Adjustment panel options missing

[Pale September]

Hi,
I have just started to use Affinity Photo as a serious alternative to Photoshop cs6. However, I am experiencing a few 'glitches' maybe....

The first is occasionally there will be a missing section in the Adjustment Panel. In the latest instance I think it is the Vibrance option. I attach a screenshot so you can see what I mean. It comes back if I open another image or if I close Affinity and re-open.

Should this be happening?

Thanking you in anticipation.

 

[stokerg]

Hi Pale September and Welcome to the Forums,

Can you try starting Affinity with the Control key held down and you should get a pop asking you about clearing some settings. Uncheck anything that's selected and check Reset Adjustments and then click on the Clear button and Affinity Photo should continue to load.  Do you have all the Adjustments back, along with the previews of them?

[Pale September]

Thank you for your help. I did as you suggested all is working fine again at the moment (as it did when I just did close and ordinary open). Fingers crossed this will stop it happening again.

[Pale September]

Errr it only lasted for a few minutes and then some adjustments have disappeared again:).

[PeeGeeBee]

Happening to me too, regularly. Sometimes, like today, no adjustments at all available in the Photo persona. Very frustrating.

 

[Oliver Winternight]

I have just upgraded to Affinity Photo 2 (plus the other apps).

All the adjustments on the right hand side in the Photo Persona are missing.

I do have the Histogram, Layers and Navigator.

I have found the instruction to open Affinity Photo holding the Ctrl key and clear all except Reset Adjustments, but I have tried this a dozen times and the Adjustments are still missing. 

Obviously, I can't use the product until this is fixed.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Oliver

[Hangman]

Hi @Oliver Winternight and welcome to the forums,

Have you tried enabling the various panels from the Window menu?

[walt.farrell]

1 hour ago, Oliver Winternight said:

Any help would be much appreciated.

If the suggestion just above doesn't help, it would be useful to have a screenshot of the complete application window so we can see what you're seeing currently.

[Oliver Winternight]

Hello Hangman and also Hello Walt.Farrell

No - I didn't conceive that the adjustments panel would need "switching on". I naively presumed the default would be "on" for such basic funtionality.

Especially so after launching with the Ctrl key and resetting adjustments as per another post.

But thanks to Hangman's pointer I have now enabled adjustments in the Windows menu.

I would have supplied a screenshot if the problem had persisted.

Many thanks to both of you - very much appreciated.

Oliver

[MEB]

Hi @Oliver Winternight,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
Affinity Photo version 1 did have the Adjustments panel visible by default. Version 2 doesn't - we changed this mostly because you can also add them through the Adjustments button on the bottom of the Layers panel (besides the menu Layer). So unless you need quick access to custom presets you may save in the Adjustments panel there's no reason to keep it part of the default set.

[Elise Kleve]

 

How to achieve something you can do in Photoshop in one click?
In photoshop, once the adjustment icon was clicked, the adjustment layer is added and the options are displayed under the properties panel in an instant. I can't work quickly in affinity photo.

On the other hand, this is my affinity workflow. There's just too many steps.

[walt.farrell]

21 minutes ago, Elise Kleve said:

On the other hand, this is my affinity workflow. There's just too many steps

Sorry, but I don't understand. In Affinity: 

1. Click Adjustments icon and choose the kind of adjustment.

2. Adjust the settings. 

3. Dismiss the dialog.

That doesn't seem like many steps to me. 

[Elise Kleve]

7 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

Sorry, but I don't understand. In Affinity: 

1. Click Adjustments icon and choose the kind of adjustment.

2. Adjust the settings. 

3. Dismiss the dialog.

That doesn't seem like many steps to me. 

That's annoying once you saw the type of work I am doing. I edit thousands of small pictures each month (3,000+) and any additional step equates to an additional ~3,000 steps. A persistent properties panel where the values can be displayed right away once an adjustment layer is clicked is the BEST and efficient part of a money and time-saving workflow.

[walt.farrell]

Fair point, @Elise Kleve. 

You might consider making a Feature Request in the Feedback forum, where the Affinity team that plans enhancements will see it. 

I am curious, though, whether that approach from Photoshop is a non-destructive one, as Affinity's is, or a destructive one. One of the hallmarks of the Affinity approach is the non-destructive nature of the adjustments.

[Elise Kleve]

10 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

I am curious, though, whether that approach from Photoshop is a non-destructive one, as Affinity's is, or a destructive one. One of the hallmarks of the Affinity approach is the non-destructive nature of the adjustments.

The website where my co-designers and I upload the images will keep disapproved photos under the history tab. We can access the original, version 1 and 2 and so on. (I am a quality assurance inspector, I redo badly edited photos.)

Saving it as PSD will eat up tons of space on my SSD and will add some more steps to the workflow.

And, I have a rejection rating of less than 0.1% per year so anything that I redo are printed and shipped right away. (It means that I don't see the need to come back to a saved PSD file to rework them later).

[Elise Kleve]

14 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

You might consider making a Feature Request in the Feedback forum, where the Affinity team that plans enhancements will see it. 

I am documenting some suggestions. We, the heavy photoshop users, are doing our best to switch to affinity from photoshop. For now, the best use case that I can see for affinity photo for me is for non-commercial projects.

Good thing affinity has decided to extend and reset my trial period to 180 days.

[Hangman]

Hi @Elise Kleve,

16 hours ago, Elise Kleve said:

How to achieve something you can do in Photoshop in one click?
In photoshop, once the adjustment icon was clicked, the adjustment layer is added and the options are displayed under the properties panel in an instant. I can't work quickly in affinity photo.

Why not just assign a keyboard shortcut to the 'Brightness and Contrast' Layer Adjustment in Affinity Photo, e.g., I've assigned the backslash key? A single keyboard click will add a Brightness and Contrast Adjustment layer to the layers panel and at the same time open the adjustment dialogue so you can make your adjustments.

You can dismiss the dialog by clicking the red close button or by selecting another layer in the layers panel.

You can determine whether the Adjustment layer is added as a layer above the currently selected layer, thereby affecting all layers below or as a nested to the currently selected layer, thereby only affecting the selected layer by changing the 'Assistant' option under Settings...

[Elise Kleve]

2 hours ago, Hangman said:

Why not just assign a keyboard shortcut to the 'Brightness and Contrast'

No thanks. Not going to switch. Photoshop workflow is FASTER. Not to mention the scripts I use to automate everything. Also, creating an account to report something like this on a forum, respond, and interact are considered "extra unnecessary steps" to tasks that are not supposed to be complex.

I don't like workarounds. User need direct and efficient workflow. No extra clicks or unnecessary keyboard interaction.
How many times do I have to ask something in adobe's forum about photo editing? Zero.

Except of course for stuff that involves their unethical practices. That, I think, is forum-worthy.

Doing a google search just to accomplish something in affinity is proof enough that the software's workflow design is slow and not intuitive enough for fast-paced work.

[Elise Kleve]

 

Unnecessary. In Photoshop, this workflow is direct and intuitive. Clip or unclip. Grouped or ungrouped. Everything is visible and clear. The visibility toggle is large and the layers panel in Ps is way better.

[thomaso]

18 hours ago, walt.farrell said:

1. Click Adjustments icon and choose the kind of adjustment.

The OP's screenshot demonstrates that they use the Adjustment Panel – while you seem to mean the Adjustment button at the bottom of the Layers Panel (which requires a click + scrolling through the menu to select an adjustment).

I wonder for what purpose the Adjustment Panel requires a click to unfold + a click on a preset preview before the editor gets opened? Does this additional click have an advantage for the workflow? (It could, if a preset would be applied without opening the editor but that it does not work this way either.)