Is Affinity D for professional use?

[bgarrant]

I love the product. Works great on Windows 10. Are pros using this or is Photoshop still the standard for website mockups? What issues does the beta have at this point?

[MEB]

Hi bgarrant,

Welcome to Affinity Forums :)

Yes, Affinity apps were designed for professional use, however Designer for Windows is still in development (public Beta). It's still subject to changes/bugs/issues and it's not recommended for daily/production use. If you are willing to give it a try it you can subscribe for the Beta here and tcheck for yourself. Designer is closer to Illustrator than Photoshop. For RAW development/photo editing  Affinity Photo is more adequate (not available on Windows yet). 

[bgarrant]

Any idea when we can start using it for production use?  Like weeks, months, etc?  I have tested it a bit and I had no crashes.  What are the issues preventing using it at this point?  What major ones to consider?  I am desperately trying to get away from Adobe as my yearly subscription is up in about 10 days and I do not want to renew.

 

Also, is AD or AP better for web mockup designing?  I asked in another post as well that you can close if you answer.

[MEB]

It may not be crashing but there still issues to solve with fonts, shortcuts, UI issues etc. If you take a look at the Beta's release threads (here's the last one) you can have an idea of the issues that were fixed (changelog on the first post) as well as reports from others users about the issues they are encountering in the latest Beta.

There's no ETA for its release yet. It depends on how developments goes. 

[Mark Ingram]

As MEB has mentioned, the latest beta is available here - https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/23847-affinity-designer-public-beta-15012-windows/

 

You should however carefully read the first sentence:

 

 

 

As this is a beta release, it is considered to be not suitable for production use. This means that you should not attempt to use it for commercial purposes or for any other activity that you may be adversely affected by the application failing.

 

If you choose to use it for production use, that's entirely up to you, but be aware, the Windows version is still a beta. There are bugs.

 

I'm moving this to the Questions forum.

[VIPStephan]

Or, to put it another way: you can certainly use it for production, and if you didn’t experience any negative effects so far that’s good for you. You just can’t hold Serif responsible in the (unlikely) case that you are losing any work due to program failure. That “not for production use” is just a warning, not a law written in stone.

[Bri-Toon]

Also, is AD or AP better for web mockup designing?  I asked in another post as well that you can close if you answer.

 

To answer this part of your question, Designer would probably be a better choice for web mockups. It has the round corner tool for rounding panels or whatever, and making adjustments would be fewer clicks.

[bgarrant]

To answer this part of your question, Designer would probably be a better choice for web mockups. It has the round corner tool for rounding panels or whatever, and making adjustments would be fewer clicks.

 

I really like AD for WIndows.  My only dilema at the moment is my Adobe subscriptions ends in 10 days.  I need a product to use before the release of AD is out since it is in beta and not recommended for production use.  ANy suggestions?

[Bri-Toon]

I think switching to Affinity is a wise choice. Yes, the Windows version is still in beta, but it is still fine to use. In Mark's quote about it not being for production use, he is sending out a warning that there might be a glitch here and there, but you can still get around the program fine. None of the problems are too serious. So I would recommend it.

 

However, if you feel that Affinity doesn't suite your needs, there is also Serif DrawPlus which is exclusive to Windows and made by the same team that made Affinity. It's a bit pricey, but there is a free starter version to test out. DrawPlus can do a lot of things Affinity can do, plus more. There is also Xara Photo and Graphic Designer. It is made for both pixel and vector editing, and the pencil tool works very well. Both programs can be used for webs mockups.

 

Aside from those, Affinity, and Adobe, I don't feel that there are any other good graphic design software for Windows (Though I haven't tried Canvas X). I never liked CorelDraw or Inkscape. There is a free application, Krita, but it's a pixel based program, and not in my opinion good for graphic design, but I'm bringing it out there because a lot of people do like it.

[bgarrant]

I think switching to Affinity is a wise choice. Yes, the Windows version is still in beta, but it is still fine to use. In Mark's quote about it not being for production use, he is sending out a warning that there might be a glitch here and there, but you can still get around the program fine. None of the problems are too serious. So I would recommend it.

 

However, if you feel that Affinity doesn't suite your needs, there is also Serif DrawPlus which is exclusive to Windows and made by the same team that made Affinity. It's a bit pricey, but there is a free starter version to test out. DrawPlus can do a lot of things Affinity can do, plus more. There is also Xara Photo and Graphic Designer. It is made for both pixel and vector editing, and the pencil tool works very well. Both programs can be used for webs mockups.

 

Aside from those, Affinity, and Adobe, I don't feel that there are any other good graphic design software for Windows (Though I haven't tried Canvas X). I never liked CorelDraw or Inkscape. There is a free application, Krita, but it's a pixel based program, and not in my opinion good for graphic design, but I'm bringing it out there because a lot of people do like it.

Thanks so much.  Affinity looks fantastic.  

[Bri-Toon]

[JET_Affinity]

Even after its initial release, its feature set will, by all indications, be lacking in comparison to existing mainstream offerings. (See the projected development road map.) But the hope is certainly that it will be reasonably quickly fleshed-out to compete favorably. We've all got our fingers crossed.

 

And since that is the openly claimed intention, any graphics professional should consider it worth being familiar with.

 

JET

[bgarrant]

Thanks Jet. I made my first web mockup with the beta today. No crashes and worked great. Can't wait to see what else AD can do. For a beta it works pretty well. Of course I have not tried drawing with it yet.