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Got frustrated with Eye Candy plugin (which I use quite often for client work) working in the betas over the last many months with various versions of Photo, but it would not open in the Mac App Store release versions due to sandboxing. Broke down today and bought the Affinity Store version and it works fine (given that Serif support have told me that they currently do not support Alien Skin plugins like EC). Took about an hour moving all my presets and prefs over from my MAS version to the new one, and had to completely rebuild the workspace. But it was worth it. Plus my Nik Collection plugins all seem to be working, so in the end the extra $50 was well spent (especially with the many upgrades Serif has delivered since I first bought APhoto!). Given the amount of time Eye Candy saves my clients for a lot of critical work, having it work in the release versions is a real plus, and I'm no longer tied to having to try to keep my APhoto betas alive! While EC works in my old Adobe CS5 PS, I'm trying to at some point soon get moved up from Mojave to Catalina before that goes away. Thus I'm now electing to start using my CS5 apps on a Parallels Sierra virtual volume, which is a bit slow and slightly buggy. But don't want to have to keep switching to that virtual volume every time I need EC. Thus, this is not a "bug report" as such, but might answer other MAS customers who might think there is a bug in 1.8.4 when they can't use EC. Just a quick tip on how to get around that problem if it's important to you like it is to me.

UPDATE I pulled the trigger. I created a new Affinity Photo folder in the Library/Application Support directory. I then copied the all the pref folders from the beta prefs EXCEPT the user folder. That I copied from the 1.8.3 MAS Containers pref folder. I then opened the new 1.8.4 from Affinity Store, entered my key, etc. The Workspace was NOT retained (sadly!). On the other hand, the Brushes, Styles, keyboard shortcuts, color palettes were retained. The macros had to be re-imported. And when trying to add the Assets Studio Panel, it caused continuous crashes. Thus I had to delete that pref and create a new, blank Asset panel. My several Tone Mapping presets didn't come over, so needed to export from 1.8.3 and re-import. All in all, it seems to have worked, although I've not really tried very much in the new setup. Took about an hour to get it straightened out. But in the end, it did fix my main issue -- getting Eye Candy plugin to work in a release version!!!

Discovered the main panel that caused a crash was the Assets panel. I deleted that pref and that allowed me to open a new, blank Assets panel.

Just installing a new copy of the Affinity Store APhoto 1.8.4, and needing to re-setup my workspace (sure wich these could be saved!!!!). About every 3rd pane/panel I try to add to the left side, or move to the left side, I get a crash to desktop. Thought I remember this was a reported bug in the beta testing, but can't locate that thread right now. Making it VERY slow to get my new workspace up and running! 3 crash reports attached. Archive.zip

In light of the above info and looking at this some more, I'm almost thinking that I could also simply copy my APhoto beta Application Support folders/files and copy those to a new APhoto app support directory, perhaps before installing the new Affinity Store copy. Perhaps if it sees those in ~/Library/Application Support/Affinity Photo, it may just use those (the beta was the 1.8.4GM).

Aha! Now the fog is lifting! I simply had not bothered looking at what appeared initially to look like simple aliases. Didn't make sense what they were doing in the containers directory, but now I see what they've done. Looks like the same folder/file structure as the Affinity Store prefs are in the Application Support directory from Containers. Question: Do you know if any directory other than the "user" directory needs to be copied into the newly purchased Affinity Store prefs? I'm not seeing any content in any of the other non-alias directories there, so guessing everything is within the user directory. Thanks for the assist!

Thanks, yes, I have been doing just that as a backstop in case things need reconstructing. Thanks for the help!

I think you're right! I am also reviewing a thread you contributed to from 2019 on moving prefs from a beta to a release version that has some interesting things. It doesn't, unfortunately, have any comments from Affinity team that I've spotted yet. But it may help. Makes me a bit worried that if I just go ahead and download 1.84 Affinity Store version, then try to work out getting things moved, if that might screw up my actual working MAS version and be out of business until I can sort it out! Not sure how things would go running MAS 1.83 plus Affinity Store 1.84 on the same machine! If that didn't break anything, would be a possible way to take time to work on the problem. 😩

Hmmmm. Not looking too encouraging. Looks like the MAS version (prefs/settings in Library/Containers) has a very different setup as compared to the Affinity Store versions such as my Publisher and Photo beta (in Library/Application Support). Unless someone knows better, looks like my only route might be to use the prefs/settings from my Photo beta version.

Of course, the other question might be if I can just move my APhoto prefs/settings from my betas to the Affinity Store version?!?! That might be the easiest, assuming they don't have anything strange in them!

Thanks, Walt. I just need to work around the issue of already having the MAS version installed, then adding the Affinity store version. Once I get the settings/prefs set up as before, then I can delete the MAS version (although it's still available to me from the MAS should I ever want to go back). Working through all the many betas this last couple years, APhoto release versions from the MAS simply won't allow Eye Candy plugin to open due to the macOS sandboxing security used in the later versions of Mojave and then newer Catalina. But in every iteration of the many betas, it works fine because the betas don't have the sandboxing required for versions from the MAS. I use EC quite a bit for my clients, so really need it to be working without having to resort to using my ancient Adobe CS5 apps, which I am now relegating to a virtual parallels volume running with the old Sierra OS, which I use for a few other older critical apps. Spending the extra $50 is nothing compared to the time EC saves me producing things for clients. Hoping I can simply download and open the Serif Store version and have my much-refined settings ready to use. One way or the other, still needs to be done, but hoping that it might be easy. I'll read that info to see if it has any answers. Thanks. AND OF COURSE, the real question is, are the pref/settings files the same for both versions so that they can simply be moved??? Hopefully they don't have different formats, items, etc. 😉

I'm switching from the MAS APhoto to one I'm buying from the Affinity store in order to avoid issues with sandboxing in Mojave. Does anyone know for sure how to preserve my layout, prefs, brushes, etc.? In other words, does the Affinity version use the same prefs/settings folder/files as the MAS version? Or am I going to have to start from scratch? Thanks.

Got caught with the same thing! Needed to do a quick job yesterday and was struggling to get the masks to work! Now I know why!

Yes, agreed. Get spoiled with the new beveling, metal, etc., but as you say, can't do that vector I guess. In the end, may just have to do a giant PNG and scale it down to size. Although I guess I then have to re-look at the limitations of PNG! 😣

You're right. Seems that a pdf might do the trick. I'm just so "trained" after all these years to use EPS for scalable graphics. It places just fine in APub. Just hope it will output properly without any issues when used in a printing piece.

Just tried copy/pasting elements into a new ADes doc, same results. Simply cannot get it to export a correct EPS with trans.

Interesting! If I Export and select the More/Rasterize Nothing, I get a transparent background, but I also lose all the beveling and metal effects. Not really a solution if that's the only way to get a trans background. Really seems strange.

Thanks for the assistance! That's a well hidden method to get a transparent background! I tried that but still no luck. I still get a white background when placing the EPS in either APub or ID. I've attached the ADes file to see if there is a possible problem with the artwork. I have to say that I never had an issue like this back with AI, so am a bit discouraged that something so seemingly simple can be so complex. Again, thanks for the help! Aero 20-yr in UK logo.afdesign

I have the same issue. Have a Designer 1.8.3 graphic that shows with trans background, has that set in Setup, but when exported as an EPS, has a white background. I also need to have this file as a usable EPS with transparency. How is that done in Designer? Doesn't seem to work. Aero 20-yr in UK logo.eps.zip

Looks like this is fixed in beta 1.8.4.663. Thanks!

I have never had a problem with EC in the betas, other than the preview doesn't show correctly sometimes and the window needs to be adjusted for size to get a correct preview. It works in the current/new beta, so you may want to try that.

TomM1, are you using the Mac App Store version or the Affinity store one? I keep thinking that since virtually all of the betas have allowed EC to work that likely the Affinity store version also would (since it's not having to deal with the stricter sandboxing issues of the App Store software). To me, spending $50 for a new copy from the Affinity store in order to get it to work wouldn't be the end of the world.

I can appreciate what you're saying. On the other hand, EC has never had an issue in most all of the betas. Works fine. That does lead me to believe that the issue lies in the Mac App Store version and, as you say, sandboxing. In the release version Mac Bugs forum, a poster did report that EC works in 1.8.3. As was the case in 1.8.2 and 1.8.1. So I guess I am now spoiled enough using Affinity apps as opposed to my antique CS5 apps, it would be worth the extra $50 to be able to regularly use EC within APh. Also hoping that you can support EC in the future. It is a very useful tool and greatly reduces time/costs for our clients.

With the release of the new beta, I finally updated my Mac App Store version of APhoto to 1.8.3. Once again, as in the past few releases for Mac App Store, Eye Candy will NOT open at all. I had waited specifically (and patiently) for the new 1.8.4.x beta to be released so that I had an option to still be able to use EC, guessing that the identical problem with EC may likely be in the App Store version again. And sure enough, it is still there. Please, please, please. With 1.8.4, can you finally get EC to open in the App Store release? And if it is simply impossible to get it to work with the App Store version, please let us know so that we can go ahead and purchase another copy via your store. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has the App store version and uses EC (or wants to). As it is right now, unless there is a beta available, it simply does not open in 1.8.3 App Store.

ID has an Effect called Directional Feather that isn't available in APub, nor is it imported correctly AFAIK. Been a requested feature for quite some time since it is a common effect used in ID.