how to stop making changes to the original photo?

[Romusko]

So I started experimenting with Affinity today... And I happened to destroy some of my favorite photos. I didn't expect it to change the original photo. I thought the changes will only show on the exported one. Can someone help to change the settings so it doesn't change the original pic?

[firstdefence]

Welcome to the forum @Romusko

Sounds like you opened a JPEG image applied some destructive filters and clicked save, this will save back to the jpeg without warning, overwriting the image. 

A few tips for the future.
Always make a duplicate of the image so you have two layers and work on the top layer duplicate, this prevents/delays overwriting the jpeg without warning because now you have a layer structure, if you click on save now it will bring up a pop window like this one...

Clicking on Save Flattened will overwrite the original, clicking Save As will create an .afphoto .afdesigner or .afpub file depending which app you are using, this preserves all of the layers, filters etc you have added.

You can export from the .afphoto file at a later date to several different file formats using File > Export...

[R C-R]

5 hours ago, Romusko said:

I thought the changes will only show on the exported one.

What do you mean by the "exported one"? What app are you exporting your photos from, & in what format?

If instead you are just opening your photos directly from some folder on your computer then as @firstdefence mentioned, they are probably JPEGs (or less likely but possibly some other single layer raster image format like PNG).

In that case, Affinity (not unlike some other graphics editing apps) assumes that you did that because you want to change the original so it won't prevent you from overwriting it or ask if you are sure you want to do that, unless the changes you made are not supported by the format of the original. For instance, erasing part of a JPEG will trigger the "Save Document" window because JPEG does not support transparency.

This is not as clear as it could be to new users, but it is yet another reason for making sure you have a good backup strategy, not just for documents you work on with Affinity but for all your documents.

[William Overington]

If I want to make changes to an item that I already have, I always open the original, then immediately use

File

Save As...

then use a new file name, then close it.

I then open the new filw and work from that, thereby never making any changes with the original file open.

I often produce a series of files from time to time as I proceed, so that if I get in a muddle I can go back to the previous one, make a new copy and then continue editing.

A consistent naming scheme for the files is helpful.

There are various ways to do this.

So, if, for example the original file is

apricot.jpg

one could open apricot.jpg

and immediately use

Save As...

apricot_20220116a.jpg as the file name.

Then the next file in the series woukd be

apricot_20220116b.jpg

William

 

[Pšenda]

7 hours ago, Romusko said:

I didn't expect it to change the original photo. I thought the changes will only show on the exported one.

The mentioned inconsistency in the schema (Save/SaveAs = native format, Export = any other format), is very confusing and, as your case shows, very unpleasant for the user. Although it is mentioned in the Help (who reads it, right?), so Serif should warn the user of these consequences - for example, with a message confirming the operation (overwriting the original JPEG file) and the Don't Ask option, so that it does not have to be confirmed every time. 

[walt.farrell]

1 hour ago, William Overington said:

File

Save As...

then use a new file name, then close it.

I then open the new filw and work from that, thereby never making any changes with the original file open

Once you use Save As you're working on the new file. There's no need to Close and re-Open it.

[thomaso]

10 hours ago, Romusko said:

And I happened to destroy some of my favorite photos. I didn't expect it to change the original photo.

You seem to have used "Save" after editing the image. What do you expect would happen then if the app doesn't ask you to enter a file name?

If you notice that "Save" simply works without a dialog window being opened, overwriting the opened image unintentionally, then, if you have not closed the file, you still can use the History Panel (optionally after  "Export" or "Save as…") to reset your changes and "Save" again. This way the initial file gets saved again but with its not-modified content, and you alter the file's modification date only, which you can fix by editing the file's metadata externally from Affinity.
For instance in macOS you can use the Terminal.app with touch -t YYYYMMDDhhmm <path/file> to set the modification date. Or, ideally you have TimeMachine active to restore the file from a backup or local snapshot.

Another option to avoid losing a certain state unintentionally would be using the Affinity Snapshot Panel which creates an entry with the current document state at any time you want and allows to recall any of your snapshot at any later time.
https://affinity.help/photo/English.lproj/index.html?page=pages/DesignAids/snapshot.html?title=Using snapshots

[William Overington]

8 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

Once you use Save As you're working on the new file. There's no need to Close and re-Open it.

The reason that I do it is more aesthetic really.

I just checked and it appears that using a

File

Save As...

wipes away the list of undoable commands.

So, yes, there is no need.

William

 

[Pšenda]

18 hours ago, Romusko said:

so it doesn't change the original pic?

I recommend using a generally valid procedure - set the Read Only flag for files that require protection against modification or deletion. The change/save will then be disabled at the OS level, or a Warning will be displayed, which the user must acknowledge, thus preventing any saving/overwriting of the file.

[R C-R]

19 hours ago, Pšenda said:

The mentioned inconsistency in the schema (Save/SaveAs = native format, Export = any other format), is very confusing and, as your case shows, very unpleasant for the user.

It should not be confusing because it is the same way the Save command works in many other apps. For all of them, the assumption is if you open a document file, make changes to it, & then tell the app to save it, you want to replace the original with the changed version, not keep both the original & changed versions as separate files. The Save As commend is provided for when you do want to keep both.

In fact, in most apps if you make changes & then try to close the file without saving it, you get a warning that unsaved changes will be lost unless you save the file before closing it.

[Ron P.]

2 hours ago, R C-R said:

n fact, in most apps if you make changes & then try to close the file without saving it, you get a warning that unsaved changes will be lost unless you save the file before closing it.

I agree, here's an example...

[Pšenda]

7 hours ago, R C-R said:

It should not be confusing

It shouldn't be, but as you can see from the OP case, so for some users is. Maybe because the wording in Help encourages this.

 

For these for some users unexpected cases, Serif could adjust the save just as Acrobat reader does when you first save the interactive form (see also my previous suggestion).

[Andy.Orange]

The suggestions in this thread are excellent workarounds, but don't really address the original post. It easy for a new user to make the assumption that a file will not be overwritten without warning. The requested solution was to implement a warning dialogue (warning = you are about to overwrite your original). A checkbox option could be included to not show warning again if users eventually find it annoying and/or unnecessary.