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Problems with Selections and poor edge definition


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I am a relativity new user to Affinity Photo.


I have included five files. 1 the Affinity Photo file and 4 jpg images for figures I refer to in the following.


I am developing a series of flower pictured that include some complex mask. I am defining the mask using the tool under the Refine Selection. The workflow is to make the initial selection of the flowers using the Selection Brush Tool. Once the initial selection is completed, I press the “Refine…” button. I continue using the using the Adjustment Brush in the Refine Selection dialog box. I have not adjusted the setting in this dialog, and I am using the default values. I complete the second refinement using the Overlay Preview. I then switch to the Black matte and that is when the “Ghost Images,” as I call them, appear. See Figure 1, first jpg image, “Fig 1 Ghost Images [date and time].jpg.” I carefully remove these Ghosts by adjusting the cursor size and by try not to let the cursor touch the part of the image I want to keep in the Foreground. After I lift the mouse button and the refine selection computations are completed, the selected Ghost Images is usually removed, but others will appear or reappear in other areas of the image. Most, but not all, of the Ghost Images appear to be a bleed through of parts of the image in the background, See Figure 2 in “Fig 2 More Ghost Images [date and time].jpg” The areas shown in all of these figures have repaired many  times.


The area shown in Figure 3 in “Fig 3 Major Problem area [date and time].jpg” is one of the worst areas and has been repaired, and repaired, and repaired….
One several occupations, the computer went into a very long computation period. I first though the system had lockup, but it eventually it completed the computation. Once completed, all the selections were lost, and only the base image appeared. The “Selection Brush Tool” had been turned off. I pressed the selection tool and the computer went into another long computation period and was able to recover most, but not all of the previous selections. A large amount of the most recent changes was lost and had to be repeated.
Another aspect of these problems is my inability to get crisp and sharp edges. Figure 4, “Fig 4 Areas with Difficult edges [date and time].jpg” show an area where getting a good sharp edge is nearly impossible.


This problem does not appear to be an “one of” problem. I have completed 47 images so far. The problems, describe above, have occurred during most of the selection and refinement process. The problem is worst on images with the more complex masks. Also, the longer I work on an image, the worst the problem becomes. On several occasions, I abandon the problem image and started over. The restart seamed to work better. But again, the longer I worked on an image the worse the problem became.
The dialog Refine Selection Dialog box has several settings that I do not understand. The settings I am using are shown in Figure 1 and are the default settings. I do not understand what these setting do.  Can adjusting the settings in the Refine Selection dialog box help?


I would like any suggestions on how I can eliminate this problem or a least minimize it.
 

0151-Orange_Flower_with_buds_v2_IMG_0151.afphoto

Fig 1 Ghost Images 2019-08-10_18-43-00.jpg

Fig 2 More Ghost Images 2019-08-10_18-43-23.jpg

Fig 3 Major Problem area 2019-08-10_18-44-16.jpg

Fig 4 Areas with Difficult edges 2019-08-10_18-48-19.jpg

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Here is a link to the help page for selection refinement: https://affinity.help/photo/English.lproj/pages/Selections/selections_refine.html once you understand what they do it should help you tweak your selections.
 

A video on selection refinement to watch.
https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/tutorials/photo/desktop/video/334273469

iMac 27" 2019 Somona 14.3.1, iMac 27" Affinity Designer, Photo & Publisher V1 & V2, Adobe, Inkscape, Vectorstyler, Blender, C4D, Sketchup + more... XP-Pen Artist-22E, - iPad Pro 12.9  
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  • 2 months later...

It's not just you - Affinity Photo's pixel selection tools are, to be frank, non-intuitive and kludgey.  I feel like I'm trying to make an architectural drawing with a crayon when using them.  It's not a good feeling.  There's no default anti-alias selection other than the brush which totally baffles.  Photoshop has had that for decades.  Honestly I'm regretting my purchase at this point.

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@1earJim

With your subject residing on a dark / black background,
I think you would be better of using channels as a work around.
Maybe, if possible, you could post the original jpg, tiff.. so we can give it a try...


Hubert
 

Affinity Photo  2.3.1

Laptop MSI Prestige PS42
Windows 11 Home 23H2 (Build 22631.3007) - Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-8565U CPU @ 1.80GHz   2.00 GHz - RAM 16,0 GB

 

 
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  • 9 months later...

Solid edges from selections/fills are sometimes impossible as AfStudio (Photo persona) appears to force AA which incorrectly handles the selection on the inside (few pixels) and the outside (few pixels) of the selected pixel area(s).  I have seen this behavior in AfPhoto program as well (AKA: without using AfPhoto via AfStudio). 

If I try to fill a square selection that is 400px, I get a solid 398x398 square that totals approx 402x402 pixels with incorrect edges.
As if I used a 1-2 pixel blur on a hard edged fill.

 

20 years of technical 3d, tool dev, tech art experience.  There's more to that but I'm just trying to thwart the 101-filler-text people put in replies.  I love everyone.. I come across as grumpy but I have a big heart.

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 7/30/2020 at 9:58 AM, .eb said:

If I try to fill a square selection that is 400px, I get a solid 398x398 square that totals approx 402x402 pixels with incorrect edges.
As if I used a 1-2 pixel blur on a hard edged fill.

@.eb Is there a solution for this? I'm facing this issue as well.

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I can't recall, sorry. That's a bad bug that should never have existed.

20 years of technical 3d, tool dev, tech art experience.  There's more to that but I'm just trying to thwart the 101-filler-text people put in replies.  I love everyone.. I come across as grumpy but I have a big heart.

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If honesty is the best policy then I have to say. . .I avoid the 'refine' selection like the plague. In my experience it makes more work trying to clean up the mess which it produces. For some images it works fine, but when it messes up - it messes up royally. This tool needs some serious improvement before I sing its praises. 

Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say there is more stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe.

These are not my own words but I sure like this quote.

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I found a "sometimes-workaround" which is nonsensical.
- I copy paste the selection.. if it doesn't work well... I move what is to be selected 1pixel in any direction. Then I try again. This has worked 90% of the time.. but has required 3-8 pastes on average to get working **AND** I have not tried this on large selection areas.

The more I use AffPhoto, the more I think it was only built to tweak photography.. as photographers probably enjoy this silly unavoidable auto-feathering.

 

20 years of technical 3d, tool dev, tech art experience.  There's more to that but I'm just trying to thwart the 101-filler-text people put in replies.  I love everyone.. I come across as grumpy but I have a big heart.

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10 minutes ago, .eb said:

The more I use AffPhoto, the more I think it was only built to tweak photography.. as photographers probably enjoy this silly unavoidable auto-feathering.

As a photographer I can tell you no way. Photo is mostly based on bad or dated algorithms combined with severe usability issues. I used it a couple of times for use with Designer.

  • "The user interface is supposed to work for me - I am not supposed to work for the user interface."
  • Computer-, operating system- and software agnostic; I am a result oriented professional. Look for a fanboy somewhere else.
  • “When a wise man points at the moon the imbecile examines the finger.” ― Confucius
  • Not an Affinity user og forum user anymore. The software continued to disappoint and not deliver.
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I tried to do a simple Flood selection of blew shy, several clouds around palm trees today, abandoned ship.  Not worth the hassle and I watched tons of tutorials.  Mostly much easier, simple, dark contrast used for tutorials.  The selection tool is not that much better. Sometimes it just seems to work, sometimes hours of work. Eraser is just as good.

Cecil 

iMac Retina 5K, 27”, 2019. 3.6 GHz Intel Core 9, 40 GB Memory DDR4, Radeon Pro 580X 8 GB, macOS,iPad Pro iPadOS

 

Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection 

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On 9/4/2020 at 12:57 AM, AffinityJules said:

If honesty is the best policy then I have to say. . .I avoid the 'refine' selection like the plague. In my experience it makes more work trying to clean up the mess which it produces. For some images it works fine, but when it messes up - it messes up royally. This tool needs some serious improvement before I sing its praises. 

Same. I like the idea of a refinement tool - but it's not nearly consistent enough, it almost always produces undesirable results for me. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Jowday, you obviously missed the point .. the name of the product has "Photo" in it bud. 
--
@ALL: Who here enjoys being shamed for wanting a 200X Standard Digital Paint Tool Feature to be implemented in a program in 2020 ?!
AKA: the pointless, shaming "Assistant" popups.  ffs. srsly.
--
If only Adobe wasn't such a sloppy hot mess of an invasive resource hog.

20 years of technical 3d, tool dev, tech art experience.  There's more to that but I'm just trying to thwart the 101-filler-text people put in replies.  I love everyone.. I come across as grumpy but I have a big heart.

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3 hours ago, .eb said:

Jowday, you obviously missed the point .. the name of the product has "Photo" in it bud. 

Another day on the internet. How did I miss the point? I tried it several times for editing photos, developing RAW files etc. Didn't fint it usable or of professional quality. I only find Photo useful for finalizing work from Designer. Which can be anything btw. Did so a few times. Then gave up and forgot about it. As a photographer I can not enjoy "the silly unavoidable auto-feathering", the poor usability and many algorithms that simply do not deliver satisfactory or "professional" results.

Fortunately I find no reason for Adobe bashing as Adobe Photoshop et al runs quite smoothly on my system(s). And is build upon very competent algorithms made by/purchased by Adobe.

  • "The user interface is supposed to work for me - I am not supposed to work for the user interface."
  • Computer-, operating system- and software agnostic; I am a result oriented professional. Look for a fanboy somewhere else.
  • “When a wise man points at the moon the imbecile examines the finger.” ― Confucius
  • Not an Affinity user og forum user anymore. The software continued to disappoint and not deliver.
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  • 1 month later...

Another quick example of Refine not working great.

Starting with this image:

test1.jpg.c47c712479cce77d8f1d8c5b2ee3b2d7.jpg

Selection brush gives me this:

sel1.jpg.2080d6db4e7c9b1e41732c4c3213be93.jpg

So I go into refine, do the thing...

matt.jpg.d24d0dfcff3175fac5ac600eabb2322d.jpg

And I'm left with a mess...

blend.jpg.940b09c009ccf530c08b22f002a59ce3.jpg

And this is why I never use refine. Because it almost always frustrates me with the result and I end up doing it manually. Am I missing something obvious here in the Refine settings? 

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  • Staff

It looks like there's compression artifacting around the edges which may causing refine selection to not work correctly. Is the JPG(564px x 1018px) attached to your post the only version of the image you have?

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