Comparrison Tutorials for PS Touch Users

[Pedro Antonio]

I want to start being comfortable switching over from PS Touch to Affinity Photo for iPad (stuck using AP v. 1.6.5 in iOS 10 on my iPad Pro, as PST is not supported using subsequent iOS versions). Although your tutorials are somewhat helpful, I find AP for iPad's approach to my usual workflow often makes my attempts to do the edits I can achieve effortlessly in PST very frustrating for me using your app.

I understand Affinity is not Adobe—your iPad version has features, options, and capabilities that render PS Touch into a dumbed-down, perfunctory photo editing app at best, though there's a lot to be said for simple when it still competently handles a majority of day-to-day editing tasks. I'm surprised, however that, for those millions of Photoshop users, there aren't tutorials skewed specifically towards taking an array of the most common Photoshop/PS Touch functions and replicating them in AP for iPad to make it far less daunting and more welcoming.

Things like:

• Selections using AP's version of the Polygon and Magic Wand tool
• Removing selected areas or extracting selections within a layer
• Adding to or subtracting from exiting selections using AP's version of the various Selection Marquee and Magic Wand tools
• Saving photos back to the iPad's Photo app
• Using AP's version of PST's Mesh Tool
• Achieving similar results in AP to using PST's Fade (mask) feature
• How to achieve PST's Stroke and Fill functions in AP
• Achieving PST's Transform and Transform Selection features in AP
• Achieving the Merging, Merging Down and Flattening Layers into a single layer options in AP
• Achieving  PST's Match Colors between layers feature to simulate a common, more naturally blended look between imported photos and/or selections in AP

I really WANT to start regularly using Affinity Photo for iPad and taking advantage of all its advanced features so I can update my iPad Pro to iOS 13 for iPad....and then update my Affinity Photo for iPad to 1.7.3.

Please help...thanks.

All my best,

Peter Donoso 

 

 

 

[stokerg]

Hi Pedro Antonio,

Thanks for your feedback regarding the tutorials, i'll pass them back to the team who produce them.  The inbuilt help file covers all of the tools, if you can't find a specific tutorial.  

If you can post the workflow you currently use in PST, we should be able to let to you know the iPad workflow to follow.  

[Pedro Antonio]

Now that I've tried working in AP for iPad, I've fallen in love with a number of its really great features...and figured out from my above posted list, how to:

Create a layer from a selection (somewhat laborious); Save a project to my Photos app, which requires having it open and active (again, restricts my workflow in being unable to simultaenously save or remove multiple AP files from the AP gallery); Merge layers and related options (also somewhat laborious),

Here's what I have yet to replicate from PS Touch that constitute a number of my frequent editing tasks:

• Saving work —
  MAJOR issue...if I've been working on a previously saved file for awhile in AP and decided the results have not achieved my intentions. I haven't been able to find a way in AP to disable the auto-save function, so  I have to go into History, find where I started the session, select that History stage and perform another action in order to delete any changes I've made for this session. If I've opened a photo from my Photos and decided not to do anything with it, I have to delete it from AP's gallery—again, a time waster if I simply had the option to NOT SAVE or deactivate the auto-save function.
  
  — Though PS Touch offers no masks and a limit of 20 undos, it also has a very simple approach to leaving your current project when selecting the
       top menu left arrow: Save; Save a Copy; DON'T SAVE.
   
• Add/subtract from a selection —
  I find it very frustrating drawing a marquee within or passing over an existing selection to add to or subtract to it...and find my selection being moved instead.
  I have to start from off the selection (or off the entire canvas!) to do this, which doesn't always yield the intended result.
   
  — In PS Touch, I simply draw over an active selection and my area's added to or subtracted from. Its Clear and Extract functions offer instant removal
       of alternately either a selection or the unselected area.
   
• Deselect a selection —
  Also annoying is having to return to Selections Persona to deselect any selection, which really slows down my workflow. I've also found little to no use for AP's Selection as Layer option, who's functions remains a mystery to me.
  
  — In PS Touch, I simply tap anywhere either outside the selection or off the canvas in any tool to deselect...regardless of the tool that's currently
      being used. In fact, most menu functions are available regardless of the tool I'm using.  And creating a layer from my selection is achieved with
      one menu tap...voila!
   
• Skewing a layer or selection —
  Again, can't find how to manipulate a selected (not selectioned) item using the move selection to change its perspective.
  
  — One major advantage PS Touch has is in the quantity of numerical entry features throughout. It offer's directional nudge tools and a
      numeric entry dialog for repositioning, rotating, reflecting or skewing items—as well as with marquee selections—all presented after
      selecting an item And though it doesn't offer the individual handle controls of the desktop app, it does have a warp mesh tool, which
     does a decent job.
   
• Making a selection through Replace Color —
  I'm struggling to find a way to replace a selected color with zero  transparency.
  — In PS Touch the Replace Color feature offers Threshold options to remove a color by replacing it with transparency, which is often a great
      fast alternative to making a selection of an area in order to clear it.
   
• Match Color —
  I can't seem to affect changing a Placed layer's tonal colors  to match my primary background.
  — PS Touch has a rudimentary function that shadows the superior PS desktop function, but manages to achieve some great results at times.  

Granted that AF offers a plethora of features missing in PS Touch:

Masks; Editable tonal, adjustment and fx layers; History and 3-digit multiple undos; Guides and grids; Inpainting object removal...the comparative list dwarfs PS Touch's many limitations.

Yet—and I know any app is experienced as being easy to use after having become very familiar with the way it functions and achieves desired objectives—I find my workflow and intended tasks in PS Touch are far faster and more results-yielding (allowing, of course, for my ignorance in how to achieve the same objectives in AF). Sometimes simple is...faster. And though I may have been focusing on specific tasks here, one needs to have worked for awhile in PS Touch to really experience the comparative points I've outlined. But then again—continuing to use PS Touch comes at a imposing cost in that it leaves my iPad stuck in iOS 10's twilight zone and prevents me from upgrading it to iOS 13.

Aaaahhhh...if I could only have that same speed, comfort and satisfaction of workflow and results in Affinity iPad...yes?

All my best,
Pedro Antonio

[Pedro Antonio]

Can anyone help me in outlining ways to replicate my workflow and results when using PS Touch in Affinity Photo for iPad?

I'd really love to upgrade my iPad to take advantage of iOS 13 for iPad's new OS.

Thanks so much.