Affinity Photo ‘Secret Sauce’ Not Working …

[Dr_No]

’Allo again, mes amis … today the Big Question is: ‘How Come It Don't Do It Like Dis?’ … You've heard of and seen the excellent series of tutes produced by Olivio Sarikas, yes? He does an excellent job. In this particular tute, he examines Affinity Photo's built-in quirk that automatically applies a series of pre-sets to the RAW image(-s) opened in Developer persona. 

Note that, in his vid, he selects the ‘Exposure’ tab and clicks the ‘Undo’ Swirly Arrow to remove the presets and display the image in its as-shot state. I have tried and tried and tried yet again to have Affinity Photo duplicate on my Mac this same behavior. Nuh-unh, Charlie. It don't be playin' dat. The picture brought remains as unchanged after clicking the Reset circular arrow as if it had never been clicked. The same applies to every other ‘undo’ arrow for the rest of the settings in that panel. Here’s the link to the tute if you want to see it for yourself … undoing the preset(-s) is the very first thing he covers, so it's not a long wait. All feedback as to how to make this work outside of the vid is appreciated. Please advise if this ‘sauce’ works for you on your machine, too. Thanks.

 

[carl123]

It probably depends on the raw file being processed and if there is certain information stored in the EXIF data

Plus, it probably also depends on your Assistant Manager settings

[Dr_No]

Please expand on the Assistant Mgr settings and their interference with the ‘Undo’ circular arrow. The RAW files are only of two types: .CR2 and .NEF as-shot and as-imported from the CF card.

[carl123]

Exposure Bias

Check the help file

[firstdefence]

Under the Assistant Manager if you have the settings as in the screenshot none of the presets will be applied so resetting the panels is not necessary.

[Dr_No]

firstdefence … Thanks for the screencap. Unfortunately, the problem continues unabated and the auto-applied ‘corrections’ remain intact and unchanged even after making the changes suggested. This. Is. Maddening.

[Dr_No]

A quick followup with a screencap to illustrate settings … the ONLY item that changes anything is the 32-bit PREVIEW setting. Changes can be seen on-screen as made. There is a problem, tho’ … the second the ‘Develop’ button is clicked, EVERY ONE of the changes just made go ‘POOF!’ and the image reverts to its auto-settings dark preview as if nothing had ever been altered. Thoughts and suggestions welcomed …

[Dr_No]

Okay … Put this in the ‘Mama, how come … ?’ column (see screencap, attached below). This was not covered in Olivio's tute, but provided the same effect as did his click of the ‘Undo’ rotate icon. The change (‘Apply Tone Curve’) was made, as shown, using a random test image in the Assistant module and results were instant. All other settings remained at their respective defaults. Whether this is a viable path forward will be learnt as new images are processed, but for now, this (’scuse the blatant internet meme ripoff) ‘One Simple Trick!’ appears to do what the ‘Undo’ rotary icon does in Olivio's tute. Here's the screencap …

[Old Bruce]

17 minutes ago, Dr_No said:

his click of the ‘Undo’ rotate icon

That is a Reset icon, not an Undo icon.

[Dr_No]

Thanks … out of curiosity, is there a functional diff'rents between ‘Reset’ and ‘Undo’ or is it just a semantic diff'rents? … i.e., do they do the same thing but under a diff'rent name?

[Dr_No]

Update time: The ‘solution’ I thought I'd stumbled upon is NOT a solution. Clicking ‘apply tone curve’ does, indeed, brighten the image, and one can click thru the adjustments and make changes to light/dark tonalities, correct exposure, etc etc - and the moment the ‘Develop’ tab is clicked, everything - as before - is undone. The only changed detected now is that the ‘developed’ image is much darker than the RAW file as opened, which is much less than being ‘the best of all possible worlds’ …

[Old Bruce]

If you think about it there is a difference. Reset resets to whatever the defaults are. Undo will undo that reset.

[Dr_No]

Interesting. A subtle yet applicable distinction. In the ongoing tale of the Inapplicable Reset / Undo icon’s functionality, I imported a .CR2 file and clicked the Rotary Reverse Arrow for the Exposure (after resetting ‘Apply Tone Curve’ to ‘Take No Action’). Damned if it didn't correct the exposure. Granted, this is one time and one file, and the image was produced by a Canon instead of a Nikon, but still … More to the point: Once ‘tweaks’ were made in the different panels and ‘Develop’ was clicked, there was no reversion to the original darkened image. Next step is to replicate this with a Nikon .NEF image. If both produce similar results, I'll be a Happy Camper – but still in the dark as to the ‘Why’ regarding the causal factor for this behavior. It's really nice (and often important) to understand the ‘why’ about things that happen, yes … ?

[Old Bruce]

6 minutes ago, Dr_No said:

I imported a .CR2 file

Did you have a document file that you used File > Place... to import the .CR2 file into? 

Or is this actually a .CR2 file that you used File > Open... with to actually open the file into the Develop persona of the Photo application?

[Dr_No]

The procedure was File > Open to ensure that normal procedure was followed …