stuck

Hate to be picky but I think what you actually mean there is that DxO products, like PhotoLab are good. DxO the company is not that good.

Why use an XP machine? I've got CS2 on my Win 10 box.

See here: https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/164377-information-about-the-legacy-plus-range/

Anybody remember FRACTINT? An amazing fractal generator for MS-DOS. I used to run it on a PC with a 10MHz Intel 80286 CPU, no maths co-processor, 1 MB RAM and two 1.44 MB floppy disc drives (i.e. no HDD). Even on that lowly device it would generate a Mandelbrot set in less than a minute. It last received any TLC in 2000 but you can still get it, from here: https://www.fractint.org/

A quick search for the specs of the OP's monitor suggests it is a basic model, with only a TN not and IPS panel. Given that it seems unlikely that it could handle the Adobe RGB colour space.

When you click 'Export', at the bottom of Affinity's Export Settings dialog the next thing that happens is that Affinity displays a regular File | Save dialog. Make sure you take note of what folder it is pointing at. Having done that, open Explorer and browse to that folder to find your file. Looking at your screen shot, both _MG_2623 and _MG_2623 (small) have been saved to: D:\Affinity Photo If your files are not in that folder, I've no idea where they are.

Look in the layers panel and ensure you have selected a pixel layer and not an adjustment layer or a mask before you try to switch to the Develop Persona.

Yes! Indeed, deep saturated colours are tricky. But I'm only a casual amateur, printing for my own pleasure. I don't claim that my prints are 'gallery ready'. Yup, been there, done that, got the t-shirt 😁 Only yesterday I printed a shot of some golden autumn leaves that does just that.

Forgot to add... If I have converted my .afphoto file to sRGB and then exported a sRGB JPEG, I don't resave the .afphoto file, because the .afphoto file is the master version of the finalised image.

My workflow is similar to yours except I'm still on DxO PL5 (still thinking about upgrading to PL7). Thus my RAW files are converted in PL5 / Adobe RGB and exported to TIFF with Adobe RGB and opened in Affinity Photo 2 working in Adobe RGB. Meanwhile my Dell monitor is hardware calibrate to its 'native' gamut, which if the X-Rite software is to be believed is a little bigger than Adobe RGB thus (I think) I can see all the colours that I've got in my TIFF. Once I've finalised an image I'll save it as a .afphoto file. If I'm going to print I'll usually do that direct from Photo 2 and what I get out of the printer is a good (enough for me) match to what I see on screen. Sometimes though I want greater control over the placing of an image on the paper so I export another TIFF with Adobe RGB and then open that new TIFF in an ancient version of PhotoShop with Adobe RGB as its working space and print from there. Again, what comes out the printer is acceptable. If I want to share an image then, starting from the finalised .afphoto file in Photo 2, I convert it to sRGB using Relative Colourimetric intent with black point compression. I rarely see any colour shifts as a result of that conversion. After the conversion, I'll export a JPEG with an embedded sRGB profile.

I'm not sure what you mean by this because DxO PhotoLab does not use ProPhoto as it's working colour space. It only offers the choice of either: 'legacy', which means Adobe RGB or: 'DxO Wide Gamut', which is a propriety colour space invented by DxO and which is close to, but not identical to, Rec. 2020 (see the last paragraph on the third link below) Once you have finalised your edits and are ready to export your file then PL does offer a variety of profiles, including ProPhoto thus I do understand your next step: There is more on DxO's Wide Gamut colour space here: https://support.dxo.com/hc/en-us/articles/6754299074077-What-color-space-does-DxO-PhotoLab-use- https://www.dxo.com/technology/wide-gamut/ https://www.dxo.com/news/white-paper-wide-gamut/

Can you not install the free trial?

@Digbydo 2 to get Walt's attention you need to precede his username with an @ sign, like this, @walt.farrell

Did you look at Hugin? It's free and has a Mac version: https://hugin.sourceforge.io/download/

On my Win 11 laptop I can increase the font size of the help file using a standard two finger 'zoom out' gesture on the trackpad. I guess that on my Win 10 desktop PC the view would zoom if I rolled the mouse wheel. I don't know for sure though as I've not tried it.

If Photo can't do it, then Hugin might be able to do it: https://hugin.sourceforge.io/

Hmm, yes, using the sRGB v2 profile (sRGB2014.icc) does seem to help. Thank you!

I use Adobe RGB as my working colour space, it works well in conjunction with my Adobe RGB capable monitor. If I want to share an image then I use Document | Convert... and pick sRGB IEC61966-2.1. I don't often see much of a change in the image. So far so simple. Today though converting the profile of a panorama in this way makes the image much more contrasty. However, if I simulate the conversion from Adobe RGB to sRGB by adding a soft proof adjustment layer with a proof profile of sRGB IEC61966-2.1 then the image does not become more contrasty. Am I wrong to expect a soft proof layer set to sRGB to have the same effect on screen as using Document | Convert... to sRGB? Any wisdom much appreciated. EDITED TO ADD: It doesn't matter what rendering intent I set for the conversion and the soft proof layer.

1) Uninstall the MSIX version 2) Download the .exe / MSI version from this page: https://store.serif.com/en-gb/update/windows/photo/2/ NB ignore the big blue download button, use the less obvious 'Also available:...' link underneath that button 3) Run the .exe / MSI installer

Ah, yes, of course.

Shouldn't do, not if this is true: and you have the installer for that build. On Windows you can find the build number of the installer if you RIGHT click on the .exe file and choose 'properties' and look in the 'details' tab.

Hmm, perhaps I'm misremembering... Perhaps I didn't click on the notification after all. Perhaps I went via Help. I can't remember! I know I did use the check for updates option a couple of times in the last few days as I'd read here that v2.1 was about to be released. However, when an update is available the 'update available' notification usually appears as soon as Photo has loaded so why would I not use that feature and go the long way round via Help?? Anybody here telepathic and able to read my memory better than I can recall it?

Don't know but probably not because I too used FF, it is my default browser. I've never had the MSIX version on my PC and I've never installed a beta version. This behaviour of clicking to get the download and landing on the update page and then having to click again to start the download is exact;y how I received all Photo 1 updates.

I'm on Win 10 Pro 22H2 and I'm running the MSI version of Photo2. When I opened Photo 2.0.4 I got a notification of the 2.1 update being available. When I clicked to get the update I landed on this page: https://store.serif.com/en-gb/update/windows/photo/2/ I nearly automatically clicked on the main download button but held back long enough to realise that I wanted the less obvious 'Also available' link below the big blue button. Clicking on that option downloaded the installer. Double clicking the installer updated Photo to v2.1.

That was your mistake because directly underneath that oh so tempting download button is a link to get the MSI / exe version.