Affinity Photo is well-known among designers as one of the best alternatives for Photoshop. But it’s also a very underrated graphics editor that does its job beyond expectation.
Learn everything you need to know about Affinity Photo. We have tutorials for all skill levels. Join the Affinity Revolition for free.:-).
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Affinity Photo is a great entry point for designers who are looking to start a career in the industry. It’s the only high-end graphics editor that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg. It’s also suitable for professional designers and photographers for designing complex graphics, processing photos, and everything in between.
This software does many things quite well, sometimes even better than Photoshop. In this post, we wanted to highlight some of those great features of this software to show you how amazing Affinity Photo really is.
Photoshop vs Affinity Photo
Now, you might wonder why use an alternative when you can use a software like Photoshop that’s been polished and perfected over three decades? Let’s take a closer look.
- Pricing: Photoshop comes with an Adobe Creative Cloud subscription that costs a minimum of $19 a month. Affinity Photo costs a one-time price of $49 and all future updates are free
- Ease of Use: The user interface of Affinity Photo is almost identical to Photoshop. It’s very easy to switch from Photoshop or even learn as a complete beginner
- Features: While Photoshop is far superior in terms of innovative features, Affinity Photo has all the main features of Photoshop along with a few additional features you won’t find in Photoshop. The app even supports PSD file format
- Updates: Serif, the developer behind Affinity software releases updates for its apps regularly bundled with new features and improvements, for free!
- Community: Even though the Affinity Photo community is not as big as Photoshop, it’s growing very fast as more people discover its value. We’re starting to see more templates, presets, and resources being developed for Affinity Photo
1. Learn to Use Personas
One of the most unique features in Affinity Photo is Personas. They are like workspaces within the app that allows you to do different editing tasks more easily.
There are 5 different Personas in Affinity Photo:
- Photo – This is the main Persona for doing all your editing and design work
- Liquify – This persona is for mesh distortions
- Develop – A useful Persona for photographers for processing RAW photos
- Tone Mapping – This persona is mainly for HDR 32bit imagery
- Export – This Persona lets you export specific regions of your photos in various formats
Photo, Develop, and Liquify are the three main Personas of Affinity Photo. Learning to work with these Personas will help speed up your workflow and get things done much quicker.
Other personas are mostly useful for photographers and professional designers.
2. Work With the Assitant
The Assistant is another useful feature in Affinity Photo. It’s an AI-powered system that takes care of some of the smaller tasks for you.
For example, if you start drawing on the canvas without selecting a layer, the Assistant will automatically create a new layer for you. Or when you try to apply a filter to a vector layer, the Assistant will automatically rasterize the layer.
You can easily select different actions for each of the Assistant features and even disable them entirely.
Just as the name suggests, the Assistant will prove quite useful in your work. We’re excited to see what kind of other features Serif will add to the Assitant in the future.
3. Develop Raw Files Directly in AFPhoto
RAW is a very popular file format among photographers. It’s the default file format used in high-end digital cameras and even smartphones now support this format. RAW files capture more details in photos.
If you also work with RAW files, you should make yourself familiar with the Affinity Photo Develop Persona. It has all the necessary tools and options you need to easily improve RAW photos and process them easily.
In a way, it’s like having a light version of Adobe Lightroom within Affinity Photo.
4. Install Custom LUTs
LUTs (Look Up Tables) are color grading presets commonly used by professionals to easily adjust and improve the color levels of photos and videos.
Affinity Photo now has an option that allows you to install your own LUTs to quickly improve your photos and graphics without an effort.
You can add your own LUTs via the LUT section in the Adjustments panel. Click on the Gear icon on the right to import LUTs. You can download high-quality LUTs from Envato Elements.
5. Use Affinity Photo Presets and Macros
Macros are the Affinity Photo version of Photoshop actions. With Macros, you can record your actions to save time and do tasks much faster.
For example, when processing a batch of photos, you can record a Macro for adjusting brightness so that you can run the Macro on other photos to make the same adjustment in just one click.
Just like Photoshop Actions, you can create your own Macros, export them, and import Macros created by others as well.
6. Take Advantage of Fill Layers & Blends
The latest version of Affinity Photo introduced some cool new features like the new Divide blend mode that does wonders for correcting colors in photos.
When coupled with a fill layer, the Divide blend mode can instantly enhance photos. To test it out, all you have to do is to use the color picker tool to pick a dominant color in the photo, create a new fill layer with that color, and switch to Divide blend mode.
There are so many amazing things you can do with blend modes in Affinity Photo. Be sure to experiment with them.
7. Make Non-Destructive Edits with Live Filters
Normally when you apply a filter like Gaussian Blur to a photo you can’t edit it afterward. You have to undo the filter and go back to adjust it. Affinity Photo live filters are the solution to this problem.
Live filters are like adjustment layers for filters. They allow you to add filters non-destructively and even make adjustments afterward.
8. Create Unique Text Art Using Paths
A newly introduced feature in Affinity Photo allows you to create unique text art using the Pen tool.
Create a path using the Pen tool and type some text on the path (wait for the icon to change before typing). Now you can control the alignment of the text using the Node tool.
This will give you plenty of freedom to experiment with different text art designs.
9. Creative Masking Tricks
Masks work quite brilliantly in Affinity Photo. For example, the Assistant is capable of automatically adding a mask when you’re trying to erase in a vector layer.
You can also use masks to make creative designs like doing negative-space graphic designs. Test it out by adding a text layer above an image layer and then right-click on the text layer and select Mask to Below.
10. A Few More Quick Tips
Here are a few more short and quick AFPhoto tips to improve your workflow.
- Double-click on a layer to quickly zoom-in on the selected layer
- Use Linked Layers to create objects that can be edited simultaneously
- Go to View >> Resource Manager to switch your embedded files to Linked to be able to carry external resources with the file
- Use Pattern layers to create repeating patterns
- Customize or create your own keyboard shortcuts from the Preferences menu
Affinity Photo Tutorials for Beginners
It does take a bit of practicing to get familiar with Affinity Photo, especially if you switch from an app like Photoshop. Check out these tutorials to make the transition a much smoother experience.
Affinity Photo for Desktop Tutorials
This is an official tutorials page for Affinity Photo. It includes video guides and tutorials covering all aspects of the software from the basics to advanced tools, retouching, personas, and much more.
Affinity Photo – Tutorial for Beginners (YouTube)
This is a quick tutorial that covers many different parts of Affinity Photo in a very concise manner. It includes tips for making various adjustments, improving photos, and much more as well.
Affinity Photo Top 10 Basic Tasks (Video)
This video tutorial includes 10 of the basic tasks of Affinity Photo that you should familiarize yourself with to make the most use out of the app.
Affinity Photo for Beginners: A Quick Start Guide
A simple quick start guide for beginners. This tutorial includes detailed descriptions about using Affinity Photo along with a video version of the tutorial.
Affinity Photo for iPad (Video)
If you’re using the Affinity Photo app for the iPad, this YouTube guide will help you understand the basics of the app in under 20 minutes. It includes tips and hacks for both beginners and professionals.
In Conclusion
Affinity Photo is a graphics editor for everyone. At its affordable price, anyone can afford it to create not just complex graphic designs but even perform basic tasks like enhancing selfies and designing Facebook posts.
Whether you’re a graphic designer or a complete beginner looking for a cheap graphics editor with great features, you should definitely give Affinity Photo a try. It comes with a free trial so you can test it out before buying.
- January 02, 2021
- 29 min to read
Before you can upload your images to your personal blog, social media page or website, it is key that you first edit your images. Nowadays this is a step that you cannot afford to skip if you want your photos to be taken seriously. In fact, as there is such a wide range of software solutions on the market, there is no reason why you should skip this important step.
[Top10] Good Photo Editing Software for Beginners - Windows/ Mac
- Luminar 4
- Photolemur
- Adobe Lightroom
- Aurora HDR
- AirMagic
- Adobe Photoshop
- ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate
- Serif Affinity Photo
- PortraitPro
Though, seeing that users are spoilt for choice, to find the best photo editing tools that will boost your current set of skills can be quite a challenge. If you thought that Adobe Photoshop is the only photo editing software, you would be mistaken. Nowadays there are many much simpler software solutions too! The following are some of the best photo editing software that both professional and beginner photographers should check out.
1. Luminar (7-day Trial)
If you need a photo editing tool to get the job done in a flash, Skylum Luminar can help you to take your photos to new heights. It boasts a really useful AI slider that lets you play around with clarity, brightness and much more. There are also exclusive filters such as the Orton and Sunrays filters that you will absolutely love.
In fact, this software can give Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop a run for their money. Speaking of which, as you only have to pay a fixed fee once (eliminating those annoying monthly subscription payments), it makes sense why Skylum Luminar has become so popular amongst professional photographers. That being said, if you prefer to use Photoshop or Lightroom, it also boasts a plug-in that you will find quite handy.
2. Adobe Lightroom(7-day Trial)
When Adobe Photoshop is too advanced for those straightforward touch-ups, Adobe Lightroom will be more suited for the task at hand. As a matter of fact, the fact that it is not as complicated as Photoshop is the whole beauty of Adobe Lightroom.
Some of its excellent features include: customizable sliders, gradient and brush adjustments, presets, blurring tools and other professional filters. Plus, you can use it with multiple devices and to help you keep your photos organized it uses face detection. All things considered, with this wide range of functional features and its easy-to-use interface, you can create just as remarkable photos with Lightroom.
3. PicMonkey
If you are searching for a more comprehensive graphic design solution as opposed to just photo editing features, PicMonkey is the perfect pick. With this package, you can create collages, edit your photos, crop and add touch-ups to mention only a couple of its features.
It is the ideal software solution to help you take your design skills to a more advanced level and unleash your creativity. Some of its other main features are basic filters, blank canvas design, and templates. Plus, if you regularly have to work with the different social media platforms, you will love its automatic sizing feature.
4. Aurora HDR(7-day Trial)
Aurora HDR can either be used as a stand-alone app or Adobe Photoshop or Lightroom plug-in. Boasting more than 80 looks, you can transform your photos instantly to deliver first-class final results. Some of its more sophisticated features that professional photographers will welcome include masking and layers, blending modes, powerful batch processing and support for RAW files.
On top of that, it also offers exclusive tools like HDR Denoise and HDR Smart Structure. The Denoise feature will automatically identify any noise and remove it while still retaining all the details, while the latter tool is a slider that uses AI to create astonishing depth.
5. Pixlr Editor
If you have grown accustomed to Adobe Photoshop, but are exploring alternatives, be sure to try out Pixlr Editor. With this online photo editing software, you can add an image to a blank canvas and come up with one-of-a-kind effects. Some of its other main features include overlays, filters and more than two million effects free of charge. If you prefer to use an app, rest assured you can download it to your mobile device or desktop as an app. At the end of the day, if you are not entirely impressed with the features and options offered by Pixlr Editor, you can upgrade to another version (there are various to choose from) that offers more sophisticated options.
6. Fotor
Fotor is another photo editing software solution that boasts an intuitive interface. Some of its main features include: design templates, filters, HDR effects, and portrait retouching. Alternatively, if you are looking to create a bit more informal design, there are countless shapes, fonts and stickers that you can play around with. And, when you feel as if your creative juices are running low, you can save your design and continue editing from where you last stopped.
This well-known cloud-based software boasts more than 300 million users already. Surely millions of users cannot be wrong? You simply need to upload your pics to their site and you are all set to begin the editing process.
7. Adobe Photoshop(7-day Trial)
You are most likely already very familiar with Adobe Photoshop. It is arguably the best known photo editing tool that countless photographers and designers rely on and is aimed at professionals that require all the extra features.
Its layering, masking and retouching features are still arguably the best and ideal for those advanced touch-up jobs. It also offers a wide range of brushes and filters, three-dimensional design functionality and multilayer editing. If you are searching for photo editing software, you can rest assured that Adobe’s products are really superior.
8. ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate (Free or Full version with 30-day moneyback option)
Do not let the oversimplified interface of ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate fool you as it can still get any job done. This comprehensive photography software is still relatively new on the market and boasts a couple of useful features. Two of its best features are that it uses facial recognition to organize and index your photos and there is no need to import. This means that you can edit your source file directly from your drive.
9. Serif Affinity Photo
This vector graphic design app has very similar features to the popular Adobe Photoshop and shares identical interfaces. For an affordable once-off fee, you can access professional tools similar to the likes of Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop for editing your photos.
10. PortraitPro
If your niche is portrait photography, PortraitPro is the tool you should give a go. This professional image editor app boasts all the features you require to remove wrinkles, sagging cheeks and other skin imperfections, enhance skin tone and add eyeshadows. Some of its other features include make-up tools, sliders, skin smoothing and sophisticated layering.
11. Corel PaintShop Pro
Photographers who value simplicity will really like Corel PaintShop Pro (and if you still get stuck, you can rest assured as there are learning tutorials available as well). That being said, do not let its simple approach to photo editing fool you as it does not make its editing capability any less effective.
This software boasts everything you require to enhance your pics from AI enhanced presets to graphic design templates to options such as blur and fix. Plus, if the wide range of brushes, textures and backgrounds do not float your boat, do not dismiss the software just yet as brand new features are being added continuously. Overall, it really offers some of the best user experiences.
12. DxO Optics Pro 10
It does not matter if Windows or Mac is your preferred operating system, DxO Optics Pro 10 works equally well with both. It boasts a suite of tools and features such as automatic and manual mode, customized profiles, optical corrections and U-point local adjustment technology. All things considered, it is a reliable tool that professional photographers can use to edit their photos and convert their RAW files to JPG format without any issues.
13. Inkscape
Just like DxO Optics Pro 10, Inkscape is also compatible with both Mac as well as Windows operating systems. What is more, you can use its source code if you would prefer to use it in your very own application.
It is ideal for aspiring photographers and boast a great number of features such as copy-paste object cloning, decorative handwriting tools, and a colour picker. It also supports multiple text formats and offers available extensions and add-ons. With the help of these tools, it is real easy to clone an object, overlay text or add a specific colour to your pics.
14. Capture One
This RAW image editor boasts some features that set it apart from the other software solutions available. For starters, if you need to work with big volumes of photos that are more than 20 megapixel RAW files, you will be impressed with its speed. What is more, to help you work more efficiently, the interface boasts some great customizability which means that you can change the keyboard shortcuts and layout to suit your preferences better.
If you often work with layers, you will also love the fact that it does not become slower when you have too many layers. Plus, it lets you make several adjustments per layer.
Some of its other fabulous features that will help you to work more efficiently are its sophisticated color editing and annotations. Its sliders make it much easier to tweak the granularity, while the annotations feature lets you jot down ideas to ensure that you can collaborate smoothly with other photographers and designers.
15. Gimp
This free professional software for editing photos is another excellent Photoshop alternative for beginners. It boasts a variety of features that can assist novices with digital photo retouching and composition. With the help of features like vignette and corrective mode, you can also take your photos of any file format to the next level.
If this sounds like the photo editing software solution for your needs, all you have to do is download it and install it on your device (it is compatible with Linux, Windows and Mac operating systems). Plus, thanks to its built-in file manager, file management will be one less thing on your to-do list.
16. AirMagic(7-day Trial)
No photo editing software list will be complete without including a solution for drone photography. Similar to Photolemur, AirMagic uses sophisticated algorithms and artificial intelligence to enhance your aerial photography automatically. This drag-and-drop photo editing app boasts many unique features that help you to get rid of haze, improve the colours, enhance the sky and bring detail to the fore. As haze is unfortunately a common issue with drone photography, getting rid of haze is a must-have feature. After you have applied these unique features, you can also play around with different creative styles eliminating the need to purchase extra filters.
AirMagic can be used either as an Adobe Photoshop or Lightroom plug-in or stand-alone app. Plus, it can identify the type of camera that you have attached to your drone and adjust its lense corrections and enhancements to that particular camera.
17. Snappa
Is Affinity Photo Easy To Use
Snappa is a great solution for photographers who work with social media platforms on a regular basis. It lets you convert pics into Facebook banners and share images on different social media sites.
In short, it is a graphics and design software that enables you to add new effects (such as texts or graphics) to your photos in a flash or change the dimensions easily with the help of image dimension templates. Alternatively, if you are searching for some inspiration or running out of time, you will be glad to know that there are also stock photos available and a useful drag-and-drop photo editing feature. As the software is available online, users do not first have to download something in order to start designing.
18. Canva
Canva is another easy-to-use graphics and design software that you have most likely heard about before. Trusted my millions, it boasts various tools and features to help you edit your photos. Whether you simply want to crop or straighten a photo or want to get creative with textures, fonts, badges and stickers, Canva can help. Some of its other features include vignette, photo blur, a speech bubble maker, an image transparency tool, photo frames and design grids.
Though, if you do not know where to start, be sure to visit the Canva Marketplace where you can find more than 8000 templates. Its basic features are available free of charge, but the more advanced features must be paid for. If you need to edit on the go, you will be happy to know that you can download it to your smartphone. All things considered, it is one of the best resources if you need to come up with visual content that you can use on your website or personal blog. Thanks to its user-friendly drag-and-drop editor, you do not need to be a professional photographer to take advantage of all its features.
19. Photolemur (Free version with watermark)
Photolemur is another photo editing software solution that realizes no photographer or designer has any time to waste behind a screen. With the help of AI and very sophisticated algorithms, this photo enhancer app will analyze all the necessary details and complete intricate adjustments on the spot.
All you have to do is just import your images to Photolemur and leave the rest to the app. The beauty of this tool is that you do not need any prior photo editing experience to complete basic things like getting rid of skin blemishes, whitening teeth or creating perfectly smooth skin as the app will automatically improve your images. Some of its other impressive features include sky enhancement, exposure compensation, color recovery and foliage enhancement. It is really easy to use (you can even enhance multiple photos at the same time) and compatible with both Windows and Mac operating systems.
Easiest Photo Editing Software for Beginners
Affinity Photo Tutorial For Beginners
With the right photo editing software, you can turn any photo into a masterpiece. Whether you want to highlight an important object, bring more focus to your pic or just want to reduce the size of your photo files to improve the loading speed of a website, there is the right photo editing tool for the job and your skills.