Affinity Designer Vs Affinity Photo

[Consecca]

Hi

 

Can someone tell me the difference between Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer?

Do you need both of these to work with raster images /photo editing and work with vectors?  I had the impression that you could work with vectors/draw logos/illustrations and edit photos/raster images in one Affinity app but is that not the case?

 

Thanks

Dean

[MEB]

Hi Dean,

Welcome to Affinity Forums

Affinity Designer is an hybrid vector/raster illustration and graphic/web/UI design application. You can use it to design/layout websites (visually - no code output), user interfaces, and all type of print/graphic work like flyers, posters, banners, logos, etc except projects that rely on heavy/linked text blocks (we will have another app later for that - Affinity Publisher). It also great for illustration work both vector and raster based (or mixed simultaneously). Although it has a few basic tools commonly found in  photo editing apps - Selection tools, Flood Fill, Dodge/Burn etc / its photo editing abilities/funcionality are not comparable to a true/complete photo editor. You don't have access to channels, RAW development/conversion, HDR merge/tone mapping, panorama stitching, Filters etc etc just to name a few.

 

Affinity Photo is a RAW converter/developer and photo editing app. It mostly used to convert/develop RAW images (taken with digital cameras), for photo editing/compositing and painting/illustration (raster based brushes only).

[Consecca]

Hi MEB

 

Thanks for your rapid and helpful response!  So I am right in thinking that Affinity Photo would be much more essential for Photographers and Fashion Designers that do a ton of RAW image editing, where as myself who is a Web Designer could I get by just fine on Affinity Designer?  but if I do need to apply say a filter, edit the  lighting etc of some  stock images for example, can I still do that in Affinity Designer?

 

Thanks

Dean

[MEB]

I've expanded my previous reply a little to provide more info. There's no filters in Affinity Designer. So for advanced photo editing capabilities you will need Affinity Photo. They complement each other quite well if you need to work on both photo and design projects. You can open our native file formats (afdesign, afphoto) in any of the apps of the suite and also swap the file you are working on (will all History steps included) between the apps as you see fit without the need to save the file first, among other things.

[Consecca]

Ah ok, I hear ya, thanks for your super helpful response @MEB that has certainly helped me to make an informed decision about what to purchase to suit my professional needs.

Sounds like AD will be enough for me to get by as a Web Designer, but if in the future I do find I need more powerful image editing capabilities I can always purchase AP at a later date

[pnnylayne]

Hi!  I'd love to get an update from the original poster because I'm debating the same thing myself.  What Designer enough for you to do very basic photo editing?  Or did you end up needing to add Photo?

Thanks!

[MEB]

Hi pnnylayne,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
I suggest you download Designer's trial from our website and check if the tools present in Pixel Persona are enough for your photo editing needs. If you have trouble performing some task just ask here in the forums and someone will tell you if it's possible to accomplish it using just Designer.

[pnnylayne]

Thanks so much for the rapid response. I’ll take your suggestion and see if that works. I don’t do anything too heavy, very armature (photos of my kids and party invitations—haha), so I’m guessing AD will be enough. Thanks again! :)

[carl123]

1 minute ago, pnnylayne said:

(photos of my kids and party invitations—haha), so I’m guessing AD will be enough

Personally, I would have thought that AP would be more valuable to you

Especially, if you progress to taking RAW images or need such tools as Warp & Perspective, Filters, Plug-ins etc

Either way there are Trial versions of both products plus many videos showing what each version has and can do

[pnnylayne]

  .

[pnnylayne]

1 hour ago, carl123 said:

Personally, I would have thought that AP would be more valuable to you

Especially, if you progress to taking RAW images or need such tools as Warp & Perspective, Filters, Plug-ins etc

Either way there are Trial versions of both products plus many videos showing what each version has and can do

When I'm dealing with photos, I don't generally work with RAW images.  I just do things like adjust lighting and sometimes combine two pictures into one since it's generally impossible to get both of my toddlers to look at the camera at the same time.  I used Photoshop CS5 a lot, but since upgrading to Mojave, it will no longer work on my Mac.  I used the crop, stamp, and healing tools a bunch when dealing with photos, and general light/color adjustment.  That's about it.

I used PS more for making print materials, like invitations, decorations, signs, logos, etc.  That's mostly what I'm trying to replace, but I also want to be able to do the occasional photo edit/splice.

[carl123]

3 minutes ago, pnnylayne said:

.  I used the crop, stamp, and healing tools a bunch when dealing with photos, and general light/color adjustment

I'm even more convinced now, that AP would be far better for you

[pnnylayne]

Just now, carl123 said:

I'm even more convinced now, that AP would be far better for you

Could I do the graphic design stuff in that?

[gdenby]

Hi, pnnylayne,

I'm a complete slouch when it comes to photography. No camera w. RAW, the camera in my iPad is as good, probably better, than any I've had. But I agree w. carl123. AP is probably what you need. I use Designer hours a day, but for some things, such as clearing out noise, or correcting scans of badly faded old pics from the 1940s, I go to photo. Currently, I'm working on a vector portrait of my brother-in-law that was taken w. a cell phone. I spent a couple of hours in Photo to get it to where it was clear enough that I could use it as a backdrop for what I'm doing in Designer, mostly using the pencil tool. If I didn't want to use that, but could get by w. the pen tool, which is available in both, Photo would have been adequate.

[carl123]

4 minutes ago, pnnylayne said:

Could I do the graphic design stuff in that?

If by "graphic design stuff" you mean your party invitations etc then AP is more than capable of doing that.

[Fixx]

For basic document preparing AD is missing clone brush and unsharp mask. Thus its image manipulation abilities are not good enough as itself.

[MEB]

Hi pnnylayne,
As suggested download the trials from our site and check which one is more adequate for the type of work you intend to do.
The video tutorials cover almost all features/functionality of the apps and should help you get started with them. They are listed here:

• Official Affinity Photo (Desktop) Video Tutorials
• Official Affinity Designer Video Tutorials

If you have trouble following them just post/ask here in the forums.

[pnnylayne]

Thanks all!

[R C-R]

I suggest that you first, before do anything else, browse through the Affinity Photo videos @MEB mentioned, particularly the Beginners Series & Basics sections, to get an idea of what that app can do. Then download the Photo free trial & give it a tryout. The reason for this is the free trial only runs for ten consecutive days from the time you first launch it, so if you already have some idea of Photo's capabilities you won't have to waste any of that time on that. You can also access the online version of the built-in help here before running the trial version if you want.

Like the others, I think Affinity Photo will do everything you want (& much, much more!) so once you learn about its capabilities & try it out, if you want you can then do the same with Designer before deciding which one to buy.

And in case you are wondering, any Affinity documents you create with a trial version can be opened & edited in a retail version -- the only thing that happens when the trial period ends is you can no longer use the trial version.