absolutely complete ignoramus

[rafi266]

Hi everyone! I recently posted about my lack of knowledge concerning workflow but the kind guys who left a post there assumed that I DID have some sort of knowhow, and- the sad thing is that I (and I presume also many many others who had their socks blown off by this beautiful piece of software) have no idea whatsoever how to wade in...

I have been taking photos for many years and have a big collection of raws, but up to now, have mainly limited myself to Picasa for JPEGs, and Lightzone and Adobes Lightroom for the past few months. And now- gorgeous Affinity...

Where do I start? Yep- I know that there are great videos and I have gone through quite a few but they go over a specific setup, and I need even more basic than that- e.g: Do I play with white/black point before or after exposure? Why are there color controls in a b&w mix? Do I have to use all the controls? what is a live layer and do I have to use it? etc. etc. etc..... In other words- A course called "basic photo editing 101"

Any ideas? Maybe there are a few videos out there for guys like me with low confidence issues? And if we're talking about videos (the guy who talks you through them is a real pro- kudos!) why arent they numbered in order of complexity?

[Aeros4]

Hi Rafi;

           I feel for you, if you are on Skype, send me a contact request at richardc.jones and I could share my screen to help you get started.

[brunzenstein]

why aren't they numbered in order of complexity?

Because they are so short as instructive that no matter of individual qualification anybody can follow each of them and profit from by simply repeating them a few times until securely digested.

There is no "instant Mozart" neither "learn French in 10 Minutes" - you have to go though most of the excellent videos.

YES - through most of them - that seem hard but even semi professional photo editing is no simple table dance.

If you do then you will be rewarded.

Without dedication, effort and willing to sweat (learn) you better stay away altogether to start with.

[Bri-Toon]

To be fair, I'm not too knowledgable in Affinity Photo either, but I would love to learn. And understand that the right way to deliver the proper information is not easy since there are so many ways of doing things. I do agree that the knowledge and terminology in the featured tutorial videos are too technical, whereas many people like us want to learn how to get started. Something that caught my attention, however, is the approach Drippy Cat used here. It does not cover everything, but he gets into the proper way of enhancing photos, and most importantly, in the correct order. I would say this is a great way to get started.

 

With that said, it's probably not a great idea to leave that topic title and expect help. Serif made plenty of tutorials, so they are definitely trying to be helpful.

[Alfred]

This thread may be of interest: Free photo editing tutorial for beginners at Udemy

 

Edit: I see that Brian ('bleduc') beat me to it! BTW, I agree with him that the thread title could be improved.

[Bri-Toon]

Edit: I see that Brian ('bleduc') beat me to it!

 

You too, huh? I guess he found the selling point.

[brunzenstein]

There are tons of good videos to be found on youtube besides the in-house videos as well. A excellent print Workbook I highly recommend to you is available from Serife to get you swiftly on track.
If one is willing to learn then he will master the programs AD & AP in a week or so.
I have done so myself under production pressure (my whole production team went sick due to a flu and I had to do it as a one man show for eight sick folks) with X-Press, Photoshop, inDesign, AP&AD and more.

If on thinks he only has to buy a fiddle to be able to play like Yehudi Menuhin, then he will be up for a surprise

[rafi266]

I agree totally- I have noticed over my 58 yrs on earth that 'no pain- no gain...'. But Im not looking for instant gratification- I just want an overall plan of workflow (as I mentioned at start). IOW- Looking at a raw I want to know (after developing the raw and moving to the 'photo persona'), do I work through the tabs on right - Adjustment/Layers/Effects/Styles -? Or is there a logical "flow chart" way of working, e.g: is the image too dark/light? YES- go to A- or NO- go to B . Is the color of the image biased towards green? YES- go to... etc.

[rafi266]

BTW, thanks Brunzenstein for your feedback, but the only workbook I saw offered is the Affinity Designer one- have you seen a Photo workbook offered anywhere?

[MEB]

Hi rafi266,

Welcome to Affinity Forums :)

There's no official workbook for Affinity Photo yet. I have listed a few learning resources - books/training courses - here just in case you want to take a look.

[rmar]

Everyone learns differently. Being an inexperienced ignoramus myself I found it a struggle to wrap my head around editing and workflow. I never used anything like AP or photoshop before. I do have lightroom 4.

 

An odd thing that helped me to understand actual workflow came from the video editing industry. It may not be useful to your education but it helped me grasp the photo editing workflow:

 

1. Davinci Resolve https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolveIf you scroll down to the bottom of the page you will see a free version for download.

 

2. This guys free Resolve tutorials http://filmsimplified.com/courses He has a lot of paid tutorials for film makers but his free classes were enough for me to grasp the idea of an editing workflow. The tools are obviously wrong for AffinityPhoto but the concept of workflow is what they helped me understand. (besides, most modern cameras come with video capability so you might need it one day).

 

3. Same guy, (Alex Jordon). This is his youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/user/LearnColorGrading/featured.. Most of the channel is advertising for his classes but he has a lot of short tutorials that I found very helpful.

 

Apologies if this is way off topic but being a noob and knowing this helped me (in an odd way) to understand the editing and workflow process, I will throw it out there for others who might be struggling.

 

 

Edit: Forgot to mention. When he talks about nodes just replace that word with layers, it will make sense then :)