Big performance problems with Photo on macOS

[duncang]

I am using v1.9.3 and have just encountered significant performance problems when editing with multiple layers.  I don't usually use this many layers (3 with 2 masks) but haven't previously noticed such dramatic performance problems - sometimes the app stalls completely for up to 30 seconds - and when using the "Refine Mask..." and brushing the edges the brushed area does not show up for 5 or 6 seconds after brushing.

What gives, and I just expecting to much ?

See attached file.  Try the following steps to reproduce the issue.

1. Open the file (duh!)

2. Zoom in to an area under the birds beak (anywhere on the mask edge will probably do)

2. Select the foreground layer's mask (top layer called background lol!)

3. Right click on the mask icon and select "Refine mask..." menu option - this is where mine starts stalling

4. Brush on the edge of the mask - when I do the brush trail does not show for quite a few seconds - maybe 5 or 6 seconds - and the dreaded colour umbrella starts up !! 

5. Cancel the action - and here mine renders part of the screen and shows blocks where the red mask overlay is not yet overdrawn, again for maybe 3 seconds or so.  You can't pan or zoom the image during this so UI is stalled

And then strangely if I close the file and open it again it might perform just fine.

Running macOS 11.4 on MacBook Air (M1) 16GB RAM, 300GB free disk space.

 

Have tried restarting Photo and restarting the laptop - neither seems to have any effect.

This stalling makes Photo almost unusable now.

Added screen recording video showing the issue.  The dreaded umbrella does not get recorded (of course not!)

DSC02347_q100-DeNoiseAI-standard (1).afphoto

Edited June 21, 2021 by duncang
Added screen recording to show the issue

[duncang]

Perhaps this is an obvious solution to more experienced users but once I do a "Merge Visible" on the layer below the foreground layer and then disable all the background layers performance is more or less back to what I would normally experience.

Is this the usual step that is required to keep performance acceptable ?  I guess perhaps I might have expected Affinity Photo to create its own 'working copy' of the unchanged parts of the layer stack if nothing lower down has been changed.

[Chris B]

I'm struggling to reproduce this on my M1 MacBook. I'd be interested to see if anyone else has chance to check it and see what they get.

I would argue that merging is a viable option and it's there for a reason. Saying that, your file doesn't have tons of filters/adjustments so I'm a little surprised by the performance here.

[Jeroen]

Same here. I do not think you are expecting too much. I have been a very satisfied Photo user for years. The controls used to work virtually instantaneously. But not anymore.

Coming back after a pause, with 1.9.3 I constantly have freezes. So bad that I first thought that I did something wrong, since (for example) twiddling with the Levels control did absolutely nothing. Only after many seconds it appeared to work after all.

I am not doing anything out of the ordinary, compared to what I did in the past. A few layers with one or two live filters, that's all. One file at a time.

Also, I noticed that with the Levels control sometimes the histogram does not show, at other times it stays at the master display when I am on red. Once, after saving the file, the histogram suddenly appeared. Could be due to the same freezing behavior, cannot be sure.

I also found that a Levels control that (sort of) works at the global level becomes unresponsive if I move it to be subordinate to a layer (with mask). That is, sometimes this happens. Could again be a temporary (but long) freeze.

I do not think that there is anything wrong with my system, or with the files I am editing (300 MB or so tiff files). System is an 2019 iMac, 3.7 GHz 6-Core Intel Core i5 processor, 40 GB 2667 MHz DDR4 memory, Radeon Pro 580X 8 GB video card. The system is lightly loaded. I am running the latest version of OSX (Big Sur 11.4).

I hope that Serif is paying attention. I have always found Affinity Photo an excellent alternative to Photoshop and I have been an active ambassador for the program, but based on this version I cannot recommend it to anyone. Please have this fixed ASAP. I have a project that needs finishing. 

(If there are any tests I can do that could help find the cause, I will be happy to help. I know about computers.)

[Chris B]

Hi Jeroen,

If you're struggling with 1.9.3 I would try the beta. There have been quite a lot of updates over the retail version and Andy (lead Photo dev) does recommend using it in preference to the retail if you're hitting a wall.

Just be vigilant with your files and work from a copy when using the beta:

 

[Jeroen]

Thank you for this. This is what I am doing right at this moment. It seems to work much better so far.

Actually, I am just submitting my first (unrelated) bug report...

Thanks again.