F_J_Woods

Just to dog-pile on this already mature thread, I completely follow what rui_mac is saying. When you click on the layers mask, you are presented with what looks like a grayscale layer, the black (obviously) being the mask. Of course, the black is usually not uniformly black, especially if you've created the mask via Select Sample Color to mask out, say, a green-screen background. With dodge and burn, you can simply select your desired tonal range (say, affecting the shadows only) and it is breathtakingly simply to tighten your task: you don't have to worry about brushing black onto your white cutout, because you're burning only shadows which in this case is nothing more than your imperfect mask.
 
If you use a regular brush with black color, you are reduced to the painstaking work of brushing just up to the fine edge of your cutout while not cutting in on detail.
 
So, two votes for dodge/burn on Masks!
 
If there's a different way to do this I would love to hear it!

Just to dog-pile on this already mature thread, I completely follow what rui_mac is saying. When you click on the layers mask, you are presented with what looks like a grayscale layer, the black (obviously) being the mask. Of course, the black is usually not uniformly black, especially if you've created the mask via Select Sample Color to mask out, say, a green-screen background. With dodge and burn, you can simply select your desired tonal range (say, affecting the shadows only) and it is breathtakingly simply to tighten your task: you don't have to worry about brushing black onto your white cutout, because you're burning only shadows which in this case is nothing more than your imperfect mask.
 
If you use a regular brush with black color, you are reduced to the painstaking work of brushing just up to the fine edge of your cutout while not cutting in on detail.
 
So, two votes for dodge/burn on Masks!
 
If there's a different way to do this I would love to hear it!

Just to dog-pile on this already mature thread, I completely follow what rui_mac is saying. When you click on the layers mask, you are presented with what looks like a grayscale layer, the black (obviously) being the mask. Of course, the black is usually not uniformly black, especially if you've created the mask via Select Sample Color to mask out, say, a green-screen background. With dodge and burn, you can simply select your desired tonal range (say, affecting the shadows only) and it is breathtakingly simply to tighten your task: you don't have to worry about brushing black onto your white cutout, because you're burning only shadows which in this case is nothing more than your imperfect mask.
 
If you use a regular brush with black color, you are reduced to the painstaking work of brushing just up to the fine edge of your cutout while not cutting in on detail.
 
So, two votes for dodge/burn on Masks!
 
If there's a different way to do this I would love to hear it!

Yes, I am sorry when I said view I assumed that we have the ability to edit in that view as well. What good would viewing something if you could not make edit it, right? Some people might be wondering why this matters so I give you a scenario an example. Sometimes when making a selection being able to view the the mask layer in  this sort of way makes it easier for you to define your selection in greater detail. In the example below. you will see there are some really fine details of hair. The areas where the image is white is completely selected and the areas that are a percentage of gray are partially selected. If I take a paint brush and paint in the areas that are gray that I prefer white then those areas will be fully selected. Now there are instances when you just want to sharpen the areas of selection but not with a tool like the paint brush. You might want to focus on areas that may be sitting in a particular color channel. You would use the dodge and burn tools to selectively increase or decrease the brightness of select pixels in the highlights, midtones or shadows. There are numerous scenarios that can be applied here. Hmm, maybe we might see more of this in Affinity Photo.... 
 

Hi evtonic3,
I'm not able to see the video here due to its privacy settings.
 
[EDIT] Thanks for the updated link @evtonic3. I'm now able to see it.
My comment to see the mask was totally out of place here. Sorry. 
I agree that channels are very powerful for selections and @rui_mac have been stressing this from the beginning.
I'm sure we will get there. Thank you both for sharing the videos.  :D

Just to dog-pile on this already mature thread, I completely follow what rui_mac is saying. When you click on the layers mask, you are presented with what looks like a grayscale layer, the black (obviously) being the mask. Of course, the black is usually not uniformly black, especially if you've created the mask via Select Sample Color to mask out, say, a green-screen background. With dodge and burn, you can simply select your desired tonal range (say, affecting the shadows only) and it is breathtakingly simply to tighten your task: you don't have to worry about brushing black onto your white cutout, because you're burning only shadows which in this case is nothing more than your imperfect mask.
 
If you use a regular brush with black color, you are reduced to the painstaking work of brushing just up to the fine edge of your cutout while not cutting in on detail.
 
So, two votes for dodge/burn on Masks!
 
If there's a different way to do this I would love to hear it!

Hi crabtrem,
While using the selection/refine tools can lead to good results, those methods rely on manual input from you to achieve their result. Its precision depends on the efficiency of the algorithms that detect selection's boundaries and on the quality/labor of your (manual) work.
Channels provide a way to create selections based on the information that's already present on the image. There's no algorithms or direct input from the user involved and so are less prone to errors, giving you a better result. The "manual labor" in this case is to manipulate the channel(s) to enhance/decrease contrast using the information already present to generate a mask from the elements of the image. This leads to much more detailed and precise selections/masks.

I raise my hand for supporting this feature! This is a technique that season veterans use very regular. This technique is used heavily in compositing and is at the core of many workflows.
 
-Ronnie 

When you are dodging/burning you are just adding more contrast to the textures that are already present in the image, since they are derived from the color channels.
So, imagine a wool sweater. It has a distinct edge, that results from the coarse wool. It even has a kind of... lets call it "organic feathered edge". So, painting would create a harder edge. Simply dodging and burning would create a nice mask with the "organic feathered edge" in a very controlled manner. I could even decide to increase the density of some parts of the edge and keep it softer in other places.
The same with hairs. Sometimes I just want to keep the thicker hairs and ditch the thinner ones. By dodging and burning on a channel that was derived from a color channel, I can create a very perfect hair mask, that is completely controlled by me, not a result of automatic processes. Oh, I can use automatic processes. But dodging and burning will allow me to edit the result of the automatic process in a very controllable way. Painting hairs is not efficient, specially when they are already there, in the mask, just requiring some brightness/contrast adjustments.

Hi rui_mac,
You're not alone. I'm also hoping this will get implemented. I know you've requested it a few times and i still hope it will be added at some point, however i don't have much details about this yet :(

Well, I succeeded in achieving a simulation of the Highlights Filter following the idea of Darren Bernhardt. A demonstration file is attached. I first explain what I made and then I state new remarks ; maybe the operation of AP could be improved—or my brain reoriented ?
 
When you open my file, you see the background layer only : a little girl with a hat a bit too luminous, which would be better somewhat darkened. In the Layers Panel, the 2nd line is a group containing the simulated filter ; for completeness, the top layer shows the corrective adjustement I made in Photoshop, namely a curve adjustment with the ad hoc mask. Please do not activate the two corrective layers simultaneously ; also do not pay attention to the strength of the correction, this is only an exercise.
 
The simulated filter is made of three layers :
(i)            a curve adjustment with a luminosity mask within its mask ( “Strength“ layer). The curve applies a very strong contrast to the lighter tones. Normally this would result into a strong darkening of medium and dark tones, but this effect is contained by the dark tones in the luminosity mask.
(ii)           This containing action is not sufficient, it is necessary to put black in the darkest tones of the mask. This is made with a Level ou Curve adjustment  (“Range“ layer) acting on the mask of the first layer  ("Strength")
(iii)         At this point, the lightest tones of the picture are darkeneanxd, as wished, but also somewhat flattened. This is counteracted by blurring the mask of the first layer (“Strength“), through a live filter adjustment in the “Radius“ layer. As a gaussian blur may easily lead to undesirable halos along edges, I used a more sophisticated bilateral  blur.
Obviously, the names Strength, Range and Radius come from the control sliders of the Highlights Filter. And obviously as well, in Photoshop, steps (ii) and (iii) are not reversible.
 
Now the new remarks :
 
(1) when I open the Level or Curve adjustment over a mask, as in step(ii) above, I have to switch to the alpha channel.  Cannot this be done automatically, since it should be possible to recognize that one is working on a mask? More comfortable !
(2) When you apply a Curve/Level adjustment to a mask and switch from RGB channels to the alpha channel, the bottom histogram suddenly disappears, which is a little alarming, especially for a beginner. Would not it be possible to display the histogram of the mask alpha channel?   
(3)  Mere curiosity : would it be possible (simply) to merge the three layers into a single curve adjustment layer, Photoshop-like, with a mask including the action of steps (ii) and (iii) ?
(4) More annoying : I did not manage to run the dodge/burn tools on a mask. Try with the upper layer in my file ; alt-click its thumbnail in order to display the mask. I could paint it with the brush tool but I got nothing with the dodge/burn tools.  Did I miss something again ?
la_bonne_glace.afphoto

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Here's the link - https://www.udemy.com/affinityphoto-solid-foundations/ . Just underneath the box that says take this course, there's a message that says 'redeem a coupon'. Enter 'IntroPromo' in the box that pops up.
 
So far over 4,500 of you have seen my other post about 3 tutorials for beginners - well this course goes much deeper and much further. As well as the 5 stages I spoke about on my YouTube videos (but in much more detail on the new course) I also cover tools and techniques that professionals use. I've been a designer for the best part of 30 years and in that time I've come to realise that there's a good way and a bad way to use the tools in any image editing program. It's this experience I aim to pass on to you. This is a 7.5 hour long, 50+ tutorial Affinity Photo course aimed at beginners. For an overview check this out - https://youtu.be/iSNpq01n3HQ 
 
I'm aiming to give you the knowledge and the confidence to make your photos shine. I know what it's like opening up a new and complicated program and wondering what on earth you're supposed to do. I created this course bearing that in mind. I also aimed to cover all the bases a beginner needs.
 
Please note that I did not cover developing Raw files. The reason for that is because most beginners won't be using Raw files, so it didn't seem appropriate to charge for that. Instead I've charged less money for this course and I have the Raw development series in development now for which I'll charge a lower price upon release. So if you end up getting both, you'll end up paying the same amount you would have paid if I'd grouped them both together and charged more.
 

Hi Mr.K
 
We do plan on creating DAM software in the future but we don't have an ETA yet sorry!
 
C

Hi Mr. K,
Currently, no. We already announced a DAM (digital assets managements software) for later, but it will take some time until it's ready.
Meanwhile there should be some improvements to the current Media Browser included in Affinity apps (menu View -> Media Browser...).

Hi ralex,
Welcome to Affinity Forums :)
We already announced our own DAM (digital assets management) software for later. It's a software similar to Apple Aperture, Adobe Lightroom to help you manage libraries. It will work seamlessly with Affinity Photo.

Hello Joju,
Welcome to Affinity Forums :)
This is on our FAQ already. You're not alone on this...  ;)
 

I'm really enjoying affinity photo and designer software, and it will be great if affinity creates a program to manage the content and photos, like bridge, lightroom, aperture, iPhoto, Photos, etc...