Affinity Photo Beta for iPad (1.6.7 - Beta 3)

[Andy Somerfield]

Status: Beta Release.

Purpose: Fixes, improvements, features.
Requirements: TestFlight Acceptance.
App Store: Not Submitted

 

Hi Guys,

The third beta of 1.6.7 has been deployed on TestFlight. The changes are detailed below.

You can download the App Store version at any time to stop using the beta - and download the TestFlight build at any time to go back to the beta.

 

Thanks,

 

Affinity Photo Team  

 

Changes this version.

 

- Develop shadows / highlights improvements.
- Develop clarity improvements.
- Correctly discard cancelled RAW develops / panoramas etc.
- Improved input smoothing for all tools.
- Improved behaviour when trying to move small layers (ie. avoid inadvertent resizes).
- Improved filesystem integration (again).
- Improved text tool UI.
- Moved spelling suggestions to context menu.
- Removed superfluous OK / Cancel buttons from develop crop tool.
- Creating stacks from RAW files now works more correctly.
- Improved Perlin Noise filter.
- Transparent TGA import support.
- Numerous touch / pencil interaction improvements.
- Fixed colour picker appearing too easily in paint brush tool.
- Fixed long press being too short in some tools.
- Fixed inability to export transparent PNG, TIFF, etc.
- Fixed HEIF import from Photos app.
- Fixed issue where stray colour picker loupe could remain after switching tools.
- Fixed incorrect DPI limit in resize tool.
- Numerous other small fixes.
- Localisation improvements.
- PSD, PDF import / export tweaks.
- Help improvements.

 

Changes since last App Store release.

 

- Now fully supports open-in-place - including saving back directly to the original location.
- New “Import from Camera” - supporting RAW and automatic HDR bracketed merge. Has fancy histograms and scopes.
- New ability to install custom fonts in preferences (these will be shared with Designer iPad once it is released).
- New “Average Blur” filter.
- Added ability to export brushes.
- Added ability to both import and export styles.
- Added option in preferences to cache screen updates - you will see much less pixelation when painting etc. - but it uses more memory.
- Adjustments panel now has an option to show a simple list (by popular request).
- Overhaul of pencil / touch input mechanism - this enabled much needed functionality such as long pressing with Apple Pencil to pick colours in brush tools, etc.
- Fixed marching ants disappearing when canvas is rotated.
- Apple Pencil can now dismiss flyouts without passing a tap through.
- Fixed transform studio aspect ratio lock.
- Improved long-press behaviour in Liquify tool.
- Made the “Protect Alpha” mode of the paint brush tool more obvious.
- Further develop Clarity improvements - including negative clarity.
- Further develop shadows / highlights improvements.
- Improved software keyboard toolbar.
- Ask a better question when leaving a feature persona without committing changes.
- Further performance improvements in develop persona.
- Preferences option to choose default storage location.
- Improved support for the dropping of files into an open document.
- Bitmap fills are now available on vector objects.
- Numerous other small fixes and improvements.
- Localisation tweaks.

 

- Brand new shadows / highlights algorithm in Develop.
- Brand new clarity algorithm in Develop.
- Can now open / edit files in place - directly from the Files app.
- New “Solo” layer option in layer properties panel.
- New preferences option to show touches - good for screen recording.
- Improved iOS11 drag & drop support.
- Can now rotate image in Develop.
- Pasting now keeps things in the right place.
- Maximum / minimum filters now obey the current channels properly.
- Brush scatter works properly when controller is “random”.
- Improved angle / tilt support for Apple Pencil.
- Handle vertical panoramas better.
- Fixed some HDR merge crashes.
- Fixed multiply blend mode in 32bit documents.
- Improved crop tool behaviour when using ratios.
- Improved retouching tools in 32bit mode.
- Fixed issues with “Direction” brush controller.
- Improvements to selection refinement.
- Improved TIFF support.
- PSD export improvements.
- Channels page improvements / fixes.
- “Save a copy” stability improvements.
- Ability to clear history (hopefully will help some people who encounter crashes when trying to return to the home screen).
- New “Constrain” modifier button for Depth of Field tool.
- Snapping candidates can now be selected by hovering over them whilst in a drag.
- All other relevant fixes from 1.6.6 desktop version.
- Help improvements.
- Localisation improvements.

[jacki3wrfsef]

 When I try to open a new file  The screen will show two of the same cloud options in upper right.

 

 

 Also when I tap the help button it’ll flash white in the middle of my screen. Shown in this video 8406EC4C-2CDF-4552-9FA8-1ABEC0148F98.MOV

Edited February 1, 2018 by jacki3wrfsef

[Andrew Tang]

Hi, the white background flash for Help is a known bug.

 

There are two Cloud buttons because one is an import and the other is open in-place. We have both otherwise certain Drives (ie Amazon) don't show up in certain modes because they don't support in-place opening. We will probably change the icon to differentiate it more.

[Alfred]

Can I just say that I really, really like the new splash screen? No?? I thought not!!

 

[Paul Mudditt]

Export via save to files appears broken now, very buggy, just hangs with a white window occasionally.

[jaromvogel]

Not sure if it's just for me, but this update appears to be unable to distinguish between touches and Apple Pencil. When I have touches for gestures only active, I can't draw at all with the pencil, if I turn it off, drawing with the pencil behaves exactly the same as just touch (no pressure sensitivity etc).

 

Love that new splash screen though!

[Andrew Tang]

@PMudditt Where are you trying to save to?

[jacki3wrfsef]

 1.There is no indication that long pressing on the “?” Give you hints on what tool is what.  There should be some pop up or some kind of indication telling the user that long pressing pause the hints to appear.

2. When I have a  Photo editing open in our use “ copy to photo ” from another app,  I will be near message saying that I need to close this document first.  Instead it should copy the new document onto affinity Photo in the background.

 

Edited February 2, 2018 by jacki3wrfsef
Added point 2

[Andrew Tang]

36 minutes ago, jaromvogel said:

Not sure if it's just for me, but this update appears to be unable to distinguish between touches and Apple Pencil. When I have touches for gestures only active, I can't draw at all with the pencil, if I turn it off, drawing with the pencil behaves exactly the same as just touch (no pressure sensitivity etc).

 

 

There seem to be something wrong with touches for gestures. We will fix it for the next beta. 

 

[DM1]

After having a quick play with beta 3.

I have been using gradient maps to Recolour some b&w photos. The improvement to colour picker and brush is amazing. Working a treat for me. 

A shame about the touch gestures , but as long as you are careful with finger placement the pencil works.

Resizing works as expected. No longer resizes when attempting to move.

Saving a copy with 5 or 6 other apps resulted in the dreaded white screen locking up AP.

Closing AP and 3 apps and restarting AP to repeat the process and the save to (local cloud) worked as expected.

 

Perhaps their is some way AP could warn when getting low on ram?, though I suspect this is more of an iOS not releasing free ram issue.

 

Be good to have a quick refresh of the beta to thoroughly test out the pencil changes with touch gestures on.  Hopefully soon.

More to come....

[Tschens]

21 hours ago, jacki3wrfsef said:

 When I try to open a new file  The screen will show two of the same cloud options in upper right.

 

 

 Also when I tap the help button it’ll flash white in the middle of my screen. Shown in this video 8406EC4C-2CDF-4552-9FA8-1ABEC0148F98.MOV

 

 

 Even worse, the *.afphoto files cannot be opened with either button. The are shown, but greyed out.

[Sean P]

15 minutes ago, Tschens said:

 

 

 Even worse, the *.afphoto files cannot be opened with either button. The are shown, but greyed out.

What cloud storage are you using to store your AFPhoto files on? Just checked myself and I can open afphoto files stored on iCloud using both options.

[Tschens]

27 minutes ago, Sean P said:

What cloud storage are you using to store your AFPhoto files on? Just checked myself and I can open afphoto files stored on iCloud using both options.

 

No cloud, the files are on my I-Pad.

[Sean P]

36 minutes ago, Tschens said:

 

No cloud, the files are on my I-Pad.

Are they stored within the 'Photo' folder in 'On My iPad'? Are you able to use the screen recording feature of the iPad to record a video of the issue please? To do this you will need to add it to the control centre in settings.

 

EDIT: No need - we've discovered this is due to using the 'Save' option on the open document's menu. Just saved a file using this and can no longer select it. I'll get this passed onto development.

[DM1]

Trying to apply a perspective distortion to create a shadow effect. Perspective grid refuses to hold shape and fails to distort image to which it is being applied.  Am I doing something wrong?

[Sean P]

5 minutes ago, DM1 said:

Trying to apply a perspective distortion to create a shadow effect. Perspective grid refuses to hold shape and fails to distort image to which it is being applied.  Am I doing something wrong?

Nope, sadly you're not - it looks broke. I've reproduced this and will get it passed onto development!

[pixelcoder]

Quote

- Numerous touch / pencil interaction improvements.

 

Like mentioned, the color picker is fixed but now the Pencil has no sensitivity anymore. I do love the new start screen too, so gorgeous <3

 

Thanks for the ongoing work, this will be a big update when it comes to the app store. I think its almost there.

[Sean P]

Just now, pixelcoder said:

 

Like mentioned, the color picker is fixed but now the Pencil has no sensitivity anymore.

Thanks for comments! We've addressed this issue already!  

[Manofjesus]

At first glance:

- was unable to apply perspective distortion in filters, it just don't hold position and resets to initial state.

- some uncomfortable delay between touching the tip of Apple Pencil and actual stroke start appearing

[kouza]

No stylus pressure on iPad 2017 12.9 Apple Pencil, I know it’s just a beta but Apple Pencil ?

 

[Paul Mudditt]

On 01/02/2018 at 11:26 PM, Andrew Tang said:

@PMudditt Where are you trying to save to?

Seems buggy on any file. If you select share, save to files then cancel then select save to files a second time it goes white screen. Just noticed as well that load from photos is crashing as well. Load from cloud seems ok however, I’ve tried resetting iPad, also reverting to previous build doesn’t show these problems, so installed beta 3 again and problems returned. IOS 11 drag and drop from IOS photos however does work OK.