TARGA file please?

[safoster71]

greetings!  i know you guys are buried, but i wonder if you could move targa file compatibility up the list a bit?   Not so much for me, as for the rest of my department at work (yes, i got my entire department at the tv station to go/buy Affinity Photo)   While i have a temporary work around (open in Preview, then copy paste) we work with ALOT of legacy targa files (20 years worth) ... so perhaps the next update... please?  :-)

[Andy Somerfield]

Yeah no problem :)

 

I can add read support for it pretty much now - write support might take a little more time :)

 

Thanks,

 

Andy.

[safoster71]

can we have this next time pretty please?

[Andy Somerfield]

It's in there for the next beta :)

 

Andy.

[William Cartwright]

Great!

 

There are still many television switchers out there that require TARGA files to load images. It is a big plus for those of us who work in television to not need to resort to workarounds. 

 

Thank you for meeting our niche needs, it is things like this that make lives easier for broadcast professionals.

 

Bravo!

 

William Cartwright

[offwings]

It's in there for the next beta :)

 

Andy.

 

Any updates on this Andy?

Thanks

[Andy Somerfield]

offwings,

 

No updates needed! TARGA import has been in the app for nearly a year :)

 

Thanks,

 

Andy.

[woober]

Also want support to export .tga file, as we are using Unreal Engine, that doesnt support 16/32Bit png. We need it for alpha channels etc.

 

Would be nice to get this asap :)

[PassiveAggressor]

I second this, TGA output would be very useful as my game engine only supports tga's

writing uncompressed targa files is actually quite easy as its a simple file format. (support for exporting compressed tga's would be even cooler)

cheers

[wtoddp]

Exploring Affinity as a replacement for Photoshop for broadcast television. Targa (.tga) export/save-as with alpha channel is a must-have for on-screen display in systems like Newsticker. Hoping for this ability in the next release?

[MEB]

Hi wtoddp,

Welcome to Affinity Forums

There's no plans to support alpha channels in Targa (TGA), sorry. This is an old format that's barely used nowadays except in very specific areas.

[Wolfen]

This is upsetting news honestly. A lot of game devs indie and pro use TGA + Alpha. That's a pretty huge market you are leaving out. You just need to convince them that this app is a better alternative to PS honestly and I thought it was UNTIL I discovered this problem with TGA's and Alpha's.

 

Not to mention your channels stuff is pretty insane. I saw a previous thread on this topic. Maybe you guys could make an alternative mode or app all together for game devs? 

 

Back to the point. I am not pleased with my purchase now and I hope that I may be able to get a refund. Having seen that the site said full TGA support on import and it's not even doing that properly with alphas.

[.eb]

Hi @ MEB... please do not be offended by this.. (I registered JUST to post this in reply to the willfully-ignorant comment of "very specific areas nowadays" regarding TGA 32 bit RGBA.)
 

Quote

" There's no plans to support alpha channels in Targa (TGA), sorry."

..but you must not like money and you're obviously living under a big, heavy, dark rock.
• How are you not aware that the video game artist market is massive beyond measure at this point and growing stronger each year ?

• Without FULL TARGA support ..and perhaps without PNG alpha support(think superpng) .. you guys are just being willfully ignorant and ignoring the open wallets in the hands of people screaming out "TAKE MY MONEY!". The other formats do not negate this issue. No one wants to use 3rd party conversions batch processing as additional work steps.

• ALPHA CHANNELS RULE MANY VISUAL and Visual DATA MARKETS.
- think of the 3d arch cad market.. think of the game market.. think of VFX needs...   geeshh.. you're ignoring millions in revenue!!!

I have 16+ years in various development areas of various industries. I am a 3d technical tools/game engine tools/photography tools/web tools... all sorts of tools.. development specialist. ... this is not a post from some lame wanker... this is a post from a very experienced multi-industry lame wanker. *ahem*

Summed up:
mind blowingly odd guys.. just WHOA * N.
-----
• How would I contact the owners(CEO/CTO/COO etc) of Affinity, directly ?  .. this situation is just mind boggling knucklebrained. If Affinity was a hobby studio.. I'd understand..but it is a business.



 

[Patrick Connor]

.eb

 

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums.

I have approved your first post, but it is inflammatory and aggressive. You are not going to get anything achieved by name calling. 

We are open to suggestions, but not like that. 

[nFF]

On 22/10/2017 at 7:57 PM, .eb said:

Hi @ MEB... please do not be offended by this.. (I registered JUST to post this in reply to the willfully-ignorant comment of "very specific areas nowadays" regarding TGA 32 bit RGBA.)
 

..but you must not like money and you're obviously living under a big, heavy, dark rock.
• How are you not aware that the video game artist market is massive beyond measure at this point and growing stronger each year ?

• Without FULL TARGA support ..and perhaps without PNG alpha support(think superpng) .. you guys are just being willfully ignorant and ignoring the open wallets in the hands of people screaming out "TAKE MY MONEY!". The other formats do not negate this issue. No one wants to use 3rd party conversions batch processing as additional work steps.

• ALPHA CHANNELS RULE MANY VISUAL and Visual DATA MARKETS.
- think of the 3d arch cad market.. think of the game market.. think of VFX needs...   geeshh.. you're ignoring millions in revenue!!!

I have 16+ years in various development areas of various industries. I am a 3d technical tools/game engine tools/photography tools/web tools... all sorts of tools.. development specialist. ... this is not a post from some lame wanker... this is a post from a very experienced multi-industry lame wanker. *ahem*

Summed up:
mind blowingly odd guys.. just WHOA * N.
-----
• How would I contact the owners(CEO/CTO/COO etc) of Affinity, directly ?  .. this situation is just mind boggling knucklebrained. If Affinity was a hobby studio.. I'd understand..but it is a business.



 

I second this all the way!!!

For the video game industry, which I am a part of,  it's essential format.

Right now I am having to process 371 TGA files from 4096 to 1024/512px for use in VR, with Oculus Rift.... AND THEN WOW no TGA...

You cannot call yourself a Photoshop alternative, with a lack of such basic file format.

 

[...]

I’m in the film and TV industry and alpha channels TGA and TIFF are a huge part of the 2D and 3D workflow. PNG transparency just don’t cut it. It would fantastic to see this as an option in AP. Quite a few people have mentioned this in my industry and have chosen to stay with PS. It would be great to give them no reason not to use AP.

[rajanaveen]

On 9/13/2017 at 4:07 PM, MEB said:

Hi wtoddp,

Welcome to Affinity Forums

There's no plans to support alpha channels in Targa (TGA), sorry. This is an old format that's barely used nowadays except in very specific areas.

This is a utter disappointment for me. I bought all the releases on all platforms just to support you guys. The only reason im still attached to Photoshop is because of .tga and .raw support. Have you guys realized how important it is for digital artists to make a good looking foliage in games you love with no .tga files? ans we rely on .raw to create terrains you love playing on! .png is a joke for game development. .tga are crucial for shaders for transparency and cutouts. Please dont ignore us.

[P K]

Hello,

 

TGA support is really a must for anyone working with computer graphics/video games/VFX industry. Could you please reconsider adding it?

[Jaidek]

On 9/13/2017 at 6:37 AM, MEB said:

Hi wtoddp,

Welcome to Affinity Forums

There's no plans to support alpha channels in Targa (TGA), sorry. This is an old format that's barely used nowadays except in very specific areas.

 

Sorry, I have to chime in here as well. Targa still is one of the standards in texture creation for gaming and really should be considered as an export format in any serious photo editing software. Please reevaluate your decision to not support this format. As many have stated above, this is a deal breaker for many studios in regards to switching from PS. 

[nymbis]

I just recently purchased Affinity and have been working in the game industry for 10 years and we still very much use .TGA.    Please add save/export functionality for TGA and I will recommend it to our company and many other game artist's who require TGA to work.   Please and thank you.

[Patrick Connor]

I have discussed this with the lead developer and head of the programming team, who agreed that we should support transparency of targa files on import, but suggest that PNG is a far more suitable export solution, and that it's easy to find free and paid for apps that can convert any PNG to tga format.

Can I ask why PNG is not suitable for your company / industry, and what the problem would be with conversion of PNG to TGA if they are a requirement ? 

Thanks for your expertise 

[nFF]

@Patrick Connor

The thing is, in the video game industry, TGA is kind of a standard (I even think Unreal Engine converts all texture to TGA on import).

Most of my library and libraries out there are composed of TGA with some info on the alpha channel, like transparency for foliage or AO info, etc.

The issue for me is that I cannot import the alpha channel. So for example, say I want to convert my TGA file from 4K to 1K to the suggested PNG-24, the alpha channel info will be gone.

PNG for me is fine, but ONLY if Affinity can read the alpha channel from these TGA files. So if you start to "support transparency of targa files on import", that would be it for me.

[SrPx]

IMO, in any case, not supporting TGA format - even not either in import - is by far not enough reason to discard one package or another (anyone remember (been a user at companies since PS 2.0) pre-CS, and so, pre CC too, PS 7 ? It did have a veery weak support of TGA, huge issue with alpha channel. It also caused almost riots, but yet they took a while to address that. And by then, TGA was much  more important, and less apps to convert the TGAs well than now). And I know pretty well your field. I'm 45 and have worked at 4 game companies, and as a freelancer worked in a ton of indy and, - previously that term wasn't a thing in games - shareware games. Back then TGA was even more important than today. There are tons of utilities that even do batch conversion, which rarely you'd have in a full package. Adobe PS has it, somehow, but extremely limited compared to what you can do in these free and/or dirty cheap tools (unless you factor in Actions,of course, still, would be limited in a lot of file operations) . You can also use these tools to extract the alpha info as greyscale bitmaps, then composite it somewhere else, - tools like AP, or video tools of many flavors, depending if you work for video or games, I've worked for both.

 

Would it be useful ? Totally, as simplifies the workflow. Can't you do your work without it, and instead, with free or cheap specialized macro converter utilities? Not true, as you can do it perfectly, even better : using these utilities has a ton of key advantages, specially when dealing with a bunch of frames (again, encountered the advantages both in games and video)

 

So, yep, it is useful for game and video (but I have always been able to EXPORT the alpha as an appart bitmap, and the game engine would take it no probs, or I'd just export it to the mentioned conversion tools, mount it there in a more versatile way than in any full 2D package, included Photoshop ! )

 

Does it justify the strong reaction or saying this is like not supporting the game editing community or game professionals? LOL...gimme a break... It'd be funny if I wouldn't find the tone sort of excessive, bordering offensive.

 

I would fully agree, though, importing is more key. You can however import the split alpha, and mount it in AP, but seems there's more functionality in programs for importing the split thing than others exporting it so.

 

There are literally tons of software apps out there not supporting TGA. I sometimes wonder why the strong reactions with Affinity's.... being one of the very few companies giving real feedback of what they do for their app. Others keep it just internal and never attend so much the final user as this people does (I can see now why the others do so... it requires a ton of patience to hear or read some stuff... ).

 

All said, I'd vote to for at least an importer (an exporter would be very practical, too).  And all the people KINDLY asking for it , kudos to them, that's the way to go.

 

PD: " you guys are just being willfully ignorant "  <------ This is blatant name calling, insulting. Totally non aceptable. They have to keep it polite, but I'm not from the company, so I can say freely that this was a very poor behavior (and there are other "jewels" in the thread, sadly). I know many others will think like me when reading the whole thread. You can request features and give feedback or report bugs, it is indeed very useful, but IMO keep it civil and use some adult manners.

 

 

[nFF]

@SrPx

Totally agree with you!

Importer is the key here.

The reason why I found this threat in the first place, was when I had to convert my entire foliage library (3000+ textures) from 4k to 512px for use in VR and I was baffled that I could not batch rescale without loosing the alpha channel in AP.

So yes, wish list item, add alpha channel on import for TGA/TIFF.

[AndyQ]

I'm one of those Adobe CC users who are keeping an eye on Affinity, waiting for a time when we it might be possible to switch over. Just chiming in with a "hell yeah - need full TGA support!" request (and making a mental note to check all the other available import/export options!)