SrPx

....and I can see why they would be interested in switching.....Price! 'cause I was just wondering...why abandone the environment if it is so perfect... I guess it'd be pricing ? (to clarify: Not a Corel user. Handled it quite in the very old times, tho. But always preferred Freehand, back in the day.). I always liked their easy UI....Loved Corel's, loved Freehand's... hated AI's... but got used to it. Now am in love again with my most often used vector tool's UI (AD ). ( for what I do , the current AD exports are perfect, tho )

Nice work, and nice introduction. The whole world is filled up with that contrast but at some places, the contrast is too harsh... Still... we should feel the contrast, always, the distance is just a random number....

One very usual workflow of mine ( for making engraved game dices or other stuff for engraving/embossing or whatever) is svg -- > 3D, typically with Blender (instead of tinkercad)). A general advice would be to take care of some things. Some people know it, u never know who do....: Close always shapes (completely closed). Don't leave isolated lines/dots. Some apps ( I don't know Google Drawings, at all) let you put two dots snapped together, visually can look melted, but they are not really melted (that's an open shape). Some apps can extrude a file from an open curve. Some wont.

I'm trying to realize what's happening there ( but anyway, I'm not often around here, so this is more a tip in case someone else sees this thread) , but it could be very helpful if you could make screenshots of where you find the problem, so could be seen what is resetting, and if you are in the right page. My best workflow recommendation, in general, but I'm desktop-only, is to double click on a brush in the library ( I quite prefer just the basic round brushes, but I have a very specific way of painting) so that you can access the settings. Is very similar to hit the "More" button in the top bar when having the brush , but this way you save permanently the changes to whatever the brush on the brush library ( or that's what I do, lol.... ). Still, I suspect all these UI things are very different in the iPad versions.

https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/46229-gif/&do=findComment&comment=345369

Dunno if you can find sth like that here... : http://www.paololimoncelli.com

What is the size in pixels of the brush and/or eraser ? Do you have the stabilizer on ? I wouldn't let Nearest Neighbor in preferences, in View quality. Set the best quality there, even with that poor integrated card. Neighbor is gonna give more pixelated stuff. The lag could be the stabilizer is on at a high rate, - is a brush setting in the top bar once u have the brush tool selected- or the brush or eraser are like 300, 500px, or bigger even brushes. Or there's some issue with the Huion driver (with non wacom tablets is often recommended to totally uninstall any wacom or other brand drivers,(and I mean wipin' 'em out) then cleanly install the huion or whatever drivers. Otherwise, issues can come easily). My 2cs. There's some lag, but by no means that bad, at all. In a very much lower end windows pc like mine (I have a dedicated card, but in Affinity that's not the thing. CPU is an i7, but sure way older than yours) you can draw, there's certain lag at beginning of a stroke, but it would never reach a second ( can happen also when doing small features when drawing zoomed out) Did you experienced this with the trial ?

I'm sorry if that was understood as flaming. No worries, I'm out.

Oh. Wow. That'd be quite a lot to assume, and in the wrong direction, and, please excuse me if I give my opinion so freely (well, as you do), and am being so sincere, but I believe at some point in the future you will regret for expressing such opinion... I mean... c'mon, we need to at least slightly put ourselves in the shoes of a development group who aims to mostly fill the gap of a photography [Photo] focused application. This category or specific industry have specific needs, and of an incredible depth in its own. All you can asume, IMO, is that they are not considering a (really, really old, archaic even) format that is totally in the area of game development, but even of actually a niche inside video games (even if counting on big numbers, but not ALL game development orbits around TGA format like if it were a Silmaril stone. If anything, AAA games production's (not produced with Unity, and in very few cases with some descendant of Unreal) main technical aspects are things like PBR workflows, Zbrush, high polygon count geometry, ultra advanced shaders, next to come RTX technology, which's gonna be a total revolution (probably) once the machines are up to all this real time raytracing stuff (and I love it, as I like rendering and high end stuff, non games high res rendering)) ....So, if anything, TGA is very important (but sorry, not so show stopper as you paint it to be, I strongly disagree, and I have worked at 4 game companies producing those kind of games!) for games mostly based on Unity and Unreal, which are very very far to be the solely manner to produce middle size (and small) games, meaning, I have quite a few colleagues that worked with me at game studios in their early years, now at some of the biggest AAA companies at Europe and a pair on the US, and definitely, it's not freakin' all about TGA (many don't use that at all , is all about dds or the like, and direct hooks), lol. Their pipelines are often using other formats, plus, way more complicated, when most cases are direct hooks with pure C++ and C# code from in-house made engines, direct to Maya and Max, and hefty use of Maya's Mel script, among many other things. That's where the huge money is being moved, indeed (in triple A games). If anything, it's YET also very important for video editing. Photography is not in the picture related to TGA. And THIS IS THE FIELD they aim to since the beginning. Oki, but again, even in video related matters, real core features, much much more important than whatever the format. In companies I have worked at and for, with this level of programmers, they'd code any sort of plugin to fil any format gap, ( they were/are no script kiddies, lol) or heck, even 3D/2D package functionality, extended. No game company of that level would be stuck for just the lack of I/O of whatever a freakin' format in whatever the 2D or 3D package. If output was provided as whatever the format from there, they'd deal with it, no issues. This is one of the bad things of depending on just some old engines. The issues would be of much, much higher end. They wouldn't EVER be tied to what a particular old and glorified specific engine would let 'em do. Among other things, 'cause they could (and can) code an entire engine and any app from the ground up !. And what I was telling before, Sorry, don't mean to sound harsh, but nobody did fool you. You had a trial to test. The least you should have done was testing at least a very basic workflow. Your most common pipelines. As a very minimal thing to do whenever you purchase ANY software. If you did not, there's only one person to blame about that. This is an extremely basic rule in software, since I dunno, always. I've been using software since 1985, and I can tell you since very early years, you have a demo or shareware version to test your basic needs. If you don't do that, well, you have not gone with the minimal part on your side, even. They offered you a trial. You don't like the direction of their development, fine. It's their business and their call, in absolutely any case. Then just pick another app. Is not like you invested a ton of money, lol( and again, you had a trial to test AT LEAST if you could export in your so absolutely essential format (in your view). I don't pretend to sound harsh, but wow, I think those statements were way out of the line. At least some commenting might put some extra views in your discourse. If not, or not at all, then, such a pity.

I was actually referring to RMB + LMB +ALT key, in Photo. What it does is dragging those kept held horizontally, it varies size. Dragging vertically with all those holding, it varies smoothness. I don't remember well, but I think PS has that only with dragging RMB + ALT hold pressed, dragging so. When I draw, I'm one of those who still have the hand mechanically dancing between mouse and wacom pen( I don't use the pen for all), I almost don't even notice now, but the mouse operation mostly for some specific tasks where the lizard part f my brain knows am faster, and for navigating (wheel zoom + middle click pan). Mostly I only use the pen for drawing, but while am drawing, the mouse is kindda static navigator. What I meant in the previous post is that while not planning to use that, I thought in its day that the combo was a bit too complex for those of us handling already too many devices at a time, so I provided that workflow in a thread where they where complaining somehow about that. I did it through that free utility which I like so much, and replaced the full combo with just dragging middle button (MMB). And it worked nicely. Still , as mentioned, is not my workflow to vary smoothness constantly, so, I don't use the trick. Edit: Sorry, it seems you only referred to my mention of the wheel being mapped to the Wacom disc. Yep, shift +1 or so is comfortable, but some prefer to depend less on the keyboard.

Maybe mouse wheel could control flow, if you don't zoom with wheel (for me would be a big loss) . And probably you can map Wacom Intuos Pro or Xp Pen Deco 03 disc to the mouse wheel for Affinity Photo ( or I guess, any other tablet which disc that can be mapped per every app) As gabriel is asking, if what you really meant is not flow, but softness/hardness instead of flow, there's a mouse + keys shortcut built-in for changing both size and hardness in the same mouse + keys gesture (one with horizontal drag, the other vertical drag. I don't remember the keys + mouse combo now). As Is a bit more complex combo shortcut than in PS, I did the test to replace all that just with middle button drag, using X-Mouse Button Control. It worked superbly. But have had deactivated that ,as, well, that's really not my workflow (if I paint, I always use hard brushes to better simulate actual painting or at least, my style. If I do ink lines, I use always the same hardness, something I just set for the full session at the beginning) I believe it does remember the last brush you used from your library. You can create a new brush (hamburger hidden menu button at the left of the brush library X closing icon) by hitting "new round brush" (for example) . Then, double click on your new brush in the library to fine tune your brush settings. Set there your wished softness, flow, size, etc. And that's it. It remembers I believe even if restarting the app, the brush you were lastly using, unless it only happens so in my machine....You can create a new brush category (from same hamburger icon) and you could have even one only brush there, if you do things uber simple. Just remember, it seems to remember latest brush selected (not necessarily used, but last which you selected in the brush library), so, if you selected one in a custom category, and go back to the basic category, you still will have the brush selected from the newly created category, and not the last one you selected in the Basic library. One thing I'd recommend is just create your favorite brushes (or use some of the included, or some fabulous third party ones) and reorder the list so that your 4-5 favs are the first five. Way more handy. Also, if you just do this in the Basic category, seems that's the category it always loads by default at app start in the brush library, so there's that. If you mean you do not see a way for a brush to retain brush softness, maybe is you are using somehow only the top bar "more" button of the brush. Try instead going this route with the brush library. I mostly draw/paint outside Affinity and import files into it (that will surely change soon) , so, am no expert in specific brushes usage in Affinity.

Well explained, nice pace, too.

two weeks... is fast already. . Anyway, looking at your test results, it confirms is the issue with raw files which they are addressing ? (yep, is a question)

(and me thinking at first PJC was some sort of soccer club or small British town.... lol) When I've had to extract frames from a vid, almost always have used Virtualdub (free, windows only, maybe non updated since 2013, pretty functional, tho. I used it heavily at some companies which were against purchasing video editing software, years ago), any professional video editor, or the very high end command utility ffmpeg (win/mac/linux). It takes a bit of reading its documentation, but it is really worth it for the level of control provided. Some fast tuts here for using these apps, but again, I'd advice mostly those 2 rather than the other solutions ( which I'd never ever recommend for that, btw, but maybe those were added for people willing to have it dumb easy. In the end, the easy and limited becomes hard...If anything....maybe VLC...). FFMPEG (main recommendation. Mac, Windows and Linux. Console only (but works GREAT). There are some GUI frontends available, tho. I recommend trying the console pure version, tho. It tends to always be more flexible and powerful) https://www.ffmpeg.org Virtualdub (GUI based. Windows only. No more new versions. Extremely useful, specially for extracting frames. You might need certain (also free) plugin to extract from movs, mp4, etc. Was mainly an avi focused tool. The article author is not lying, it is fast extracting frames (till what I can remember years ago), but IMO ffmpeg is way faster, besides giving a crazy level of control) http://www.virtualdub.org PD : Of course, these for mostly processing video files, extracting, chopping and joining (there virtualdub is particularly useful), converting, etc. For more full video editing, Davinci Resolve seems to be the big hit for this.

Woah.

They're busy coding!

I'm curious...didn't you test the trial, at least for the essential features you need? (and it would seem to me (or you make it look like that) TGA full support is show stopping material, for you) . This is a must, even if just to complain, later . I know there's a useful acronym for the manuals (RTFM !) , but there should be one for trials, TTFT ! (Test the f* trials ! ) Problem is, we don't have a single clue (well, I don't) what are the implications and structural changes or whatever that would require that. I do agree TGA full implementation would be a great addition (tho definitely not one of my main "wishes", which are on a more "core" line) but without knowing anything about their code base, neither the implications of supporting so many platforms, a native format for all apps (which the competitors do not have to support) , etc, etc, I would say it is at least adventurous to consider that it would be easy to make a particular change, whatever it is. My take at it and all similar other petitions, is as simple as probably can be considered captain obvious material: They are fixing a ton of bugs of any kind. If it'd be an easy/fast thing to do as you suggest, I bet it would had been implemented a very long time ago.

I didn't know about this tutorial....Great work with it, Mike. Very fresh approach, too. And of course.... Keep strong !

Hands are difficult, but if you focus on them well, (and feet, and heck, the full body. Is not like the other parts are "easy"! As I see this of the hands posted a lot. Ppl just over simplify other parts and our mind is less able to detect the errors there.... Just like in faces, for psychological reasons.) and start from its basic "3D" volumes/shapes, it ends up being easy. As always in drawing, from overall structure to progressive detail, never starting with detail, so you will be much able to handle and imagine any possible angle/torsion/pose, then detail can come in over those structures. A large bit goes in real life observation, like in everything drawing. Even your own hands!. Is one of those many cases (all, in my view) where solid drawing skills are an essential base to do good toon, stylized, expressionism, or whatever kind of drawing or painting. Besides all that, I strongly recommend a good anatomy book. Even for just consulting it as you might need during work. Even more rare recommendation ( I see veery few times ppl recommending this, and I don't know why ppl learning now is not using this) : We have now an infinite source of image reference. I did not have that when studying Fine Arts, neither before as a painter and comic artist. Today, is uber simple to just have some movie, or sports event, or etc, movie file, where you can even take screenshots to analyze even step by step of how the torsion of a hand, fingers, an arm pose, how muscles get revealed in a fore arm torsion, feet, etc, etc. You can go frame by frame in a movie viewer like the free VLC (mac/win/linux), capturing the ref you need, so you can draw it and study it, but if you just "copy" it, or much worse, just trace it, you are plainly doing nothing towards learning. The key part is analyze in your brain, understand it, the volume, and the whys. As the ultimate objective can only be to assimilate those shapes, make them your own, so to be able to draw them without refs at any time, pose and perspective. I don't use refs anymore (for anatomy), thanks to these "analyzing" procedures. That said I am not a genius, but I kind of know some stuff there, I hope it ends up being helpful to someone who probably would use it all better than me. Oh, was forgetting, my fav book... Is rarely promoted vs some that had really a lot of success on internet (srry, right now I don't remember the name of that other author... I could only check some pages, and it did look good...)... My issue with any other book I've been able to at least skim through the pages is... I don't understand why the heck would anyone want to use an anatomy book where the refs, examples, and etc are NOT CORRECT. Where the teaching is bad from start, it can trigger long standing errors in your future drawing. I've seen this horrible matters in many anatomy drawing, but also general "learning to draw" books. This one I like since always, is from before we had internet, I purchased mine around '91 -92, when I had to get these books for the Fine Arts subjects.... I LOVE the book. But is definitely not as good maybe from a learning perspective as those american authors so famous on inet. Still... I believe the one I propose here is really good for a basic, academic ref. Sadly, I've never been able to find an English version. And the French one, not sure if is exactly the same book : (Spanish, sorry..... :s ) https://www.amazon.es/Anatomia-artistica-hombre-Bellas-Artes/dp/8484510220/ Now...the French version...title is the same, same author... Surely same book, despite having a different cover ( and I don't remember that illustration inside the book, but the book is quite extensive, has many illustrations, could be one of them) : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/2224002254/ But again, after that ( or another GOOD anatomy and general drawing books), my "paused movies" (btw, I have not done it. I wish I had that back in the day, tho. I've used it recently for finding quickly some historical ref (clothing, weapons, etc) for illustration projects, but then discovered VERY few movies are really accurate, the best for that is... almost only museums and academic material...) and photo refs from anywhere will help you a ton to build that "brain capability". I just believe it is needed first of all a good drawing book, anatomy oriented. Great if you also get some other about perspective, other about light/contrast, other about color, or a good one covering WELL those three. To have as a base in learning, then enrich with references. Not the other way around. I see a lot of young people not caring at all about these first steps, today, and that way is close to impossible (okay, not fully impossible) to get drawings right.... No matter what style one is drawing in, IMO. Again, am no authority on the matter or whatever. Yup, I can draw, but take it as an advice from another (bit seasoned) student. Anyway, for this completely stylized mood, these matters are a bit irrelevant. It is all mostly about your design concept (still, general rules of color, composition, etc, still apply as in most art) and having a sharp mind. Sorry for derailing a bit the thread. Is just when I read "hands are hard to draw", I feel a compulsive need to say something. As I think in that very sentence can be perceived a total wrong take at the matter (which is absolutely natural to have at the beginning). Again, me no genius, more of a chit-chatter grunt.

I think you really should leave the card as selected and not let the software-only, in preferences. I actually didn't reply to the main question, now that I see, lol. Yes (what carl says), you should totally set your graphics card in AP/AD preferences (about what to set at nVidia Windows control panel, a bit of trial back and force is what I'd do, if in the need, as I haven't had performance issues yet in AP/AD, with the projects I make with those). I remember reading from some dev that setting the by software renderer was gonna be slow. It seems, indeed, the final render is relied on the graphics card, so, not selecting it, is probably removing a key part in the puzzle (you can read in one of those posts in that thread how smooth panning is provided by the card. It seems is about bits, yet important ones), but IMO that doesn't contradict the fact that most stuff is driven by the CPU and happening there, and that most performance benefits (provided on the basis that you set your card in preferences) from CPU. Then also from RAM size (and probably RAM speed and latency?) as the more is done in RAM and less in disk, the better.....and disk speed (SSDs, or at least, if you have a 5400rpms disk (typical in PC laptops long ago), a 7200rpms will improve things. I've seen dell laptops having a setting for the 7200, where if in BIOS you set certain disl performance mode, everything will run faster (with the penalty of more noise, temperature, and who knows if less durability, or overheating risks, but...). Anyway, despite the life cycle issue, SSDs are a ton faster than any HD). If that wasn't a laptop (I'm a bit lost on how easy/expensive is to replace a cpu in a laptop) but a desktop, I'd maybe try to replace the CPU with a more powerful one. Second hand, obviously, as those CPUs aren't sold anymore.Also, you should find it pretty cheap...at least for desktop. Thing is... I find i5s refurbished, even Sandy Bridge full towers (desktop) at 100 -200 bucks, with poor discrete or integrated card (if the card is poorer than even your current one, you could plug the old -maybe- in the purchased tower/laptop). That said, you are surely better of with even a cheap new AMD board, and even just a 2600 (if you overclock it) or a 2600x (if can't afford a so much better 2700x), for just some bucks more than an old refurbished intel. But I know how at times even 100 $ are a barrier If you read that linked thread (several posts from devs) it totally matches what I have been experimenting with several other softwares...Specially Blender. I don't know if rendering is a much more controlled task than all what Affinity apps do (probably the case) , and so, it can be relied to the card in a more predictable way, but the fact is, while rendering with Blender Cycles with the card is fast, very fast (yet tho, obviously beaten by any render farms CPU based with old Xeons...), the problem often arises with shortage of memory. If the scene is big enough (and/or, you use large textures, often my case), you are out of look, as you can only fit there what the gpu memory can fit in. I know you can use a 1080 with 8GB, but a lot of us not happy in investing 700 bucks, or 900 for the new 2080 RTX.. (plus, there will be a bottleneck if the cpu is not on pair with that monster, you'd be not using it to most of its capability at all. And for Affinity, better invest in the CPU, anyway) And there are scenes that wont even fit in that memory. And seems to me Affinity apps, specially Photo, might see some really more complex memory situations. I totally agree with the fact that there's a lot of hype with using "only the card", and that's a bit of a myth. Most of the apps I've seen using that as a selling point, were very focused digital painters (video editing too, but seems the type of task is more fitting to GPU) not doing the bazillion of other things that, for example, AP does. BTW, (and I know I'm derailing, but I've been asked too often, locally, about which card to work with graphics) besides you'd need a great machine to fit such monster card in (bottleneck issue), as a first thing, is the fact that with the 700 - 900 $ for the card, you could buy instead an amazing new desktop (maybe a decent laptop, instead, I'm just not fan of laptops for long sessions and pro work). Like a Ryzen 2700x with the board and everything (a tower, not also with a monitor), if you use a cheap and good distributor. And probably you would see a lot more benefit (unless you're a hardcore gamer) than with a low or average machine and a monster of a card. Productivity goes always by the hand of a better CPU, and also having good components in everything else (ram, disk), but without breaking the bank in one of them (like the card). You are welcome. But that said, absolutely any of the developers' posts (even from a 2015 thread ) has a lot more value and credibility than anything I could say. I'm just a user chit-chatting, while they actually know the stuff, I just read from them and combine with what I know (often in a poor manner).

yep, I've used a 12" one (used one for kindda long, but tested several) , if I ever get back to that, is gonna be 22 inches or +.

Yep, exactly (both things). X-Mouse Button Control is a tool to replace key shortcuts, mouse buttons or any combination of it all (other ppl use Autohotkey, but I believe is more complex for the average user). But in this case it wouldn't improve anything, really. I suggested this possibility the other day to an user who is too used (is logical, after decades of using a workflow...) to work with the mouse wheel since always for changing the brush size (I've used every formula, I can sort of adapt). But I tested yesterday, of course, as all I was doing was replacing the wheel (and not using zoom at all with the wheel, which is my fav) and making it call the [, ] keys (c and v in my case), it still would do both things : non integers brush sizes, and growing exponentially (which again, very useful in many other cases) the increase step. I believe I even used an old shortcut I had configured in X-Mouse to substitute the long combo (u have it here in AP, but is more complex than PS's) to vary size + hardness with ONLY middle mouse button CLICK-drag (horizontally or vertically to vary one thing or the other). BUT...Even if it had worked, not good for the case, you don't want to accidentally change hardness in pixel art ) . As far as I remember (from yesterday, lol) it still was doing those two things that, aren't a bug in any case, but not good for pixel art (so, for that mouse based task, probably same code is used than the increasing with keys) About the change you request, actually, I agree that better if an optional, non default, setting in preferences (because we need the way it increments for higher res illustration and photo retouch). Actually you would need two settings in prefs : 1) Make the key based brush increase to be in only whole numbers (integers?) , and 2) Another check mark to disable incremental growing of the brush size increase. I bet this was done for fast switching from detailing brushes to a large blocking brush, is done so by many painting software apps, otherwise you'd have to hit the keys like playing invaders every time you'd need to switch from tiny brushes to large ones. For pixel art, this is a problem, of course. Not going to name it as a (3) option, as the two above solve the issue, but as an apart case, another partial solution for the problem, better than the best current workflow (detaching brush library as a small window, detailed in the previous post) tho never as good as adding those preference settings, but would as well solve other people's workflow needs request in high res illustration, and this petition has had one recent instance, there's a third solution. In one thread an artist requested recently (am sure has been asked before) to have the capability of keys for "next brush" and "previous" brush (referring to the current order in your current brush library, I guess) , and/or, (not sure if he asked both solutions or one of them) a number to select the brush (1,2,3,4...) . In photoshop, the numbers were used for an opacity level (1,2,3 would produce 10, 20, 30) or flow, if your last touched setting was flow. Also, if u did hit very fast the keys, could do finer opacity settings (01, 05....32..). All this of the opacity and numbers is the same in AP. Only that the flow thing doesn't work like that (which I prefer, never liked that in PS). This is the kind of gift done to old time users, experienced pros, who can find their workflow shortcuts in the new app. So, as numbers are already doing that, my take at it is... of this third via/option (which can live with the other options as well, the more, the merrier) , maybe best just to use next brush and previous brush keys, whatever the two keys the user prefers. The problem is that with PS, Painter, and etc, each artist developed own's habits. Some ppl say they can't even consider using AP without the wheel changing brush size. Others need the next and prev brush keys. Others need to pan with the pen, others with the mouse. Others can't stand zooming with the wheel, some others can't work without it. There's people who can only consider zooming with the actual zoom/hand and and the ctrl + space workflow. Others with ctrl + and ctrl - ...You know... My whole global take is... in the end, it depends on how strong is the will of changing of tool, moving away from the cloud. If it is too small, any obstacle would seem like a a barrier made of concrete and steel. If not the case, workflows will be found. The big problems would stop even those motivated ones ( core functionality issues where no workaround can help). But those issues are getting to be fewer and fewer.... my 2c. Anyway, eventually some of this might be implemented. For pure gravity. More options is better, and better workflows tend to end showing up one way or the other. ( I saw it happening with every thing I wished in Blender, during more than 16 years...)

Use the "pixel tool" instead of normal brush, and the brush size slider in top bar slides then in integers (1,2.3...) when dragging the slider. If that is too slow, I'd build my own pixel-tool brushes (1,2,3,4, 5px) library, have a special category (or just main one if u only do pixel art) , detach the brushes library window/panel, reduce this panel so to place on canvas very small (extremely similar setup to old pixel artists' UI distribution, back in the day), and always place it near (I believe it remembers exactly the placing between sessions) where you are drawing. In the other side (I usually put brushes on the right, swatches/color on the left), maybe your color swatches (I tend to have in the hidden tab the normal color selector, too, for some new color), with a good pallete (you could even have saved before some image pallete with all colors you need (create pallete from document), and then hit 'create pallete from image' so you get to have those colors in the swatches, great also for working with sprite frames, use the colors from one team mate, etc), and as well, your recent used colors are always listed there. You can definitely use X-Mouse tool to replace wheel for brush size (just tested). Can also, if having an intuos with the disc wheel, set the wheel with [ , ] keys,or whatever keys you set in AP preferences, so to increase/decrease brush size with the wacom disc (this is what I do for all my art, high res or pixel art). But that kind of brush size increase/decrease (is always the same, the based on keys) makes the increment grow per step, which is handy when changing in very large brush sizes in hi res illustrations and photo retouch, but not for your pixel-art. With pixel tool happens so just like with any brush. But with pixel tool if you drag the size slider in the top bar, it jumps from 1 to 2, 3, etc, as you want. If that is too much of a journey fo the cursor -which it is- then the collection of 3 -5 brushes, well configured in each brush settings, reduced and detached the brush library, is pretty fine for the usual small space needed on canvas for pixel art. I'd use so, the brush library detached and reduced, as I mentioned, over other systems. Actually, I tend to block like in normal digital painting, with a large brush, then the 95% is 1px tool work. While I do that, I like to see the whole canvas, with no panel over it, very much in the sides. As I still am seeing the global composition. (in case is a large background instead of sth built by tiles on a map editor or whatever) Yet another thing that works as a workaround is, always using the Pixel tool, create a big square brush, and set disable any dynamic value in the brush to be non affected, but the size (actually, how the pixel tool comes pre-configured., but activating pressure sensitivity to size) So, size varies with pressure. You might need to deal with your Wacom's pressure (maybe also the brush curve) and set it as firmer for AP in Wacom's panel for that app, so it's less subtle for this blocking stage. Kind of 3 steps before hardest in the wacom slider. It worked for me. You can now block stuff fast having a somewhat variable brush size with pressure, yet hard edges, no transparency or other bad stuff for pixel art. For this working best, to me it helps to disable preview brush, and only leave the crosshair cursor, in preferences. I'm of the kind tho, that prefer to just use the 1 px brush move the slider up in size, and fill large areas so or with just square selections , doing my main scene blocking which gives me the global contrast/lighting, tone, colors... then start the whole thing, the 95%, with the 1px tool (being actually 1 px ).

There are i5 that are even 2 cores (ie, i5 7267U )...heck, I've seen even recent i7s... and series U are very toned down chips for mobility, thermals and -mostly- cutting production costs. Also, 6gb RAM , imo, maybe is just me, but looks to me way way low for the purpose pretended (probably is also 2133 MHz RAM speed or less, too), maybe RAM speed has some influence, too (neither know if latency, as well). Often are not just components alone... is also BUS speed, cpu cache speed, etc... the price of a machine versus another implies too many factors. Indeed, there are many cases where even (random non real example) a dual core i3, at higher clock speed, ie 1.8 Ghz, is gonna be quite slower than even a dual core i5 at 1.6. As the architecture, mother board features, CPU functions, etc, do factor in heavily. About ACDSee, it depends on what it does with the files, or what structure must it have to do further stuff with those, I guess...What I don't fully understand is... if it goes so well for you with ACDSee, why willing to purchase A. Photo? (pure mere curiosity).

The animator in PS is quite poor (and has an incomplete, messy workflow) compared to anything specialized (usually, free and pro versions available..or free-open source) like Moho (debut or pro), Spine, Toonboom, Spriter (and 2), Synfig(100% free), Nima, Pencil 2D, Animation paper (PAP) , Blender (my fav) and its Grease Pencil feature (or 3d model/animate and toon render), Opentoonz (free), CACANi, etc....I know Krita and Clip Studio Paint EX (Pro is limited to 24 frames, no way...) do have their animation modules, but imo, is a way to clutter an interface, and widen too much the scope....Even so, if I'd have to choose, I'd RATHER animate with krita's or Clip Studio Paint EX's modules than with PS's.... but heck, I guess there's ppl for everything.. If using the adobe cloud stuff (if so inclined) Animate CC and/or After Effects are so much better for the job. And if is all pixel art, for old skool (great low res games) you don't go better than with Aseprite (my own favorite and dirty cheap), Gale (free, cheap for commercial), Promotion NG, or even the surprisingly effective and powerful (doesn't look like that in a first glance) Piskel ( www.piskelapp.com ) which is fully online, so, cross platform. Not to mention that u can use many of the before mentioned high res animation pro tools to -somehow- do animated pixel art, too (at least with those having raster tools). There are several fronts to attend waaay more important and even crucial, IMO, than expand the natural scope of a 2D vectors editor and a 2D raster static image editor/photo editing package. I very sincerely recommend anyone to use one (geez, is not like there's not enough flavors to pick from...) of that bazillion of great apps to make animation, and combine those ( they CAN'T do stuff that AD/AP do in their specialty areas, not at that depth by any means) with Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer. Once you get to do really advanced stuff, you will see yourself combining animation exported files with advanced 2D raster editors, composition tools, 3D software, vector editors and etc.