Bryan Rieger

The title speaks for itself. If you're looking for quality tools for raster graphics, vector editing or DTP, you won't find them in Serif's Affinity-branded programs.
If you have an important commercial project to complete, use proven software rather than Serif products. That way you will save yourself a lot of frustration due to bugs and wasted time looking for workarounds to problems.
Below I wanted to share my review and opinion on several key areas such as bugs, UI/UX, features, updates, development process. This is all that made me draw the conclusions I mentioned at the beginning and abandon Serif products. My patience has run out. I'm not going to wait for something that won't come.
Bugs
There is no such thing as a bug-free program. I am aware of this. The fight is on to have as few of them as possible in the program and not to affect the user's work too much.
Unfortunately, Affinity programs look very bad in this respect. There are a lot of bugs in retail versions that have accumulated from previous versions and updates. The response time from reporting a bug to being fixed by the devs is too long. Suffice it to mention, the V2 version still has bugs that were reported a few years ago in the V1 version.
UI/UX
It appears that not much time was spent on the UI and that it was not designed to be effective, easy to navigate and pleasant for the user to use.
User interface is cluttered, small panels are bloated with lot of controls, grouped into multiple collapsible sections. Navigation reqires a lot of expanding and scrolling. The application's color schemes for both the dark and light theme do not provide sufficient contrast, making the interface unreadable. The alignment and organization of the elements is poor. There is a lack of structure. Visual aesthetics are disturbed. The user interface feels patchy. UI elements are not consistent in appearance and size. Stupid UX decisions don't help. By this I mean no custom export presets creation unless they are distinct in parameters from those provided by the application, export preview permanent on, text frame that remembers the last changes applied to it, or not being able to set the "Align to :" option before performing the alignment operation.
Features and tools
They are of poor quality. They use poor algorithms. Just look at tools like Contour tool, Stroke Width tool, or use expand stroke after using one of the mentioned tools. Open source software offers greater precision and quality not mentioning about competitors.
Updates and development
When it comes to updates, when Serif releases an update it will almost certainly contain regressions or, worse yet, there is a high chance of even more serious problems such as unexpected program shutdowns due to bugs in new features. It all stems from a lack of quality in the development process and insufficient internal testing. There are promises of updates that you will be happy with, but when faced with reality, it turns out that these are just empty words.
At the end, I would like to thank the forum users who always provided advice when I needed it, because I didn't know something or had a problem with something. It was good to know that I could always count on your support and quick response. Regards

At least no ridiculous bugs. And if there are, then not for years.
Why I'm slowly but surely getting annoyed with Affinity: The Affinity suite could be so wonderful and cover almost 100% of my needs if Serif had a different culture of dealing with bugs. Programs that have serious colour management bugs for months on end are - I'm sorry to say - not fit for serious use. I don't need a spiral or QR code tool if the software can't set closing quotes correctly. And so on. 
In short, and in the spirit of the original question, it would be really nice if Serif, under new ownership, would finally work through the list of annoying bugs instead of inventing new features. 
 

It must be said that one thing that has been a "feature" of Serif software, ever since the "Plus" range days, is the way that some bugs just go on forever, from update to update, version to version, and are never addressed! Hopefully, now that Canva owns Affinity, they may decide that making the existing software work as well as possible is more important than adding more (often buggy) features. I do understand that there are some new features that many people want, but is it worth having them if the bugs make the software so difficult to use?

I wonder how many Adobe users have begun trialing/using Affinity in the past week and run into not only UX/UI issues, but also significant bugs? It's wonderful that so many people are now discovering the Affinity apps, but if their first impressions are one of bug-ridden confusion and stability issues, I can't imagine they'll stick around for long—if not write them off entirely.
Acquiring new customers is hard. Getting them to take a second look is even harder.
If Canva really bought Affinity with the intent to appeal to professional users, these long-standing issues aren't going to do much to help the cause.
It would be a shame to lose them (potentially forever) due to a less than stellar user experience.

Some of the older ones may remember the Halftone Sticker Sheets from Letraset and other companies, that were used as graphics content in the analogue last century, to fill areas with halftones of certain percentages. I worked a lot with it in my early days. Some time ago a user asked for a vector based digital solution for that on this forums. So I thought about it and then created the attached assets.
My idea was to create a very simple, small and flexible solution, that doesn't need too many bytes and is easy to handle anyway. So I reduced the halftone texture to the minimum you need. That should allow you to add those to your Assets Panel without slowing down your app too much with it.
And here is how to use it:
1. Drag one of the Halftone Texture Elements on your open document.
2. Align it to the top left of your document.
3. Press Enter to open the Move/Duplicate dialogue.
4. Look at the Transform Panel to see the Width of the Halftone Texture Element and enter or copy and paste it into the field Horizontal of the Move/Duplicate dialogue. Take care that you enter the right measurement unit - the elements are created in Pixels, but possibly your document is set to Inches or Millimeters.
5. Tick the Duplicate Field to activate the duplicate function.
6. Enter the number of duplicates you want into the field Number of Copies. You can also simply click into this field and use the arrow button Up repeatedly to increase the number of duplicates.
7. Then click OK.
Now you have one line of Halftone Texture Elements.
8. Press Ctrl+A (on Windows) or Cmd+A (on Mac) to select all elements.
9. Press Enter to open the Move/Duplicate dialogue again.
10. Enter the height of the elements into the field Vertical (in case of the Halftone Strokes, enter the Width as Height).
11. Tick the Duplicate Field.
12. Enter the number of duplicates you want into the field Number of Copies or increase it using the Up arrow button as I told above.
13. Click OK.
14. Finally, I recommend to select all elements (layers) and apply the Boolean Operation (Geometry) Add, to make just one object outoff all of the elements (layers).
All single elements are 50 pixels x 50 pixels at 300 Pixels per Inch; so 4,2 mm x 4,2 mm  respectively 0,16535 Inch x 0,16535 Inch. As they are vectors, you can scale them lossless.
Thats it. Not too complicated, I think.
I hope someone likes it and finds it useful. You can of course use it for personal projects and as well for commercial ones. But dont resell the Assets!
Vector Halftones.afassets

I wonder how many Adobe users have begun trialing/using Affinity in the past week and run into not only UX/UI issues, but also significant bugs? It's wonderful that so many people are now discovering the Affinity apps, but if their first impressions are one of bug-ridden confusion and stability issues, I can't imagine they'll stick around for long—if not write them off entirely.
Acquiring new customers is hard. Getting them to take a second look is even harder.
If Canva really bought Affinity with the intent to appeal to professional users, these long-standing issues aren't going to do much to help the cause.
It would be a shame to lose them (potentially forever) due to a less than stellar user experience.

I wonder how many Adobe users have begun trialing/using Affinity in the past week and run into not only UX/UI issues, but also significant bugs? It's wonderful that so many people are now discovering the Affinity apps, but if their first impressions are one of bug-ridden confusion and stability issues, I can't imagine they'll stick around for long—if not write them off entirely.
Acquiring new customers is hard. Getting them to take a second look is even harder.
If Canva really bought Affinity with the intent to appeal to professional users, these long-standing issues aren't going to do much to help the cause.
It would be a shame to lose them (potentially forever) due to a less than stellar user experience.

I've just updated that report and left a link back to this thread so the Affinity Info Bot will update here when its been resolved  
We do have a few issues logged regarding changing the DPI of a document and other objects getting scaled incorrectly, be it text or curves.  Hopefully we will see these resolved in the next beta/update  

Hi @Bryan Rieger,
Has the document been resized via File>Document Setup?  We have an issue logged where rounded corners using absolute size can be reset to 0 when a document is resized.

I ran across this video from OH no Type Co on Instagram today in which he talks about how he uses AI in his work. Rather than simply using AI to generate 'new' work from scratch, he uses it to enhance his own original work, which he uses as input. He then takes the output (feedback) from the AI and further refines it in his own designs. 
I think this is a great use of AI in that it provides the artist with the ability to rapidly explore multiple variations of their own work. This 'AI feedback' is in many ways not dissimilar to some of the feedback artists might routinely receive from peers, but it's immediate and doesn't pull them too far out of their workflow.
This is a great example of AI as a tool to enable artists, rather than as a tool to replace artists.
I've include the video itself below, but the comments in the original post https://www.instagram.com/p/C7pk-dKSGoH/ are definitely worth a read.

Just some thoughts on how I use AI. I’m not an illustrator!.mp4

I've run across a few art directors at various agencies that have been trialing 'AI artists' for some time, and have recently recommended that their agencies no longer commission AI generated (prompted) art.
A couple of problems seem to come from 'artists' who only work with AI prompts. First, they often lack any proficiency with Photoshop that would enable them to tweak the generated images to meet the agency briefs, and instead the keep modifying their prompts in the hope that the AI will somehow magically incorporate any art direction supplied. Unfortunately, the continued prompting often makes things worse, which then causes the second problem. Because these 'artists' have no formal training in the arts, they've never been exposed to critique or art direction, which means very often they take any criticism or direction as a personal attack on themselves. Needless to say, this cause a lot of friction when working to an agency brief.
We're in the gold rush (where the folks who make the shovels win) days of AI (ahem, Nvidia), and while there's LOTS of excitement, generative AI generally hasn't proven itself as a solution to any problem most folks actually have. Yes, it creates images based on a prompt, but the majority of the images have a definite 'AI smell' to them, which has recently been labelled as 'AI Boomer Art' by younger folks (I'll leave it to you to do a web search). It's also interesting that there's been a noticeable uptick in younger artists creating using analog materials (paint, charcoal, clay, etc).
Personally, I think the prompter AI 'artists' are likely soon to go the way of all of the NFT artists from a few years back. If you can't make a living creating prompt generated AI art today given how cheap the services are (many companies currently view AI as a loss-leader), there's no chance you're going to pay the adjusted standard market rates when things cool.

The art is a concept here, which asks questions about the nature of art, of creativity, interpretation, etc by presenting the audience with a blank slate and asking them to imagine the work from the description. There's been a number of artists who have executed similar concepts over the years. Cy Twombly did this back in the late 50's, where he 'painted' works with alluring titles (such as 'Poems to the Sea'), using only a few pencil lines, brush strokes, and scribbled words to depict the subjects, compelling the audience "to read what is there, but not fully manifest in the artist’s scrawled script."

I've run across a few art directors at various agencies that have been trialing 'AI artists' for some time, and have recently recommended that their agencies no longer commission AI generated (prompted) art.
A couple of problems seem to come from 'artists' who only work with AI prompts. First, they often lack any proficiency with Photoshop that would enable them to tweak the generated images to meet the agency briefs, and instead the keep modifying their prompts in the hope that the AI will somehow magically incorporate any art direction supplied. Unfortunately, the continued prompting often makes things worse, which then causes the second problem. Because these 'artists' have no formal training in the arts, they've never been exposed to critique or art direction, which means very often they take any criticism or direction as a personal attack on themselves. Needless to say, this cause a lot of friction when working to an agency brief.
We're in the gold rush (where the folks who make the shovels win) days of AI (ahem, Nvidia), and while there's LOTS of excitement, generative AI generally hasn't proven itself as a solution to any problem most folks actually have. Yes, it creates images based on a prompt, but the majority of the images have a definite 'AI smell' to them, which has recently been labelled as 'AI Boomer Art' by younger folks (I'll leave it to you to do a web search). It's also interesting that there's been a noticeable uptick in younger artists creating using analog materials (paint, charcoal, clay, etc).
Personally, I think the prompter AI 'artists' are likely soon to go the way of all of the NFT artists from a few years back. If you can't make a living creating prompt generated AI art today given how cheap the services are (many companies currently view AI as a loss-leader), there's no chance you're going to pay the adjusted standard market rates when things cool.

Warning: this post contains generative AI work for illustration purposes only.
Not to dismiss the many talents of the Affinity staff, but typically you'd want an AI trained on a MUCH larger dataset in order to be able to generate anything meaningful.
Anyway, you can do this already - check out Canva (you know, the folks who know own Serif/Affinity). Their 'Magic Media' and 'Magic Write' features are pretty impressive. For instance, I give you the following Canva Magic Write poem based on the prompt " a villanelle about a frog and toad", along with a Magic Media image generated using the following 5 word prompt 'frog toad pond moonlight friendship'.
It's not great (although it does have that 'generative AI smell'), but it's also not terrible, and could easily provide a great starting point for your own illustration and villanelle about a frog and toad.
I don't think a separate Affinity Generative AI app is needed (or a wise investment), just an SDK that enables others to add integrations to various AI services. Users can then opt to use, or not, any AI in whichever way they personally choose.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

So I'm gonna pipe in with what is very likely an unpopular opinion here to try and balance things out.
Before the acquisition of Affinity by Canva my only experience with Canva was having to prepare assets for others to use, as well as provide a little art direction for folks from various disciplines; social media, marketing, community orgs, etc. Every time I logged into Canvas I cringed, and I made a point of spending as little time as possible there.
After the acquisition I decided to dig a little deeper into Canva; the product, the company, and the community. I tried to approach it with an open mind, and without all the years of baggage I have of using 'professional' design tools. Here's my takeaways:
The Product
I decided to take Canva up on their offer of a free 30 day Pro trial, rather than just use the free version. This includes things such as custom fonts, branding kits, resizing and translation of designs, and the ability to schedule social content (among other goodies). The (old) interface took a little getting used to as it was very simple, BUT something about it reminded me of using Apple's Keynote (especially the new interface). I LOVE Keynote in that it doesn't overwhelm you with features, but it still enables you to achieve impressive results. And it's FUN to use. For me, Canva has this same feel. It's fun. It might not be packed with 'professional' features, but it is very easy to quickly create something that looks good—even without using the avalanche of available templates or elements. Will it replace Affinity (or Adobe) for me, no, but it is an app that I am definitely going to add to my toolkit. After using it for the past month I have to say I can see why it is so beloved by its community. I hope Canva can help bring some of this 'fun' user experience to the Affinity apps. Not dumbing them down, but rather adding those little touches that delight and engage.
The Company
Now I've developed a general distrust of all tech companies in recent years, and I approached Canva with the same trepidation. I watched the Canva Create Musical, and to be honest I've seen worse (recent Adobe and Apple events come to mind). The thing I liked about it was that it didn't take itself too seriously, and it was instilled with the same FUN that I've come to know in the app itself. I'm also really impressed by their philanthropy, environmental initiatives, and their commitment to provide Canva and Affinity for free to non-profits and education. The last one is HUGE, and so important.
The Community
So this is the bit that blew me away. Canva is LOVED by its community, and (judging by social media interactions) Canva loves its community. So many folks around the world have used Canva to help create and run their businesses, community projects, side-hustles, hobbies, and freelance projects. It has enabled these people like no other tool has, and there are entire cottage industries built around Canva to provide templates, training, tutorials, artwork, consulting, etc. The fact that it's gaining traction in the enterprise is no surprise as folks will often initially use the tools they already know personally long before corporate purchasing enters the picture (see Slack, GitHub, etc). For marketing, growth and social media departments Canva is a no-brainer, especially if you're working with a team.
The Opportunity
So, essentially I've come away from this experiment with a new app in my toolkit. One that is fun and easy to use. One that is developed by a company with values that I'm generally aligned with (the AI stuff, not so much - but EVERYBODY is doing it for the moment), and one with a massive community that is fanatical about the product. For me, I see this as a massive opportunity to find ways to work with orgs and enterprises using Canva, creating bespoke assets/illustrations, branding kits, and templates (using the Affinity apps), and providing design training and consulting/art direction.
Anyway, if you've read all the way to here - thank you. I easily could have written pages and pages, but I hope these few paragraphs provide some insight into my experience and perspective of Canva since the acquisition.
Change is hard, but it's also an opportunity.

This is a big shock to many. They need to process it and guess what the consequences will be, and some need to express those opinions, which is all they are. There's so many many posts in here speculating and guessing what might happen, which I would love to say are just plain wrong, but until something actually happens we would just be back and forthing about unprovable opinions.
I feel sad that so many are suspicious and I think Affinity will be upholding Ash's 4 pledges in ways most are happy to see. 
Deleting the more negative posts from this thread would simply make those same users be able to also say we silence criticism, and we don't. Many of those same users also participate very positively in other areas of the forums and I appreciate that and don't want that to stop. If negativity here keeps the rest of the forums functioning I would take that.

It is indeed true that there are some who attack anyone who submits a suggestion for a new feature or improvement. But that should never cause one to stop contributing ideas. Nothing can stop you from having your say. Ignore the naysayers while they have their say. There are lots of smart, discerning people reading these forums. They are perfectly capable of sorting the comments and extracting value.
Personally I find the frequent remarks against suggestions quite humorous. They are typical of a certain mindset described more than 100 years ago by F. M. Cornford in his delightful "Microcosmographia Academica" in which he explains why nothing ever gets done. He was speaking in particular about universities and elite professors, but the arguments can be extended to other fields.
https://www.cs.kent.ac.uk/people/staff/iau/cornford/cornford.html
Cornford describes the Principle of the Wedge and the Principle of the Dangerous Precedent in Chapter VII of his essay. Ultimately it follows that nothing should ever be done for the first time.
https://www.cs.kent.ac.uk/people/staff/iau/cornford/cornford7.html
For almost any request or suggestion included in the Feedback and Suggestions forum you can expect to see one or more of the following responses:
1.  Your suggestion should not be implemented because I have no use for it.
2.  Your suggestion is unnecessary because you can easily achieve the effect by following this ten-step procedure...
3.  Your suggestion is unnecessary because you have been doing things wrong for years. Just follow my example and you will be happier.
4.  Your suggestion should not be taken seriously because I can't imagine how the developers could actually implement it.
5.  Your suggestion has been made many times over many years so it is unnecessary to repeat it.
6.  Your suggestion has been made many times in the past and it is logged with the developers.
7.  Many more boiler-plate responses could be listed, but it's supper time here in Virginia and so I must sign off
 
 

+1 for a slider to control the amount of smoothing applied. It would be nice to be able to vary it, rather than just have it on or off.