos. This is a requirement for stock image uploads.

Sorry i should have been more clear.  If you go back to the Home screen without doing anything else the file is automatically saved there. To delete or rename it, click the menu button on the bottom right of the thumbnail. Files "saved" here are not accessible from outside the app. The Save As Copy and Export options i was referring to are located in the document icon - the one on the right of the (<- ) when you have a document open -, see screenshot below.
 

 
Currently there's no way to open a file from iCloud Drive (or other cloud service), edit it and save directly over it. We are aware of those workflow issues and will do our best to improve/solve them in the future.

Hello Anon223029,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
We are aware of those limitations with the Expand Stroke command. This will be improved soon.

Hi befehr,
The Merge all Windows command only merges the document tabs into a single window, it doesn't go back to non-separated mode. For that you have to uncheck Separated Mode form the Window menu.
This seems to be working fine for me on both versions 1.5.4 and Beta 1.5.5 Beta 1. Am i missing something?