Creating an HDR merge from images in the Develop Persona

[EricNepean]

If I have 5 or 7 images open in Affinity, is there a way to open all or some of these these images as an HDR merge?

I'm trying to develop a workflow from Capture One to Affinity for HDR merges of a bracket sequence of images.

So far I can use Applescript or Capture One's "Edit with" command to cause Affinity to open the images selected in Capture One. But I can't seem to get those opened images into the HDR merge list.

[HVDB Photography]

Via  File > New HDR Merge

 

 

 

[IanSG]

4 hours ago, HVDB Photography said:

Via  File > New HDR Merge

I think the requirement is to use images which are already open, and maybe modified, rather than opening them again.  So far as I know it's not possible without saving and reopening them, but it's something I've wanted to do in the past.

[HVDB Photography]

22 minutes ago, IanSG said:

I think the requirement is to use images which are already open, and maybe modified, rather than opening them again.  So far as I know it's not possible without saving and reopening them, but it's something I've wanted to do in the past.

OK, got it.

[MEB]

Hi EricNepean,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
As IanSG pointed out this is not currently possible without going through the File ▸ New HDR Merge command to open them directly. So you have to save the images first (if edited).

[EricNepean]

OK thanks for the Info and quick response. I will find a different application for my workflow then.

My intent was to find a way to have Affinity open a set files based on information from another application and use them for an HDR merge, right now Affinity only opens them for editting.

I think there is no point in saving the files, they have not been editted, and that will not help in any case move the information pointing to the file into the HDR Merge add files menu.

[R C-R]

53 minutes ago, IanSG said:

I think the requirement is to use images which are already open, and maybe modified, rather than opening them again.  So far as I know it's not possible without saving and reopening them, but it's something I've wanted to do in the past.

I am just guessing but I suspect it is designed this way to avoid excessive memory use & maybe other problems, for the reasons mentioned in this topic by @Mark Ingram & @Ben.

[John Rostron]

The HDR merge procedure requires the files be loaded from disk. You can load raw files (but there is no opportunity to choose any develop actions) or you can load developed and saved files. You cannot use images that are already open.

What do you mean by:

43 minutes ago, EricNepean said:

open a set files based on information from another application 

John

[EricNepean]

Hi John

I'll try to state the question again, with more context.

I'm using Capture One to manage my image colllection of 16000 images, and I do much of my editting there.However Capture One doesn't have any HDR merge or any other kind of merge capability. It also doesn't do tone mapping. So I need other tools to do my HDR merge.

Affinity doesn't manage image collections, but it does a nice set of merges. I particularly like the fact the Affinity can do merges using RAW files as input.

What I can do with Capture One, is execute the command "Edit With..." and the images I've selected in Capture One are sent to another application, like Affinity, for editting. I actual fact the image data is not sent, Capture One saves the image as a TIFF file, and the path to the TIFF file is sent. Then Affinity (or some other tool) opens the image file which is identified by the path.

I can also do this task by dragging and dropping the images selected in Capture One into Affinity, and also by using an Applescript message  to Affinity, and this allows me to send the path to RAW images files instead of TIFFs. (Affinity doesn't support much Applescript, but it does repsond to the messge "Tell application "Affinity" to open myfilelist" where myfilelist is a list of file IDs that I have obtained from anothe application)

In each of these 3 methods, Affinity responds by opening the images for editting. That's great for some purposes, like single image tone mapping, but doesn't get me to the HDR merge.

I was hoping there might be a method within Affinity that would allow me to transfer the image information from files open for editting into an HDR merge. But there isn't. The reason this feature isn't present is 1) priorities of Affinity's dev team and 2) objections about large amounts of memory used. There are several easy ways around issue 2, consider the Capture One implementation which creates a TIFF file for the purpose of transferring image data.

When you want to do an HDR merge, you get the best reuslts if you start with an uneditted image, RAW is best. So for an HDR merge, you typically do not want to ttarnsfer the edits that Affinity may have done on an image, you want the pathe to the original uneditted image file.

Another approach to the whole problem would be the ability to drag and drop files (actually file paths) into the HDR merge add file menu. Then one could select the images in some other tool like Capture One, drag them and drop them into the Affinities HDR merge or focus merge "add files" menu. The user is of course faced with the fact that these files would typically hold the original images, witthout edits. But that is actually preferable.

[John Rostron]

If you prefer to merge the raw files, then all you need do is to open Affinity, selct the HDR merge dialogue, click Add and select your raw fies. No need to open them in Affinity first, or even to open them in Capture One at all.

I still don't know what you mean by 'image information'. Do you mean metadata? Or perhaps the data in a sidecar file. The former would be included in the raw file as loaded. Affinity will not read sidecar files.

John

[lepr]

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[lepr]

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[John Rostron]

2 minutes ago, owenr said:

Eric is using C1 for its Library, and so he wants to drag from the Library view to AP, instead of from the OS file system to AP.

I do not have C1 so I cannot comment on it use. I was implying that you do not need to edit in C1, not that you do not need it as a library.

John

[R C-R]

2 hours ago, EricNepean said:

I was hoping there might be a method within Affinity that would allow me to transfer the image information from files open for editting into an HDR merge. But there isn't. The reason this feature isn't present is 1) priorities of Affinity's dev team and 2) objections about large amounts of memory used. There are several easy ways around issue 2, consider the Capture One implementation which creates a TIFF file for the purpose of transferring image data.

There is no way around issue 2 because even with C1 the created TIFF image has to be stored somewhere. If that is not in RAM, then it must be paged in & out of VM or a scratch disk in chunks, or saved to the filesystem. There just isn't any other place to put it besides cloud storage, which would be even slower.