How to add ALPHA CHANNEL

[hl24a3]

Look at the layer and channel panels on the attached image for details, but basically when I export this image it always exports a combined alpha of all layers and I want the alpha of Sylvester only to be exported, how do I do it in Affinity?

 

[myclay]

Hello ds24a3,

 

right click on your Sylvester Alpha  and select create mask. save as png.

 

other method;

select what you whish to have in your alpha channel 

rightclick on your Pixel Selection,

Create Spare channel,

right click on your spare channel,

load to Background Alpha.

 

 

the usual problem with png files is, that even with 32bit dept,

you won´t have the ability to retrieve the now transparent background.

 

There is a solution for that apparently;

Affinity Photo can save and open pngs with 64bit dept (16bit for each channel)

 

For that above task; 

select under 'Color Format' 32bit HDR

create the alpha channel

use the Export preset  'PNG-24'

save it out.

import the file into Affinity Photo,

right click on Background alpha,

press 'Fill' and you have your background back.

 

https://db.tt/gIflhyqk7q<- her is an example file for the above solution for making the transparent parts opaque again.

[hl24a3]

I couldn't figure out what you proposed to do, I tried as best I could follow but it seems not to do what I need it to do.

 

Basically I need a custom black and white alpha channel within the image, or any image for that matter, alpha channel must be able to represent any shape and not only the automatic cutout done by Affinity's masking feature. I need this for other programs, 3D programs, where it is very useful feature, basically essential. In Photoshop it is allowed to draw on alpha, to paste on alpha, it is like any other layer, is this really not available in Affinity?

[myclay]

For 3D Artists there is this neat tutorial from the Affinity Team available.

Which shows the packing feature of channels.

https://vimeo.com/205028961

 

 

All clips about channels:

https://vimeo.com/affinitybyserif/videos/search:channel/sort:date

[hl24a3]

Thanks, nice tutorial it doesn't solve my problem abut still quite useful

[myclay]

Hello ds24a3,

 

while reading the other thread which you opened about the same topic, I now get what you want.

That 'alpha1' functionality is unfortunately still missing in Affinity Photo.

 

 

Since you posted in the tutorial section and others might have the same question;

While the Affinity photo developers are still trying to add that functionality,

simply use in the meantime the Channel Shuffle program which was written by Lukas Orsvärn.

 

Channel Shuffle helps Affinity Photo/Designer Users in three ways;

It gives you DDS and TGA support and you can also add images to the alpha channel.

http://orsvarn.com/post/channel-shuffle/

 

hopefully it helps you in your further work. :) 

[hl24a3]

You've nailed it myclay, this should do until affinity implements this feature into photo. Thanks so much

[travisrogers]

Hi, I'm currently trying to achieve the same thing here in April of 2020 and it seems it's still not yet possible, or I can't for the life of me figure it out.

I want to make a 1024 x 1024 PNG image with an alpha area in a particular position. If I export the layer with the area I want to keep and I specify in the export dialog that I want to export the selected layer without the background it works as expected (I get a PNG that's transparent except for the area my selected layer occupied), however, the image is now cropped to the area of the selection and is no longer 1024. Ultimately I want to keep my image 1024 so that when I map it in the 3D app I'm using I don't have to guess at the correct scaling and positioning of the image as the 3D app is assuming it to be a square format.

I've played with every combination I can think of in the Layers and Channels menus, but I can't seem to achieve what I'm looking for.

In Photoshop I can create a 1024x1024 canvas add a layer with the graphic I want, position it how I want, delete the background layer and export with transparency which gives still gives me a 1024x1024 image. Is this possible in Affinity without the use of a third party app?

Thanks in advance!

--------------------------------------------

Edit:

I think I figured out how to do this using the Export Persona. If you select the layer you want to be opaque and then create a slice for that layer, you can expand the slice to take up the entire canvas and when you export that slice it will retain the scale of the canvas and layers / layer position and alpha out the background. I'm happy to see that this is possible for my workflow as I would prefer to us AP vs PS. It would be great and so much easier however if there were an option in the regular export dialog Area pull-down to export 'Selection without background full canvas' or something to that effect.. Maybe it's a checkbox below the dialog 'Export full canvas size'.

Please let me know if there's a more efficient way of doing this.

Thx!

Edited April 10, 2020 by travisrogers
I discovered a partial solution

[hl24a3]

sadly I don't think it's done yet 😕

[yalcin]

I have just purchased a new copy and found out this. I already own a corel paintshop pro, but I dislike its interface and heard a lot of good of things about affinity photo. It is rather disappointing that there is not an easy way to copy paste a grayscale image to alpha channel.

[NotMyFault]

On 1/21/2021 at 12:05 PM, yalcin said:

I have just purchased a new copy and found out this. I already own a corel paintshop pro, but I dislike its interface and heard a lot of good of things about affinity photo. It is rather disappointing that there is not an easy way to copy paste a grayscale image to alpha channel.

Hi,

only 2 simple steps are required:

1. crate spare channel from any color channel of the greyscale layer
2. load to pixel alpha 

in most cases, you can simply use „rasterize to mask“ to fully use a grayscale layer as mask.

[languidcorpse]

1. crate spare channel from any color channel of the greyscale layer
2. load to pixel alpha 

I am not following your easy instructions. I too would love to jump the adobe ship but masking is huge and I keep running into the Affinity shortcomings when try to mask things.

This is right up there with turning a selection into a vector.

 

[lekastor]

Hi guys, running in the same (huge) limitation.

One solution that would be very handy is to be able to select any spare channel as alpha channel at export time.

I think any 3D artist need to customize their alpha channel. Thanks for your time