Inverted Masks in A-Photo

[DannyBCreative]

Hey Everyone,

In the latest version of Affinity Photo, is there still no way to create an inverted mask, ala option clicking on the create mask icon? This has never worked in either the Windows or MacOS versions of A-Photo, or maybe I'm missing something? I find it frustrating that I have to always create a layer mask, then invert it after the fact.

Thanks!

[walt.farrell]

19 minutes ago, DannyBCreative said:

is there still no way to create an inverted mask, ala option clicking on the create mask icon? This has never worked in either the Windows or MacOS versions of A-Photo, or maybe I'm missing something?

Alt+Click on the Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers panel works just fine for me on Windows to create an inverted mask.

[DannyBCreative]

15 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Alt+Click on the Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers panel works just fine for me on Windows to create an inverted mask.

Not for me. It also does not work on my Mac. Never has. Let me be clear in my process. Let's say I have a layer that I want to create an inverted mask from a selection. I make my selection,  then option (alt) click on the mask icon and the layer mask created is solid black and ignores my selection. But, if I don't use the option (alt) key, and just add the mask, the mask is accurate to the selection, but then I must invert the mask to get it to work. This simple operation is standard in Photoshop and works without fail on both my Mac and PC workstations.

[walt.farrell]

Thanks. You hadn't said anything about making a selectiion, which is a different situation.

If you make a pixel selection, then create a mask, you're automatically restricting the mask to the selected area, and everything outside the selection is masked off (invisible).

If you make the pixel selection, then Alt+Click on the mask icon, you get an inverted mask that is restricted to the selection, which means the selected area starts out invisible. But the rest of the area outside the selection is still masked off. So the entire picture is invisible. That doesn't seem terribly useful, but I can't comment on or compare to Photoshop.

But even making the selection, clicking on the mask icon, then inverting, gets you an image with everything invisible in Affinity Photo, so it all seems consistent, but not terribly useful.

 

 

[DannyBCreative]

2 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

Thanks. You hadn't said anything about making a selectiion, which is a different situation.

If you make a pixel selection, then create a mask, you're automatically restricting the mask to the selected area, and everything outside the selection is masked off (invisible).

If you make the pixel selection, then Alt+Click on the mask icon, you get an inverted mask that is restricted to the selection, which means the selected area starts out invisible. But the rest of the area outside the selection is still masked off. So the entire picture is invisible. That doesn't seem terribly useful, but I can't comment on or compare to Photoshop.

But even making the selection, clicking on the mask icon, then inverting, gets you an image with everything invisible in Affinity Photo, so it all seems consistent, but not terribly useful.

 

 

This is the problem. It shouldn't be this involved, right? This is a type of masking I do very often and A-Photo just makes it painful. In Photoshop, I literally set my selection, then option (alt) click on the mask icon in the layers tab, and done. No weirdness, just an inverted mask with no issues.

I so badly want to replace Photoshop with Affinity Photo, but it's issues like this and others than continue to prevent that change. I'm shocked this hasn't been addressed by now.

Thanks for replying by the way.

[jmwellborn]

@DannyBCreative According to my MAC version of Photo, you can make your selection, then use this Shortcut - Shift + CMD + I .  You should have an inverted mask.   At least it works for me.   Hope you will try this before you give up on Affinity Photo!!

[DannyBCreative]

1 hour ago, jmwellborn said:

@DannyBCreative According to my MAC version of Photo, you can make your selection, then use this Shortcut - Shift + CMD + I .  You should have an inverted mask.   At least it works for me.   Hope you will try this before you give up on Affinity Photo!!

Shift + Command + I, inverts the selection. So I would have to do that first, then make my mask. I know it's only 1 extra step, but again, this is a single click in PS which is why I find it frustrating.

[JB D]

if you can't reverse the selection, what you can do is reverse the mask. To invert a layer mask in Affinity Photo, simply select the layer mask, and then go to Layer > Invert. I hope it can help you!