Anyone using it for scrapbooking/craft projects?

[MrsPeel]

Hi guys, I'm quiet sure some of you are savy Serif customers so I guess some of you know me.Hope you are all well!!!

For those who don't, I was scrapping on Craft Artist, but have been trying to move to something else since they discontinued (and  I have been crying since I heard last year!!!)

Got a message from a friend saying you guys were beta testing Affinity , she suggested it can be a replacement for Craft Artist... I'm not too sure after downloading and being completely lost with what I see..... I went to the tutorials but (of course, as it is called publisher!) it doesn't give me much that my half dead brain can register. Is there anyone using Affinity for making scrapbook pages? or cards or whatever similar projects? If anyone has any links to more relevant tutorials, would be great!!

or maybe I should get Affinity Photo?

Thanks so much in advance for your time!!!

[MEB]

Hi MrsPeel,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
Affinity Publisher is a desktop publishing application similar to the PagePlus app in the old Plus line. It's not the most suited app for scrapbooking - it's mostly used to design/create publications/magazines, books, flyers etc. The Affinity line doesn't have a direct equivalent but both Affinity Designer (similar to DrawPlus) and Affinity Photo (similar to PhotoPlus) can be used for this. Designer is a hybrid vector/raster design application. It contains both a vector and raster brush engines and a few basic tools to manipulate images but it's strength are the vector tools (it's also able to convert shapes into text frames and support text-on- path). Affinity Photo is a RAW converter/developer and photo editing app. It contains a raster based brush engine and advanced features/tools to manipulate/edit images (macros, channels, HDR Merge, Panoramas etc etc). It's vector based tools are more limited and doesn't support text-on-a-path nor is able to convert shapes into text frames, features you may find useful for scrapbooking. I suggest you install a trial ob both (Design and Photo) from our website and see for yourself which one is most adequate for you. There's plenty of video tutorials to help you get started:

• Official Affinity Designer Video Tutorials
• Official Affinity Photo Video Tutorials

Any questions you may have please post them here in the forums. There's always users and staff willing to help.

 

[GarryP]

I think Designer will probably be the most useful - of the three Affinity products - for scrapbooking and craft projects.

As MEB suggests, you can download the - fully-functional - trial for free but you only get 10 days of trial period - actual installed days, not days in use - so it's best to watch some videos first so you don't take up a lot of that trial time getting to know the software before trying something real.

Reading some of the on-line help https://affinity.help/ (it's the same as you get installed with the products) before you download would probably help too.

You can always ask for advice before downloading the trial which will also help you to get the most out of the trial period (just make sure that you say you haven't actually downloaded it yet so people know the situation from the start).

As for getting help, it might be good if you can give an example of something specific that you want to make. If there's a web page or something that people can look at, to give them a good idea of what's necessary, that would be helpful. People will probably give you lots of advice on different ways to do things and you can then choose what you want to try.

[MrsPeel]

Thank you guys.

Now I wish I had come here before I downloaded...  I did (download) because one of the scrappers friends wrote to me saying it could be used in place of Craft Artist... I should have looked through before.

I don't think there is a chance I will know if I will be able to use it in 10 days, even if I could use it every one of those 10 days.... I am not good with tutorials, I'll have a look, but not much hope, to be honest.

Do you know if I need to uninstall the Publisher? or just move it to the trash can will do?

[GarryP]

You're welcome.

Publisher is in free user-testing beta at the moment which means that the beta version of the software - the only kind that's currently available - probably has no 'end date'. You can probably go on using the beta version as long as you want, and it's pretty stable as it is (unless Serif have put some kind of 'kill-switch' in there somewhere).

The trial period only pertains to the free trial versions of Designer and Photo which are paid-for production-ready (not beta) software.

As you were using Craft Artist, which was Windows-only as far as I know, I'll assume you're using WIndows so you will need to uninstall Publisher when you're finished with it as just dragging the short-cut to the trash will only remove the short-cut and not the software itself (unlike what happens on Macs when you drag an application to the trash).

[Zoot]

I think the beta versions expire after a month or two.

[jmwellborn]

2 hours ago, MrsPeel said:

Thank you guys.

Now I wish I had come here before I downloaded...  I did (download) because one of the scrappers friends wrote to me saying it could be used in place of Craft Artist... I should have looked through before.

I don't think there is a chance I will know if I will be able to use it in 10 days, even if I could use it every one of those 10 days.... I am not good with tutorials, I'll have a look, but not much hope, to be honest.

Do you know if I need to uninstall the Publisher? or just move it to the trash can will do?

Don’t give up the ship on Publisher yet!    When you first see the workspace, it is pretty daunting.   But the first thing you might try is to go up to the very top, left-hand corner of your workspace, and click on  the words “Affinity Publisher”.  You will see “Preferences” and if you click on that you will get some choices.   There will be a little box marked “Tools” with an arrow beside it.  Click on the arrow and scroll down to “User Interface.”   Then you can change your screen from Dark to Light.   (At least I hope these are all the right words.  Doing this from my iPad.).   For me the easiest way to find my way around was to have a lighter screen.  Black is rather intimidating.    Then when you start trying out the various tools, use the command HELP up at the top where you can enter questions.   It isn’t a complete HELP section, but it is very useful just the same.  And don’t forget EDIT>UNDO.   There isn’t anything you don’t want that you can’t get rid of.

If you stick with it for a while, I’ll bet you start thinking about writing family stories, etc. to go along with those pictures!    

[Alfred]

3 hours ago, GarryP said:

I think Designer will probably be the most useful - of the three Affinity products - for scrapbooking and craft projects.

So do I. CraftArtist (CA) was developed from Digital Scrapbook Artist (DSA), which in turn was based on DrawPlus (DP), Serif’s original vector drawing application before Affinity Designer arrived on the scene. @Mark Ingram, now in charge of the Affinity for Windows team, was the project manager for DSA/CA, and he took over as project manager for DP when @MattPdisappeared to work on what was a top secret project until it was launched publicly as Affinity Designer.

[GarryP]

If the Publisher beta expires after a month or two - as Zoot says - then, since Publisher and Designer share most 'basic' functions, you can get used to most of what Designer can do by using Publisher beta. Some Designer functions are missing from Publisher - the pixel persona, etc. - and some are only available via menus rather than toolbar icons but they are close enough to each other to get a reasonable idea of what the other can do. The layout, snapping, geometry, effects, text formatting and most of the drawing tools of Designer are in Publisher so you can have a decent amount of experimentation before you buy.

[fde101]

On 10/18/2018 at 7:42 AM, GarryP said:

I think Designer will probably be the most useful - of the three Affinity products - for scrapbooking and craft projects.

agreed

[KayKay55]

Sorry, I don't know how to start a new topic. I have a Serif Craft Artist 2 project that is 83 MB. I was about to split it into 4 sections to make it smaller and it crashed.

I have tried EVERYTHING but now I can't get it to open.

Help?!

Thank you!

[MikeW]

@KayKay55

It would be best if you posted on Serif's CommunityPlus forum.

https://community.serif.com/forum