Jump to content

Recommended Posts

Posted (edited)

It's been 3 months since I ditched Adobe Photoshop and Premiere and switched to Affinity Photo 2 and DaVinci Resolve.

DaVinci Resolve has been a doddle. Great training resourced. Intuitive but powerful interface and workflow.

Affinity Photo on the other hand - a complete nightmare. How do people transition? NOTHING, but nothing, works the way you'd expect it to..

Create a new document with a colored background? Click on the Colour tab (why? when there's room on the main tab) and the only option is transparent. So I have to faff around with drawing a rectangle of the right size to get what I need! But then whenever I want to click on something that ruddy background rectangle seems to immediately want to be the thing selected. It's such a time sink. 

Every time I paste a new image into a file it's impossible to then manipulate it. I paste a PNG file in and it appears at some seemingly random position. Click on the Move tool and the new image can't be touched. It's there in it's own layer. The layer is selected, but the Move tool does nothing on any of the images and they're not highlighed when mouse clicked with the Move tool clearly in effect in the tools palette. It only works on text. Seriously? How am I supposed to move the image around? How do I google a "how to" for this nonsense when the only answers say the Move tool SHOULD do what you'd expect it to do?

I've lost count of the number of times some sort of invisible object seems to have been placed on the screen and shows as a dashed border with a square at the top in the middle. It can't be selected. It can't be deleted. Sometimes a complicated mask from an image is shown as a shadowed outline. It's not an object that can be moved or deleted. It's out of line with the image that originally used it to wipe out pixels, but nothing can be done with it. What the....?

Why isn't there a simple "Clear" command for a selection? Cut sometimes seems to achieve what's wanted, but sometimes it doesn't and I see no rhyme or reason to it?

I've spent hours googling stuff only to find the way to do something is so complicated and unintuitive I don't understand how anybody could have designed the software this way. I feel like I'm going to have to go back to paying for software that doesn't make producing anything to a reasonable timeline acceptable. Three months! And still the software is mostly unusable to me.

I'd assumed I must somehow be the one at fault, but when I spoke to two friends who tried to make the switch the same time I did they've said "Couldn't get on with it at all. What were they thinking? I ditched it within a week"

How have people somehow become productive with this stuff? Is there some magic explainer somewhere?

Edited by IanInWingate
Posted

@IanInWingate Ian, a lot of people transitioning expect AfPhoto to work exactly like PS...it doesn't. There are many things that work the same, even using the same keystrokes, but many that don't. It's not an Adobe clone or an 'overnight' transition. We get used to working a certain way, then we want to continue working the same way when we switch. After a few years with AfPhoto, I feel somewhat adrift and frustrated using PS, and I used PS for over 20 years on a regular basis. I far prefer the Affinity interface, but it did take some time.

I watched all of the official Serif Tutorials and many 3rd party tutorials on Youtube. I also practiced many of the techniques. (I did the same with PS, Illustrator and InDesign years ago). I use AfPhoto, AfDesigner and AfPublisher on a regular basis. I like them all, but they aren't perfect and have their bugs, quirks and omissions (like most software programs). A LOT of people use Affinity on a regular basis, some professionally, and some as hobbyists. Not knowing how to use a tool doesn't mean the tool is useless. For me, it was worth the effort, but I understand that may not be the case for everyone.

2024 MacBook Pro M4 Max, 48GB, 1TB SSD, Sequoia OS, Affinity Photo/Designer/Publisher v1 & v2, Adobe CS6 Extended, LightRoom v6, Blender, InkScape, Dell 30" Monitor, Canon PRO-100 Printer, i1 Spectrophotometer, i1Publish, Wacom Intuos 4 PTK-640 graphics tablet

Posted
26 minutes ago, IanInWingate said:

Create a new document with a colored background? Click on the Colour tab (why? when there's room on the main tab) and the only option is transparent. So I have to faff around with drawing a rectangle of the right size to get what I need!

Do you mean "Fill layer"?
https://affinity.help/photo2/English.lproj/pages/Layers/layerFill.html

Affinity Store (MSI/EXE): Affinity Suite (ADe, APh, APu) 2.5.7.2948 (Retail)
Dell OptiPlex 7060, i5-8500 3.00 GHz, 16 GB, Intel UHD Graphics 630, Dell P2417H 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 24H2, Build 26100.2605.
Dell Latitude E5570, i5-6440HQ 2.60 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics 530, 1920 x 1080, Windows 11 Pro, Version 24H2, Build 26100.2605.
Intel NUC5PGYH, Pentium N3700 2.40 GHz, 8 GB, Intel HD Graphics, EIZO EV2456 1920 x 1200, Windows 10 Pro, Version 21H1, Build 19043.2130.

Posted
5 hours ago, IanInWingate said:

Seriously? How am I supposed to move the image around? How do I google a "how to" for this nonsense when the only answers say the Move tool SHOULD do what you'd expect it to do?

That should work unless you accidentally locked the Layer, so check in the Layers panel for a padlock icon next to it there. If you see one, click on it to remove the lock & the Move Tool will do what you want.

5 hours ago, IanInWingate said:

Why isn't there a simple "Clear" command for a selection? Cut sometimes seems to achieve what's wanted, but sometimes it doesn't and I see no rhyme or reason to it?

Not sure what you mean by selection but if you have a 'marching ants' pixel selection made with any of the selection tools, you can delete it via the Select menu item named Deselect or its keyboard shortcut. Otherwise, if you mean a selected layer you can just tap the Delete key or the Layer > Delete item to "clear" (delete) it, or if you just want to deselect it click on something else like a different layer in the Layers panel or on the canvas using the Move Tool somewhere other than on the selected layer.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.5.7 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
A
ll 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Guidelines | We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.