Question on setting up document size/quality/resize

[onamac]

Hi, I am a new purchaser of Affinity Photo. I read that its documents are maintained as non-destructive, so when resizing, an image can be resized without destructive downsampling, etc. I came from Photoshop so I know what this is; but my question pertains to quality and the way Affinity Photo handles documents. See below:

 

If you are making an image that you eventually want to be enlarged, or even 2x while retaining high quality, does this mean in this app you can create the document as the smaller size then resize up when needed because it is not based on originally-assigned size in pixels? Or is it better to make the document the target larger size and then scale down? I'm just wanting to know how AP handles its documents, because from what I read somewhere it sounded like the final size and quality are determined upon export or resizing via the menu, where it stays flexible until that time? Thank you!

 

 

[Leigh]

I think most designers prefer to scale down and not up when designing graphics for multiple resolutions. However, Affinity's retina export is very handy when needing to export your document @ 2x or 3x. Ben's reply here explains how the retina export works.

[Ben]

That answer no longer applies.  The document DPI will be used to determine whether you intended the document to be a 1x or 2x source.  So, if you use 144dpi, for example, your 1x will be 72dpi and you 2x will be 144dpi (your document res).

 

Best advice is to use standard DPI, then 2x and 3x will be finer res than your document.  You can of course preview in 1x and 2x Retina mode to see what output you'll get.

[onamac]

That answer no longer applies.  The document DPI will be used to determine whether you intended the document to be a 1x or 2x source.  So, if you use 144dpi, for example, your 1x will be 72dpi and you 2x will be 144dpi (your document res).

 

Best advice is to use standard DPI, then 2x and 3x will be finer res than your document.  You can of course preview in 1x and 2x Retina mode to see what output you'll get.

Thank you.

 

1) When you say "best advice is to use standard DPI, you mean 72? and if so, then why would the 2x and 3x be finer res when the original was only 72? I'm trying to understand how AP is handling this scenario.

 

2) Let's say you want to create a new image and your target is a 600x200 standard image, and a 1200x400 enlargement of that image. When you launch AP, what do you enter as the settings to begin the image (and at what size)?

 

3) If you already have an image done at 600x200, and then want to engage the 2x retina, what do you do in AP to get the best quality?

 

4) RE: your comment "the document DPI will be used to determine..." Does that mean that the images are "fluid" and not committed to pixel size until final export, meaning the pixels won't suffer the enlarge (pixels stretched) /reduce (pixels discarded) damage?

[onamac]

Oh, and thank you Ben in advance.

 

Am looking forward to an answer on this as I want to know the best way to resize in AP for best results.

[onamac]

I'd like to bump this post to clarify what is the best way to handle resizing, per my previous post questions. Thank you!