Switching from PS – few issues/questions

[jospo]

Greetings! I am a long time PS user and recently I am trying to switch to AP for most of my workflow. 

 

I am however still struggling with few issues so I was hoping to get some feedback here to make my work with AP easier :-)

Sorry in advance for such a long list, but I don't want to spam this forum with multiple posts.

 

1) Is there any shortcut for Perspective tool? I am using it a lot (in PS it's Cmd+T and Cmd+click on corners). How to use Perspective tool non-destructively? So far the layer needs to be converted to pixels to use Perspective tool. I am looking for something like Smart Objects where you can easily transform dimensions without loosing any information.

 

2) Converting text to curves when pressing Cmd+Enter is for me not a good option. I am sooo used to this shortcut from PS that I am almost always converting the text to curves instead of just finishing text editing (which is in AP done using the Esc key where in PS it cancels the editing – is there by the way any shortcut to cancel editing in AP?).

 

3) Is there any tool similar to polygonal lasso tool from PS? I would like to make straight angled selections but not just rectangles.

 

4) Cropping with rotation on small resolution images produces jagged lines in image. Is there any way how to get rid of this?I need to perform cropping in PS to get desirable results and then to switch back to AP.

 

5) Is there any shortcut to reset colors to black and white? (in PS it's "D" key - it's useful when masking with brush tool)

 

6) Is there any easier way to pick color than to switch to brush tool (B key) and hold Alt key while dragging? (in PS it's "I" key and click)

 

7) How the Flood fill tool actually works on layers? So far I have found that to fill the object visible on layer I have to select the layer, then select Flood fill tool and select the color in swatches. When I select the color and click anywhere in the layer it does not do anything.

 

8) Is there any way how to transform selection? I know you can grow/shrink selection (Cmd+B), but I am looking for more precise way.

 

9) Thank you for reading this all up to this point ;-)

 

Petr

 

 

[MEB]

Hello jospo,

Welcome to Affinity Forums :)

 

 1) Not in the Mac App Store version. We introduced Custom Shortcuts in the latest Photo Customer Beta which you can get from here (pinned at the top). Just remember to keep the MAS version installed to be able to run the Beta if you don't want to wait for the next MAS update. The Beta lets you assign a custom shortcut for the Perspective tool. There's currently no way to use the Perspective Tool non destructively.

 

2) See answer above. Custom shortcuts are still not finished yet. More will be added as we move forward. If the one you're looking for isn't listed there, it's probably because it wasn't implemented yet.

 

3) You can press and hold ⇧ (shift) to constrain the Free hand Selection Tool to straight lines. There's already a thread requesting to make this tool similar to the Polygonal Lasso tool in PS. This will be improved later in a future update.

 

4) Check if Affinity Photo ▸ Preferences, Performance tab, View Quality is set to Bilinear (Best Quality).

 

5) See my first reply.

 

6) Currently no. You can however drag the colour picker from the Colour panel independently of the tool selected.

 

7) The Flood Fill Tool only works with Pixel layers. If you have placed (or dropped) an image in your document (Image type layer), you must convert it to a Pixel layer rasterising it (right-click the image layer in the Layers panel and select Rasterise...)

 

8) Press Q or click on the Toggle Quick Mask icon on the Persona toolbar on top with a selection active to enable Quick Mask, then change to the Move Tool and transform (scale, rotate, stretch and skew) the selection using the bounding box controls on canvas. Press Q again or the icon in the toolbar to finish.

 

9) :)

[jospo]

Thank you! I will try the latest Beta and test the custom shortcuts.

[manu schwendener]

> 4) Check if Affinity Photo ▸ Preferences, Performance tab, View Quality is set to Bilinear (Best Quality)

 

I still strongly think this should be the default! (Tripped me up, too -> just made me think the rotating tool was unusable).