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Will Affinity ever be able to call itself a true replacement for Photoshop untill.....


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4 hours ago, R C-R said:

But is also the nature of business to consider carefully which investments are likely to generate profits vs. those that are likely to generate losses, otherwise known as return on investment or ROI. I think Serif has a pretty good handle on that, including how big the pool of users they could grab really is, both in the short & long terms.

I think Serif's long term plans are perhaps more (happily) ambitious than you might think.... ;) 

I think most of the basic polishing is going to be done, and I am not in a hurry, as I have a bunch of alternative tools, which I indeed already know in depth (I've done corporate image design at a company with the 3 foss main ones, gimp, inkscape and scribus (and helped by video and 3D ones, too!), with quite some high level of intensity, stress and requirements, so, after that, what I would not be capable of :D. With those factors combined , you become a "rambo" of the graphic apps, haha ). But the size of the pool of new clients to be grabbed once a) firstly the more important bugs are fixed (I can work without that, ie, the brush related stuff I do it elsewhere) b) keep evolving adding firstly those features which are key for entire niches, I mean, the size of target users gained would be huge, and I am not saying this to "convince" Serif (nobody will, imo, and we should felt relieved knowing that), like in those Linux threads, or web wysiwygs, or whatever . But yepp, I agree partially, I'm more than sure that what we both are saying here is boringly redundant to Serif, that has its plan and order for things. I don't complain, I mostly predict stuff will be there, in its given moment. (so, is always a positive vibe.... ). My main point is, the more it gets of those points covered, the larger of a global influence (and I am indeed one of those believing the suite IS a potential, very serious threat to Adobe) and the damage it'l make in the giant's land.... I think it already is grabbing a lot of potential users from it. IMO is not a matter about if it will remove large chunks of the target users to A., is a matter of when , or at which rate it will grab them. I am not in a hurry, so I'll just calmly grab my popcorn (or my cereals bol, if I'm realistic about my actual habits) and watch it happening, with a huge smile on my face..... :D 

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4 hours ago, Iulisvectordesign said:

So, will Affinity truly be able to replace PS? — again, they already do;

For some uses, and certain type of users, only (and I am one of those capable to use effectively in real world's hard work the apps already, so, am not one of the target to be convinced about their advantages...) . If you insist in another reality, imo then you are not seeing the big, pro picture.... In the professional world, at high levels (that is, a lot of professional bits, in almost every company).... Too much to cover yet (the devil is the details... in lots of workflows, professional ones, those "details" fully break it there, been reported often, if you're around the forums) , and I don't say it happily, but facts are facts. And it is supposed to be so, it is a progressive work!  , it could only be expected a slow process, with all the years the other one has been dominating.  I am speaking that what a business or advanced freelancer needs (forget about mere PS comparisons, go to the actual business needs) of inserting a tool in the middle of a workflow that can be self sufficient. Forget about the term of "replacement", if that avoids further open thinking.

Yet though, I completely disagree with those others thinking you cannot yet insert partially the apps in your workflows already because the lack of A or B feature. You will need extra supporting applications for a while, but imo it is possible to go adapting workflows already, and we should do that (specially freelancers and small businesses, as I see little to no reason for a hobbyst to go the Adobe path, well, I already thought that once having certain level in the FOSS tools...) or , in a way, we are saying with our acts that we are happy sustaining a monopoly. Which is bad even in the cases where the giant's intentions  aren't bad. Adobe is probably the most benign monopoly in software/hardware out there, after all, if I compare to at least other 5 (Microsoft, Intel, nVidia, Autodesk, Apple...all this being my personal opinion, of course) . But in the end, even so, that's not good for us. Is less options, and ppl is forced to take whatever rude change of plans with the one and only option, we've seen that.  

4 hours ago, Iulisvectordesign said:

IMO the future of graphics is all mobile; that’s the reason why Adobe is investing in it,

I have strong doubts for that in the professional field. Have a look at the very most high end techy art schools preparing for people for CG, games. All are workstations. Look at the companies, even right now, their work places/seats. In ten years will be all mobile? Probably! But IMO, anything past 5 years, or even 2, in IT, graphic industry, is just mere sci-fi, You don't have a way to predict reliably that long of a term such a fast changing and complex industry. Almost as hard as to predict well and in detail global economy. What I can tell you, right now, and in the future short term that we can kind of predict a bit more safely, that is, 2 - 5 years, nope, very far from that, pro work at least at high levels is yet very much desktop for a while. (that does not  mean one can't work in the sofa with an iPad and transfer stuff later, pitch to clients, or whatever. Or that many pros can do their particular workflow entirely with an iPad (some CMYK  related operations have some trouble with that, to name just one tip of the iceberg. )

4 hours ago, Iulisvectordesign said:

do anyone really see PS having the same easy-to-use brilliance Affinity has in its apps?

Well, they have the power to do whatever. But is like intel with AMD's Ryzen... they can, but they would have to change certain bad habits, and are probably thinking if it's worth it, or if they can afford to keep going as they have till now ( and the competition was already there, btw, hearing some people sounds as if in a lot of places/print shops/design studios was not fully functioning Corel Draw for everything during decades, and Xara in another places/countries. But for some reason, people expect Affinity to hit quite much harder. And I truly hope is more than wishful thinking. ) 

4 hours ago, Iulisvectordesign said:

In ten years, people will forget the greedy Adobe ever existed; the future is mobile, and the future is Affinity (as cheesy as it may sound, I truly believe it).

IF the future is mobile   [  again, I doubt it until we reach a point where what you can cram in power for hardware in graphics is really  ( and I can write an entire book about why it is not so now) equivalent to the same in a tower...even then, a lot of pro areas DO require large devices, less related to the chip power, and more to the actual professional tasks' nature. Like a large screen. Which is anything but portable. And a large drawing tablet--> same issue (yeah, some illustrators love to paint on the iPad. Power to them, and best success in life. Just check on a bunch of other ones (I count on certain large and diverse personal network), and not old grunts like me, some pretty young ones, hear them shouting "don't give me anything smaller than a 22" (for a pen-display, a pen-tablet, or even just the work screen). Or large scanner. List goes on. That's PRO area kind of stuff  ]    ,  I'm sure Adobe has its big teams of highly specialized ppl, dedicated to prevent such movements when they become big enough to move a finger, and if needed, they can produce whatever that would blast any competition away ( My opinion about the PS ipad version,  while they have been avoiding the entire matter for years, comfortably : They start now to open one eye, blink a little, but not entirely seeing the full threat, yet. U'll really notice when the sleeping lion really wakes up, u'll hear the roar...But again, it must be worth it for a lion to move, is a heavy animal) . That's what huge resources and money provides you with. One of the very "weak ankle" points  of the giant, imo, resides in its main power... they are huge, and in a naval combat ( to use yet another colorful metaphor), that's not always an advantage. IE, I think Serif has it easier to keep going with flexible purchase models rather than Adobe, but that's a very personal opinion, I have no data. And speaking of agility, surely less dependent on a legacy decades old code base, capable of perhaps fresher developments, etc. So, it's gonna be an interesting fight (referring again to my popcorn situation) even if is repeated ad infinitum that there's no such thing as an intent to compete with Adobe in any way possible (yeah, u can totally smell that in the Aff. "and no subscription" slogan, for eons in the site (haven't checked now)...) .  After all, Photo does tasks and solves problems tooootally different to PS ones, for example.  ;)  ( ---> super subtle irony). IMO, yep, they're humble to assume it can't compete (so they can't be expected to cover the same) with it for now, due to the huge scope of PS after so many years of advantage. It is very unfair to demand them the same level of "coverage" just yet.   Or...maybe, really, they only care about photography!  (  :o   ) (personally, no clue). Whatever, it's their call. Their business. 

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15 minutes ago, SrPx said:

Whatever, it's their call. Their business. 

I believe this post from @Patrick Connor tells you everything you need to know about Serif's business goals for the Affinity products, & does so in one brief, easy to understand paragraph. ;-)

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Most discussions of this question seem to ignore us amateurs. I'm an old guy restoring 100-year-old  photos from my family and friends, rejuvenating slides I took more than 60 years ago, and doing simple touchups and cleanups on current digital photos.

I used Photoshop Elements for many years until I "upgraded" to version 14. I was dismayed to learn that Adobe had removed some features I had used for years. Some said they didn't want to upgrade those features to 64-bit. Whatever the reason, I paid more and ended up with less. So I went on a search for alternatives and tried Paintshop Pro and PhotoDirector. Suddenly last December I came across a reference to Affinity Photo, which I had never heard of. After a couple of weeks of use, and after watching many video tutorials, I stopped using the others. Affinity did things the way I thought they should be done. I resolved to learn the Affinity way.

We could nitpick about details but I've been through too many software wars over the past 35 years to want to get involved in another one. I'm reminded of the wars at my university over WordPerfect vs MS Word and Windows vs MacOS. After a time user preferences determined who would use what and all the arguments were pointless except for those who wanted to control how everyone else worked regardless of their particular needs, skills, and preferences. I long ago gave up trying to persuade other people to just do it my way.

Affinity Photo is a superb choice for amateurs willing to learn how to work with it. The video tutorials are excellent. The learning curve is certainly less than I faced years ago when I first started using Elements and had to buy a half dozen books to learn the basics. Photo editing, retouching, and restoring are enormously complex subjects, as are most skilled crafts. (I wonder how someone who decided to take up woodworking would make out if he simply purchased a Shopsmith and expected to suddenly make grandfather clocks.)

I've read it is a poor workman who argues with his tools. I'll be patiently waiting for further developments in Affinity Photo as designed and written by people who have the right ideas about how editing can be done. Meanwhile, Affinity Photo meets all my needs and so replaces all the alternatives.

(Of course I'd like a good DAM. I'm approaching 100,000 images on my hard drive. I can find what I want because I took the photos or scanned them and I can still remember the events and when they occurred. But I need something I can pass on to my descendants that would be comparable to the boxes of labeled photos my parents left me.)

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@SrPx They’re all valid points, so from my part, nothing to disagree with here.

@R C-R True, but he said “which currently means“ — so I think that in the future (even if a distant one), will be pretty much, to all the people (my wish, at least, driven by my (I’d say “selfish, but I’m sure everyone hope the same) need to see it happen; having everything I could possible need in one place, in THIS place, is, even if by a long shot, desired and possible.

iuli

 

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@Granddaddy ,  for now ( I believe an Affinity DAM is planned by Serif, but that can take long) , but meanwhile, we have been given the advice/tip by a great user around here (one with a sort of Australian sort of mouse as an avatar) that a free tool (for non commercial usage, which seems this very case . And purchasable at 26$ for commercial) , which has its own long history indeed ( I remember using a prehistoric version many years ago) , as an image browser/converter, called XnView MP,  is able to even open (I am not sure till what extent... but it certainly can open and convert a lot of other formats) native Affinity files !  :o I was even shocked to know  about it.   https://www.xnview.com/en/   and the downloads, please scroll to the bottom at the following page ( mac, windows and linux versions)  :   https://www.xnview.com/en/xnviewmp/#downloads

About the software wars, I'm younger, but not so much (also, I'm with computers since very tender age) as not to remember the Word/Wordperfect wars, Adobe/Aldus/Corel, Commodore/Amstrad/Spectrum,  etc....Well, in my case is more a matter to always use the optimal thing, even if the professional state of things do force a lot of us to a path which is not the most enjoyable. If my needs were only personal work, hobby, (I would not call your activity amateur, as you seem to know your tools too deeply for that term. Only that is not focused in obtaining money, neither has certain hard constraints in the commercial work world,  there we can establish the differences) I certainly wouldn't mind those bits pending, to be sincere. As for that type of activity, there's a huge bunch of options, today, thankfully.

Indeed, I'd rather prefer to have other job (although I'm mid way to that) , i mean, freelance activity and also job profile at companies, which would not depend at all of those bits needed. So to only use the software apps I do really enjoy more.

I applaud your criteria on the matter.  ( and please excuse me if my English is very messy to understand, English is not my first language)

 

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
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1 minute ago, Iulisvectordesign said:

@R C-R True, but he said “which currently means“ — so I think that in the future (even if a distant one), will be pretty much, to all the people (my wish, at least, driven by my (I’d say “selfish, but I’m sure everyone hope the same) need to see it happen; having everything I could possible need in one place, in THIS place, is, even if by a long shot, desired and possible.

I think 'being all things to all people' is, always has been, & always will be an impossible, unachievable goal. That is a constantly moving target, impossible to define exactly or completely, much less to implement in a way that would satisfy everyone.

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PS has done so through the years.... It has been possible. Never totally, I'd agree on the absolutes.... Meaning, for example, while serving for game graphics, photography,  fashion,  science (medical, astronomy), etc, to quite a wide extent, in several of those fields there were always nit pickings. In one of those which I know better, painting, a lot of young manga artists moved to Clip Studio Paint, accusing PS of brush lag (it lags in the usual celeron laptops those teens tend to have, while csp is an unmatched jewel in performance in low machines) . Game people, well, I remember how Adobe PS 7 moved RIOTS ( the passionate TGA followers is not sth new....even while those workflows were quite different) against it because while previous versions had been fully supporting it, an initial 7  (no CS, previous to that, obviously) had wrecked the TGA's alpha support till some extent (badly).. I think it was fixed not immediately, some time later, with a 7.1 version. A lot of young artists can't remember that (or many other bugs in the way, like crazy crashes in 6, etc) because they weren't working with it, but in the high school or at younger ages. But PS has needed to climb all that ladder and users complaints about a lot of bugs over the years, till its somewhat more polished today's status. In a fraction of the time, AP has a lot of that solved. That's my point about is a wip, and it'll get there, just faster. I'm positive it will keep adding stuff critical for many fields, I believe even if not the purpose, as PS neither was trying hard to specialize in any specific field other than photography and maybe "some" painting stuff. IMO, the polishing affects all fields. People already  have managed to adapt an image editor to very specialized, non photography related industries.

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
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22 hours ago, R C-R said:

Some people's expectations are, to put it as kindly as I can, not well aligned with reality. For reasons I cannot understand, they expect apps developed by one company to be able to do in some way everything the apps developed by another company can do, even though this has never been true in the entire history of software development. Some even expect everything to work in exactly the same way, using the same UI & terminology.

I completely understand that this would make things a lot simpler for a great many end users, but short of complete monopolistic dominance by one company across all apps that drives all its competitors out of business, it just isn't ever going to happen. History also tells us what happens when one company achieves market dominance even when it is not complete, & I don't think many end users would be happy with that.

Wow, it's really fascinating in what different ways one may perceive that same reality :o)

I could fully understand your point of view, if Affinity Photo was a node based app or if one had chosen to build a full image compositing app, based on the layer-less multi-tool editing approach typically found inside RAW processors. I would get what you say when Affinity Designer had an interaction concept which rather resembled paradigms used in 2D CAD programs, or when Publisher was LaTex-based, rather than wysiwyg ;o).

I don't see any of that being the case.

I see all three Affinity programs made with a very clear focus on matching the expectations of an as broad as possible audience. And Serif knew that a lot of their potential customers were already used to Adobe products. From day one the whole interaction concept in all three programs was extremely similar to what's found in comparable Adobe programs. Things have the same names, are found in the same place, work pretty much in the same way, look similarly, very often even use the same keyboard shortcuts. This is not to say that Serif would not know how to implement deviating concepts, but Serif (like many other software houses) conciously voted against doing so.

After having decided to take an extremely similar route one simply has to expect constant comparisons + the desire to fine tune existing functionality, to match the (better, simpler) Photoshop/Illustrator/Indesign implementation. That's the price one has to pay – anything else was extremely naive.

In the case of Affintity Photo I only see one concept where Photo cleary differs from Photoshop: That's Layer/Mask nesting (but that implementation once again isn't exacly an invention – it existed for many years in other image processors too, Photoline comes to my mind.  Well RAW handling is also done differently, but one could also call this workspace quite raw (sorry ;o) and unfinished. Where do you see the fundamental differences to Photoshop?

I personally find quite interesting what's recently going on in the field of programs which used to be purely RAW editors:
Firms like  On1, Alien Skin, ACDC , Skylum and others are transforming their RAW converters into fullblown compositing programs – I'm curious what they come up with.

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32 minutes ago, hifred said:

In the case of Affintity Photo I only see one concepts where Affinity cleary differs from Photoshop: That's Layer/Mask nesting ...

There are some significant "under the hood" differences that are the result of the "clean slate" approach Serif took when designing the Affinity apps:

1. Probably the most obvious is the single native file format that all Affinity apps use, resulting in the ability of any Affinity app being able to open files created by any of the others without loss or conversion. You can change the .afdesign extension to .afphoto without it affecting anything besides the default app that  opens the document -- all the layers, effects, whatever will be exactly the same regardless of which app opens it. You can even change the extension to .afpub & open the document with the still-in-beta Affinity Publisher 1.7 app, but you will get a warning like below because until Photo & Designer are updated to the 1.7 versions, this could result in new features the 1.6 versions can't use.
807805570_non-Betawarning.jpg.d78cc4f064606e49b12c1af0d7db8580.jpg

This is much different from Adobe's products. If you want to work with Photoshop, Illustrator, & InDesign, you can't just change the extensions & expect everything to work.

2. The Affinity apps have been designed to significantly reduce the amount of memory (RAM) needed to work on a document compared to Photoshop. PS attempts to load the entire document into memory. If it can't do that, it resorts to either using system-managed VM or dedicated scratch disks, resulting in tons of performance-killing page swaps & disk thrashing when working on large files. That's why if you are configuring a system for use with PS, Adobe recommends installing as much memory as possible for best performance, plus fast dedicated swap disk(s) if you really want to get the most out of it.

The Affinity apps take a very different approach, in part based on its unique serialized native file format & the use of mipmaps, which not only reduces memory usage without compromising performance but also results in quick, serialized saves that support the recovery feature.

3. The Affinity apps are effectively self-contained -- everything needed to run the app is in its application package in the Application folder. Adobe is (in)famous for installing a plethora of support files in system level support folders, an "old school" approach that has a number of drawbacks, among them that they can cause problems if they are not updated or removed properly, needlessly duplicate more efficient OS level functions just to support a few decade old 'legacy' features that most users will never use, & use large amounts of file space that could otherwise be used for document files.

Of course, a lot of users won't care about any of this. They just want Affinity to match PS feature for feature, regardless of what it takes to do that or how it might affect performance, the file format,  or anything else; in pursuit of that unattainable "all things to all people" goal, a folly Serif/Affinity clearly has no interest in doing.

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43 minutes ago, R C-R said:

[This is much different from Adobe products...] Of course, a lot of users won't care about any of this.

That's the crucial sentence here. You could safely replace "a lot of users" with everyone, but a handful of nerds.
What you list here may all be perfectly valid: But this stuff isn't visible, has practically no effect on how users interact with the software* and doesn't explain itself in any other way. This under the hood stuff is utterly irrelevant for the experience of average users – it's not there.

All they see is programs which look and work similar to Adobe products.

_____________________

*Adobe also offers extremely nice interchange options between its applications. Strictly from the user perspective I see zero disadvantage in comparison to Affinity.
A program with a much older code base has hooked up a lot of stuff in ways one would no longer use nowadays – that is another story.

A clean slate and profiting from success and failure of older implementations is an advantage every younger programs has. The result of all this elegance and slimness sure isn't superior performance: The often called bloated Photoshop (+ half a decade old CS6 in my case) is crazy fast in comparison to Affinity Photo.

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52 minutes ago, hifred said:

All they see is programs which look and work similar to Adobe products.

Not everybody will have used Adobe products, so they won't know, will they? Not will they care about the under the hood stuff. They will just want a really good photo editor, and Photo is perfect for that.

Photoshop is too expensive for most keen photographers or hobby photographers. Maybe Photoshop Elements but Photo is half the price and twice as good.

The only people who might be that bothered are current or former Photoshop users who just want Photoshop 'on the cheap'. But as Photoshop is more geared towards professional (or trade) use, I think the tendency would be for most serious professionals to just pay the money. Photoshop is not that expensive for professionals.

 

 

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1 hour ago, toltec said:

Not everybody will have used Adobe products, so they won't know, will they?

I think the reality is that most image editors out there, even cheaper and free ones are conceptually very much influenced by Photoshop. It doesn't matter if one has used Paintshop Pro, Corel Paint or Draw Plus – none of them as an editing concept that one could call truly unique. A person with a solid Photoshop background is instantly at home in all of these packages.

There's a variety of quite different principles for editing images visually, I mentioned a few in my second-last post, but the majority of applications took the familiar Photoshop route for compositing programs. Just look at how one deals with the canvas, with layers and masks, how layer effects and filters and all these fundamental functions are hooked up. Serif with Affinity Photo even went a lot further in terms of similarity than the majority of competing programs. Also (btw. pretty well made) marketing positions the Affinity Suite quite aggressively as an alternative to Adobe. Developers stating the opposite in a forum post here and there sure don't change anything about the public perception.
 

1 hour ago, toltec said:

The only people who might be that bothered are current or former Photoshop users who just want Photoshop 'on the cheap'.

I don't think that a lot of these Photoshop users care greatly about pricing. Adobe's Photo bundle is affordable – even for hobby users. But one loses access to possibly years of work, as soon as one cancels the SAAS contract. My driving interest therefore is authority over my data. I had no issues paying ten times the current cost of Aphoto for a program that is actually as good as Photoshop, or even better. 

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5 hours ago, R C-R said:

You can change the .afdesign extension to .afphoto without it affecting anything besides the default app that  opens the document

And that's amazing. But I'd partially agree with hifred that this would be of minimal importance compared to a show stopper bug or lacking feature that avoids accomplishing certain workflows.  Anyway, it is what it is, so, there's a point where every complaining user, IMO, needs to accept this, and just learn to live with the limitations of a neat product produced by zillion times smaller company, or, go back to a renting system. And not over-pressure the small company..... IMO. Because here's one important key detail... In my opinion, I think is perfectly fine to mention one feature lack for certain workflow....now, troll in bad mood -sometimes with insults- the company for not adding it, is not just unfair, is unacceptable, abusing the amazing tolerance in the forums. (not speaking about this thread, at all, btw). I mean, it one gets, or, performs a search to get/find an answer from a developer about that very lack, pending feature, then, the harassment is out of the line, imo. When is a gentle reminder, I'm totally fine, with that, also as if there's room to implement it in the moment, is more sells for them. But is totally their call and their business, you had the trial to test, and if after a careful testing you went ahead, that's entirely your responsibility. A total crash that REALLY is unrelated to your particular system (a lot of the times IS related) then, yeah, you have quite some right to get help from the devs. But I see them jumping like ninjas to help, in those cases. The point I wanted to comment to that quote, is that, that's all amazing, how it is built, but consider pros (and let's be real, is not just all the marketing, site slogans, reviews, and (have you seen the youtube ads? I have.. the only ads in youtube I see till the end! ) it is also that obviously Affinity is a more pro attempt than the legacy line! ) wont mind :  A) If they have to purchase a bit more RAM and a medium-low but modern card (that's all u need, tested with cc 2018 trial). U can even deal with it with a crappy card. B) Those elegant details you mention, if they can't build the workflow needed to get the job done. But I agree, we cannot/should not ask for that much. IMO, the clever line is going to be to adapt our workflows however possible, and hopefully, the improvements they implement, will help in also making these tricks and combos we will have to use, each time less cumbersome. As I see it, for pro freelancing...Anything but renting.

5 hours ago, R C-R said:

The Affinity apps have been designed to significantly reduce the amount of memory (RAM) needed to work on a document compared to Photoshop.

And well....not sure what deals better with large files... I guess a lot depends on the type of the file, what you add to it in each case, etc. I am absolutely sure PS is heavier in a number of cases. In a modern and powerful machine, tho, with enough ram, you might get more performance in PS in some scenarios. But CC eats for breakfast hardware. Indeed, that's part of the works under the hood in CC 2019, performance improve...curiously, the other improvements (out of curiosity, have been watching videos and reading articles about this update) , or at least several of them, seem to target some of the Affinity Photo strongest points: Content aware and the HDR panoramas.... "casually". And seems they've done a good work. For some of us, tho, all that means nothing, while keeps being a subscription. Also, really PS has become really heavy of handling. Long are the times of such a light wonder as it was CS 2.

5 hours ago, R C-R said:

Adobe is (in)famous for installing a plethora of support files in system level support folders, an "old school" approach that has a number of drawbacks, among them that they can cause problems if they are not updated or removed properly, needlessly duplicate more efficient OS level functions just to support a few decade old 'legacy' features

Even worse... it loads now a lot of TSR process largely unneeded, and which are really hard to block (but far from impossible). It all adds to the performance issue, overall. Again, all these seem to be thought for... actual workstations, where there's power for anything. But efficiency is important, also in the extreme cases....Specially in certain projects, even with the best machines.

5 hours ago, R C-R said:

They just want Affinity to match PS feature for feature,

IMO, there are two typical examples, we should not generalize or over simplify... Those actually expecting the very same behavior... That'd be wrong. Heck, I come from handling Max at the companies, and woah, I can tell you I found Blender UI and workflows like from another planet... even more when learnt XSI....So, that's never an issue for  me. Raw functionality (I mean, not RAW, lol, no photography here...), yep, more of an issue.  So, the other type will be those needing to get the job done, even if takes more steps, and the icons are in other places, and the workflow is totally different., but gets the job done. I'm right there. But I think we are not in a position to "demand" those features. I think that's totally wrong. Politely suggest, yep (insisting, after getting a response about that, every day, or every time they have to pay the subscription and then leave the forums for another month, and in bad manners...  that is not polite, in my book)

5 hours ago, R C-R said:

"all things to all people" goal, a folly Serif/Affinity clearly has no interest in doing.

I agree... But... My hope is that polishing the existing tools ( which they know it is needed, altho I do have a much more positive impression about the current status than many), everyone will get certain benefit in their workflows...

5 hours ago, hifred said:

This under the hood stuff is utterly irrelevant for the experience of average users – it's not there.

Nope, not utterly irrelevant (strong words, in any case...this kind of bit is the kind of thing I was referring to, btw....). Sometimes a workflow gets delayed in I/O stuff, with the famous suite... Optimization in the internals can end up in much better development in the new features, and probably faster. So, nope, it is anything but irrelevant.

4 hours ago, toltec said:

Maybe Photoshop Elements but Photo is half the price and twice as good.

Well, I have tried the trial... it is nice. Feels a bit too much as a toy, to me. But then again, that is really, clearly, and in the slogans previous to the purchase page, not targeted to professionals. You don't even have CMYK mode there, so... next.... ;D   (to be fair, neither does the loved by many Paint Shop Pro....)

4 hours ago, toltec said:

I think the tendency would be for most serious professionals to just pay the money. Photoshop is not that expensive for professionals.

Sorry, nope. At a company, obviously. They wont let me (wouldn't even hire me if denying to use PS) consider other option.  As a freelancer/indy/you name it, heck no. Is not just about the money (but freelancers do not swim in money, every buck counts) is also the concept. Some of us hate to rent, and add yet another monthly bill, opposed to save some money and purchase in our own preferred moment. ( I am referring to purchases of several hundreds or two thousands, not that 50 bucks needs that. Although it does, in non first world countries.. people keep forgetting about those situations! Sadly. 10 - 12 bucks is no big deal for us, but.... ). It is even worse than renting a flat... I can carry the furniture with me  ;););) if I need to move to another city !

3 hours ago, hifred said:

I think the reality is that most image editors out there, even cheaper and free ones are conceptually very much influenced by Photoshop

I'd say an overall standard ( followed by corel and others from arcane times). But I do quite see that standard very much followed in Affinity apps. With its own personality, but it doesn't  make it a bad experience. Just compare it to Gimp's (it does not really follow it, been the main issue of an overall nice package). And yeah, is a must , and kind of an UX rule, don't play with people trying to put stuff in places where they do not expect them... But I clearly see that Affinity does a great job in that respect.

3 hours ago, hifred said:

Developers stating the opposite in a forum post here and there sure don't change anything about the public perception.

I have to agree here, it's been marketed as  professional solutions. BUT... in no place as Adobe killers or even equivalents....And this is what people is demanding, not rightfully, imo.

3 hours ago, hifred said:

But one loses access to possibly years of work, as soon as one cancels the SAAS contract

yeah... I can't deal with that, conceptually...but is not the only cloud issue, from my POV

3 hours ago, hifred said:

I had no issues paying ten times the current cost of Aphoto for a program that is actually as good as Photoshop, or even better. 

Is actually....pretty close (IMO).... So, you should be VERY happy for having all that for only 50 bucks in a single purchase, take it as my 2 cents, or perform a ninja flying kick with  my advice....  ;) ...and again, it's a WIP... people kind of take the instant photo (no pun intended) of  its current status in a particular moment, it's a wrong take at it... Of course, for now you need helper tools (or would get large frustrations if need to accomplish certain specific industry workflows) , but.... I've been checking the PS CC 2019 update, and like the others (CC 2018 added the brush stabilizer that A. Photo had just added months before....and that PS users were crying for it since the beginning of times... some moved to Painter due to that (it had it since eons...years and years without it... suddenly, A.Photo adds it, months later, magically appears in PS... Coincidence?  )  ...now in the 2019, I see features that were particularly highlighted in favor of AP in AP vs PS review articles (HDR panorama and content aware fill)  , the frame tool is nice (not as ground breaking as the reviewers want it to be, I used to do all that with smart objects, place, masks and paste special, more powerfully thanks to also Actions)  these make me feel even happier for having chosen Affinity (even if weren't already in that conviction for the "purchasing" system)... But to each her/his own. And... let's be brutally honest.... if the money is absolutely no problem for a pro, freelancer, or whatever... Why be here. Why anyone would even care to even visit the Serif's site, and not stay in the standard, market validated giant's site.... Ppl is willing to pay less, and get ride of yet another monthly payment, big or small... that's the actual truth... if not, they wouldn't dare even to loose the energy to post a 2 lines post, here.....And if they come back even with rage months later, every now and then, is because... they really, *really* want to leave Adobe... but they play the diva and "this is crap, and Adobe is superior, you losers" .Not very sincere.... IMO.

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
(Laptop) HP Omen 16-b1010ns 12700H, 32GB DDR5, nVidia RTX 3060 6GB + Huion Kamvas 22 pen display, Windows 11 Pro.

 

 

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4 hours ago, hifred said:

That's the crucial sentence here. You could safely replace "a lot of users" with everyone, but a handful of nerds.
What you list here may all be perfectly valid: But this stuff isn't visible, has practically no effect on how users interact with the software* and doesn't explain itself in any other way. This under the hood stuff is utterly irrelevant for the experience of average users – it's not there.

Maybe it is not so safe to replace "a lot of users" with everyone, assume it has practically no noticeable effect, & so on? A quick web search turns up these items, among others:
Adobe, your products suck
Goodbye Adobe
Adobe’s Software Bloating, Performance Issues and Bugs
13 Background Processes, 360MB, general bloat. Why?
A Creatively Bloated Adobe Software Suite
Serious!? [Why are so many background processes required when using Adobe Cloud apps?]

It is not just Adobe's subscription model that a lot more users than "a handful of nerds" dislike enough to look for alternatives, it is also the ever increasing intrusiveness & particularly the bloat of Adobe's software. Call it Software Bloat, Feature Creep, or whatever you want, it is far from irrelevant to users, whether they understand its effects or not.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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16 minutes ago, R C-R said:

 

It is not just Adobe's subscription model that a lot more users than "a handful of nerds" dislike enough to look for alternatives, it is also the ever increasing intrusiveness & particularly the bloat of Adobe's software. Call it Software Bloat, Feature Creep, or whatever you want, it is far from irrelevant to users, whether they understand its effects or not.

Speaking of bloat, Photoshop elements is a download size of over 2gb with a required disc space of 6gb and it's hardly a high end product.

I think it is also limited to 2 computers.

Don't know about the full fat PS ?

Windows PCs. Photo and Designer, latest non-beta versions.

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49 minutes ago, R C-R said:

Maybe it is not so safe to replace "a lot of users" with everyone, assume it has practically no noticeable effect, & so on?

Those who are the mayority of software-users don't create such posts. And a lot of those who did still subscribe to the Cloud.
I as a CS6 user can honestly say that I didn't have the slightest problems caused by Adobe's software architecture used in that particular version, for the last 6 years.
Obviously I do like slim and elegant – but I'm even more interested in great performance: For me Fatty wins, hands down.

1 hour ago, SrPx said:

Is actually....pretty close (IMO).... So, you should be VERY happy...

Unfortunately I can not agree and I'm not happy at all with Affinity. Right now I honestly can't stand editing a single image from start to end with APhoto.
For performance reasons alone –  and I have run numerous side by side comparisons for the same task. Realistically it will take a couple more version numbers (and a useful RAW editing implementation!) before I will eventually switch over. You btw. forgot mentioning a possible reason for a purchase: Supporting a promising competitor.

 

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12 minutes ago, hifred said:

You btw. forgot mentioning a possible reason for a purchase: Supporting a promising competitor.

Yup ! ... Totally agree with this point. (if its not said in an ironic vibe ;)

Meanwhile, Adobe grows in its stock value (+20% ? ) this year, acquires Marketo, is predicted a gigantic growth, etc... I'll stick with the underdog, anyway. I'm weird.  I see your points, tho,  more than it seems. (I just have not had those problems...)

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
(Laptop) HP Omen 16-b1010ns 12700H, 32GB DDR5, nVidia RTX 3060 6GB + Huion Kamvas 22 pen display, Windows 11 Pro.

 

 

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17 minutes ago, toltec said:

Speaking of bloat, Photoshop elements is a download size of over 2gb with a required disc space of 6gb and it's hardly a high end product.

The last PSE version I used on my Macs was version 9. According to this Adobe page, its installer is also a 2 GB download, & installs language support only for English, German, Japanese, & French -- other languages (including Spanish, Italian, & Chinese) were not available. I don't remember the total file space the app & its support files used after the installation process completed, but it was considerably more than 2 GB.

It ran OK on the iMac I was using at the time I bought it, but with only 8GB of RAM installed on that Mac its performance on large files was (to put it kindly) poor, & almost glacial when run along side other apps, even ones that did not use much RAM. Worse, as I began to upgrade the OS to a later versions, it started displaying a variety of quirks, like crashing every time I quit the app, stalling during some simple editing operations for up to several minutes at a time, or causing the iMac's fans to spin up to full tilt for no apparent reason. Adobe did issue a few (maybe only one?) update that helped with some of that for the first one or two OS upgrades, but eventually began saying that users should buy newer versions if they wanted to keep using the app. Even with the mail-in & hope for the best rebates they offered, this would have cost me about $200 or more to keep the app current & fully compatible with each successive Mac OS update. >:(

Needless to say, I did not do that, began using PSE 9 less & less, & eventually decided to deleted it. No joke, it took me months to find all the bits & pieces Adobe's uninstaller failed to remove, & I am still not 100% sure I got them all.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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53 minutes ago, hifred said:

Those who are the mayority of software-users don't create such posts.

The majority of users don't post much if anything about the software apps they use. That does not mean they are happy with their performance or unaware of their drawbacks. You don't have to be a nerd to notice such things.

1 hour ago, hifred said:

And a lot of those who did still subscribe to the Cloud.

But the majority probably do, since Adobe has made it all but to impossible to run the current CC versions without a subscription.

1 hour ago, hifred said:

I as a CS6 user can honestly say that I didn't have the slightest problems caused by Adobe's software architecture used in that particular version, for the last 6 years.

I don't doubt that but then again, that does not mean your experience is representative of everyone's. After all, "everyone" is inclusive of a very large number of people, working on a great many different machines, using various operating systems, workflows, & so on.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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48 minutes ago, R C-R said:

That does not mean they are happy with their performance or unaware of their drawbacks. You don't have to be a nerd to notice such things.

R C-R, we are getting side-tracked here.
I had pointed out that APhoto in pretty much everything what happens on screen very closely resembles Photoshop and asked if you could name some mayor differences in workflow. You didn't do so, instead you listed some differences in the software architecture. That is interesting as well but has nothing at all to do with the point of my post*.

As I said before, Photoshop (under the hood) sure does a couple of things even Adobe would no longer do when starting from scratch – but stating that Adobe's software architecture is a constant source of pain for a lot of people is just wrong and blowing up a problem. 

*Those who build a visual and functional clone of any software should be prepared to get compared.

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13 minutes ago, hifred said:

*Those who build a visual and functional clone of any software should be prepared to get compared.

Also....those who expect to find a clone (or perceived it like one), need to realize that what a company of the size of Adobe did build its apps in a very long time, requires now certain amount of time for Affinity, too. Of course, now is easier than it was before, technology has improved, the hardware too, programming knowledge, everything... but the difference in size and resources is ... oh, wow. I have just been some hours ago checking  the actual numbers and stats on Adobe.... *  Geez  * . I insist in my previous statement... if a company of that size and current immense power took 30 years for this, and a so smaller one has acquired what it has, in a way shorter time, I repeat, is epic, despite the current tech advantage. This is not to say anything against your decision to go back to the cloud. I think in your case and situation, it makes sense. (I would never keep using an app that crashes on my face... but besides it very rarely happens to me, even with pre alpha software, it certainly never happens in my machine with Affinity products. But can't judge your case. Must be irritating. )

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
(Laptop) HP Omen 16-b1010ns 12700H, 32GB DDR5, nVidia RTX 3060 6GB + Huion Kamvas 22 pen display, Windows 11 Pro.

 

 

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14 minutes ago, hifred said:

I had pointed out that APhoto in pretty much everything what happens on screen very closely resembles Photoshop and asked if you could name some mayor differences in workflow. You didn't do so, instead you listed some differences in the software architecture.

I can't really speak for anyone besides myself, but when my workflow is interrupted by the Mac spinning beachball, during which I can't do anything with the app, it is hard not to notice that!

14 minutes ago, hifred said:

*Those who build a visual and functional clone of any software should be prepared to get compared.

While as already has been mentioned by several posters, there are users who would like that, Affinity Photo is neither a visual or functional clone of Photoshop.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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12 hours ago, R C-R said:

While as already has been mentioned by several posters, there are users who would like that, Affinity Photo is neither a visual or functional clone of Photoshop.

APhoto is awesome, it's built from the ground up and runs more efficiently and faster than photoshop, it's streamlined and simplistic. That said, while no one wants to call it a clone but... When you search for both photoshop and Aphoto, these are the first lines you get;

Affinity Photo is a raster graphics editor developed by Serif for macOS, iOS and Windows. - Wikipedia
Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Systems for macOS and Windows. -Wikipedia

And attached below just for fun is a side by side screenshot of both softwares on my pc...

Waitwhat2.png

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30 minutes ago, MattyWS said:

And attached below just for fun is a side by side screenshot of both softwares on my pc...

There are of course many similarities, but there are also obvious differences, like in the Layers panel, toolbars, & the Persona-based UI of Affinity Photo.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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