HUGE loss in sharpness when developed trough Develop Persona

[GZA]

 

Hey guys,

I'm new to affinity. Just purchased it, but I already see a lot of problems that need to be fix quickly if they want to advertise it as a professional software. The biggest dealbreaker however is the HUGE loss in sharpness and dynamic range. I'm gonna talk only about the loss in sharpness here because I'm not sure yet how to show the difference in dynamic range.

The problem seems to be in Develop Persona because the images look blurry only when processed trough it.
If I export a TIFF from Capture One for example and open it with Photoshop and Affinity Photo the image look identical.

Another thing I've noticed and I'm pretty sure is behind the cause of that problem is that the resolution appear to be different compared to any other software. For example in Photoshop (or any other software) the resolution is 4912x6144px but in Affinity Photo the same file will be 4928x6164px.
10 or 20px might not be much of a difference but is enough to ruin the sharpness in the image.

In the example bellow I'm comparing the sharpness in Photoshop CC, Affinity Photo 1.9 and Capture One 20, but I've tested it with Preview, Quick Preview and Lightroom and it seems to be the same with all.

I've read the topic from 2019 "Affinity seems very blurry" but there is no progress on that one and no one is linking it to Develop Persona so I'm not sure if it's the same problem or this is a new one.

Thanks in advance.

[MEB]

Hi @GZA,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
Contrary to most RAW developers we don't apply any sharpening by default to the RAW images when opened in Affinity Photo/Develop Persona which is why they look less sharp than what you see in other apps or when compared to the camera processed JPG's. We leave these decisions to the user. Check the Clarity control in the Basic Section or the Retail Refinement under the Lens section to increase the sharpeness/detail in Develop Persona. 

The same applies for the image size: most apps trim/crop the image according to the camera manufacturer specs to red rid of the extra/unusable pixels, we leave that decision to the end user.

On the Mac you can switch the RAW engine to the one provided by the macOS going to menu View > Assistant Manager (while in Develop Persona) and changing the Raw Engine dropdown to Apple (Core Image RAW) - it honours the dimensions specified by the camera manufacturer. Note you must reload the RAW file for the change take effect. 

[GZA]

12 minutes ago, MEB said:

Hi @GZA,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
Contrary to most RAW developers we don't apply any sharpening by default to the RAW images when opened in Affinity Photo/Develop Persona which is why they look less sharp than what you see in other apps or when compared to the camera processed JPG's. We leave these decisions to the user. Check the Clarity control in the Basic Section or the Retail Refinement under the Lens section to increase the sharpeness/detail in Develop Persona. 

The same applies for the image size: most apps trim/crop the image according to the camera manufacturer specs to red rid of the extra/unusable pixels, we leave that decision to the end user.

On the Mac you can switch the RAW engine to the one provided by the macOS going to menu View > Assistant Manager (while in Develop Persona) and changing the Raw Engine dropdown to Apple (Core Image RAW) - it honours the dimensions specified by the camera manufacturer. Note you must reload the RAW file for the change take effect. 

Thank you so much!
I've tried it with Apple engine, but did not knew that I need to reload the file. 
 

[MEB]

You're welcome 🙂

[Photo Paul]

On 2/11/2021 at 1:19 PM, MEB said:

Hi @GZA,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
Contrary to most RAW developers we don't apply any sharpening by default to the RAW images when opened in Affinity Photo/Develop Persona which is why they look less sharp than what you see in other apps or when compared to the camera processed JPG's. We leave these decisions to the user. Check the Clarity control in the Basic Section or the Retail Refinement under the Lens section to increase the sharpeness/detail in Develop Persona. 

The same applies for the image size: most apps trim/crop the image according to the camera manufacturer specs to red rid of the extra/unusable pixels, we leave that decision to the end user.

On the Mac you can switch the RAW engine to the one provided by the macOS going to menu View > Assistant Manager (while in Develop Persona) and changing the Raw Engine dropdown to Apple (Core Image RAW) - it honours the dimensions specified by the camera manufacturer. Note you must reload the RAW file for the change take effect. 

How does this work in Windows. I have the same problem, I loose all the sharpness when I develop a dng or a raw-file to the photo persona.
Paul Grefte.

[Photo Paul]

I work with the Fujifilm X S20. The program recognizes  in the Metadata de camera and the lens: Sigma 10-18 mm f2,8 DC DN. The problem is that when I develop the RAF-file after sharpening I loos al lot of sharpening in tthe Photo Persona.
As far as I know Affinity works not so wel with RAF-files. I tried different: I use Iridient-X-Transformer to create a dng. When I develop the dng to the Phot persona I loose all the sharpness I brought in it in de develop persona. I work with Windows 11 and I install evetytime the updates in Affinity: 2.5.6.2887.
My questions: Will be there an update where RAF-files can be developed in a proper way? And second: There are a lot of people in the Netherlands who work with Affinity Photo, when will be there a Dutch version?

Paul Grefte, Oldenzaal, Nederland.

[walt.farrell]

On 12/6/2024 at 11:52 AM, Photo Paul said:

When I develop the dng to the Phot persona I loose all the sharpness I brought in it in de develop persona.

You need to make sure that you are viewing the image at 100% Zoom when you adjust the Sharpness. Otherwise (e.g., at smaller Zoom levels so you can see the entire image) you will get a false sense of the sharpening you have applied due to the display technology (mipmaps) that the Affinity applications use.

I suspect you're zoomed out (less than 100% Zoom) and this is what you're seeing.