Levels channels keyboard/touchbar shortcuts

[ESE]

Hello great people behind Affinity Photo!

 

This is largely an extended repost from this thread, in which I asked if there are any shortcuts to switch between the master/r/g/b channels, like in Photoshop. The answer was basically: "nope, but write a feature request". So here we are:

 

I would like to switch between levels channels easily using some sort of shortcut, in order to make my workflow more efficient again, since I use levels adjustments a lot.

 

Comparison between my workflow in Photoshop and Affinity Photo:

 

• In Photoshop, I could iteratively make channel adjustments very fast by switching between the channels with my left hand and controlling the sliders with a drawing pen with my right hand, while keeping my eyes focused on the photo. The keyboard shortcuts to switch between the master/r/g/b channels were CMD + ~/1/2/3, as you can also see on the first screenshot showing the drop-down menu in Photoshop's levels interface.
• In Affinity Photo, I notice I am much less nimble when adjusting channels. Because no keyboard shortcuts exist, I constantly have to take my eyes off the photo to find the drop-down menu (first click) and selecting the desired channel (second click) before I can refocus on the photo and control the sliders. As I tend to alternate between channels a lot, I simply notice it is taking a lot of the speed out of my workflow.

 

A typical workflow of mine is as follows:

• Coarse adjustments of the black and white levels of the rgb channels (first red, then green, then blue)
• Initial fine-tuning with the gamma levels (first blue as I am in that channel anyway, then red, then green)
• Further fine-tuning depending on how happy I am with the results, which can range from going back to just one channel up to redoing the coarse adjustment altogether
• I rarely touch the master levels, but if I do, it's mostly at the end of the color balancing

 

Possible solutions I see to creating a shortcut to switch between channels are:

1. Keyboard shortcuts: this option would be to implement the shortcuts akin to the way Photoshop had them.
2. Three Touch Bar controls: in this option, the Touch Bar would be enhanced by adding red/green/blue buttons when the master channel is active (the buttons would become master/red/blue if the green channel is active).
3. One Touch Bar control: in this option, you would use one button to cycle through the channels in the order master->red->green->blue. So to get from master to green, you would have to depress the button twice, and to get from green to red, you would have to depress it three times.

 

 

To illustrate the Touch Bar controls, I have added a screenshot of the currently available controls in the levels adjustment interface (showing only controls for black, white, gamma, and presets), as well as a screenshot of the B/W conversion interface showing a separate button for each color slider (this gives an idea what the option with three controls could sort of look like).