tomdot

Yes, I’ve tried that. I’m not sure what the issue is, but for most of my work it doesn’t impact too much. The lag is horrendous though, regardless of the settings I use.

I’m happy for you to have the file, although because it’s a child in the photo I’d prefer a private link please.

I can, but I don't need to if you can replicate it: 1. Create a Curves adjustment and boost the brightness. 2. Add an empty mask to it and paint in white. 3. Add a pixel layer above and paint in black over the top of the white. 4. Group the layers and enjoy. You can see how wrong my dodging looks after moving the pixel layer, which had been in that folder from the start. I've been able to replicate this with another file also. pixel-move.mp4

Okay, I've figured it out. It was the curves adjustment underneath – although only those I've dodged with. See the video, and the buggy issues I've got with adding a separate curves to the Dodge and Burn folder. brush-settings-full.mp4

Ah actually I just did that and I don’t believe I saw the issue. I don’t have video of that unfortunately. The only visible layer underneath is the dodge curves layer and the original image. There are other layers inbetween, but they’re not visible.

I've took a recording of almost the whole screen to show all my settings, blend modes, etc. Check out how the white outline moves with the brush. brush-settings-full.mp4

Ah, blend modes were Normal for everything, and the brush did not have wet edges activated. I checked this, and never use it anyway for my needs.

Okay, so I've been driving myself up the wall here, because I've just noticed that my paint brush in black is also painting white depending on the existing luminosity of the image it seems? Check the video out, and please let me know if this is something I'm doing, or whether it's yet another AP2 issue to add to the list. Also note the ridiculous rendering I'm having to deal with on my M1 MacBook Air. I've tried all sorts of hardware settings to no avail. brush-video.mp4

Does anyone have an idea of what this might be please?

So, this Affinity Photo / Apple Photos experiment is not going well at all. I have yet another thing that I can't find an answer to, although I suspect this is more of a MacOS issue. See the video – the cursor graphic doesn't travel onto the canvas, yet you can see the Info panel whirring about. I'm at the end of my usual workflow, and AP2 seems stressed when it hasn't been in the past. I also have an issue that I don't recall seeing before (maybe pre-update?) where if the brush size becomes large while zoomed into the canvas, AP2 freezes and struggles to keep up. I'm on a 2020 M1 MacBook Air with 8GB, so I can accept some performance lagging. However, this is much worse than Photoshop, and makes the app pretty much unusable at certain points. I've also attached my performance settings, although anything I'm touching here doesn't seem to have much of an impact. What could be the cause of this, and how can I put things right? cursor-glitch.mp4

Hmmm, kind of? Note that isn’t my typical use case. For example, in Photoshop: 1. Add a Curves layer and boost or reduce exposure. 2. Add an inverted mask, take a white brush, and paint in the adjustment where you want. 3. Clip a HSL adjustment to the Curves to spot reduce saturation or hue to the masked areas. In AP2, it seems like this super common approach that would take two keyboard shortcuts isn’t possible. Yet the task is so common – typical in fact – that there must be a way without duplicating images (which is somewhat destructive) or faffing with channels. Blend options don’t seem to be the answer, because how does the blend know where to apply the new adjustment? It can’t, so you’re applying it to unmasked areas. So far, the only answer seems to be to copy the mask. It’s alright I suppose. It’s more clicks than is necessary, given AP2’s excellent parent-child layer structure. As an aside, how do I go about grouping my helper layers together if even a group appears to have a mask attached? In fact, how does this make grouping anything possible at all?

I want to be able to clip an adjustment layer to another, so I can localise the effect. A typical example is clipping a HSL layer to Curves for dodging and burning. However, this doesn't look like it's possible in the typical way you would in Photoshop. Can AP2 do this as other apps can, and if not, how can it be achieved here? I want to be able to clip an adjustment layer to another, so I can localise the effect. A typical example is clipping a HSL layer to Curves for dodging and burning. However, this doesn't look like it's possible. Can AP2 do this as other apps can, and if not, how can it be achieved here? Also, I have a perhaps related problem. All of a sudden, adjustment layers within a group won't activate regardless of visibility. The only exception is if there is a filled layer underneath. See the video for a better showcase. group-layer-error.mp4

Thanks for this. It’s something I haven’t yet looked at in detail, but I like the idea of subtracting various live masks from each other. I’m hoping it’s accurate! I’ve not tried this either actually, as I generally have a different way to pick specific tones on the skin. Of course, this falls down when I want to use any other adjustment. I’m working on a way using the Selection Tool and further masking to make super accurate selections. If I come up with something good, I’ll come back and post it 😄

Hello! I like how a Live Hue Mask can work in a similar way to Photoshop’s Color Range tool for selecting skin tones. It’s not perfect, but I can get a selection that’s 90 percent there. However, the other ten percent is the issue. Of course, you can remove elements from the mask with a black brush, but can’t paint in white. As such, what can I do to further build my selection other than refining the hue range? If there is nothing we can do, what is the best way I can select skin tones and mask it? AP2 seems to have nothing that’s suitable, which is frustrating. My typical use case is to mask skin, then apply a gradient map and pick suitable tones before moving on. In fact, I’m using Live Hue Masks to do this and also select complex textures like pet fur, flyaways, and other non-uniform elements. Thanks!

That's going to be a useful tutorial – thanks!