Basic Image Edit (Affinity Photo)

Learn some fundamental techniques of Affinity Photo including RAW development, non-destructive retouching and using adjustments and live filter layers.
Credits: Photography by James Ritson.

[@mintlou]

These are some of the best tutorial videos around. Smooth and precise.

[@clumein2]

LOL... "Basic Image Edit".... Just goes to show that 'all things are relative'... Not basic for beginners... but maybe basic for some with more experience. Nevertheless... VERY educational and informative. I HAVE learned much. Thank you.

[@scarletdragon1019]

Freaking combo of clicks right there just to use the brush tool...

[@billfried626]

Very helpful as a quick refresher run through. Appreciate the relative brevity and clarity of your presentation.

[@wernerrohrmann9347]

Very well done! And finally a waterfall! 👍The basics of image processing, that's the way it should be! No crazy stuff, just regular editing and the photo is done! I hope there will be more tutorials like this? 🤔 I'm happy I chose Affinity Photo! You don't need more...😁

[@javierrivero7]

I congratulate you for the new tutorials where the image of the person who is explaining does not appear, since this image distracts and covers part of the program's interface. Congratulations!

[@alangauld6079]

Thanks for explaining the difference between HSL and HSV, that has puzzled me for ages. I could see a difference but had no idea what was going on to cause it.

[@thomastuorto9929]

Excelent tutorial James. Thank you.

[@AnilAtluriWord]

Thanks for this tutorial. Made it simple and useful and easy to follow.

[@javiervvgarcia9650]

Quick, easy powerfull thecniques! And also learning with your answers to other hereby questions. Happy with the new version 2!!!

[@iandrury1542]

Excellent, very clear step by step instructions that I will use on my own images.

[@g.t.m.thurlings4882]

Thanks, this is a very good tutorial.

[@flightographist]

Really enjoyed the intro and super in like with affinity!

[@waynehollman8950]

Great Tutorial James I love the way you work so enjoyable to watch. Awesome

[@nerrelloader4226]

Thank you. I'm surprised you didn't do more in Raw Developer. But, I learnt a few things watching your process.

[@brynscott2997]

Thanks, nice to refresh some basic techniques in A2. Nice and easy to follow as always.

[@Mitch-6-Strings]

Thank you for this. Please can you explain how layers work in AP 2. I have always found this confusing 😊

[@selenitafm]

I bring down the correction scale to 92 to 98 percent depending on the camera. It’s a great trick

[@emilegregoire7739]

Thank you. I learn alot by watcching what you did. Thank you for sharing this with us..

[@davidk6264]

Great video. Ill still have to add it to the "watch later library" Making the colors pop without making it look oversaturated is still my biggest problem.

[@carlseibert9015]

Oopsie. When you inpainted out that guy on the right, the tool duplicated a big rock on the slope, leaving a super obvious tell that the image was retouched. Probably fixable in a jiffy with the same tool. Or maybe needs a more sophisticated retouch. In which case a different demo picture would be in order.

[@largefamilyruralliving7434]

So what things should be done in develop mode (vs layers after)?

[@DalsPhotography]

Excellent video indeed! you taught me a lot! Is there anywhere where I can find how to work with noisy photos? Thanks again, and Happy New Year, from Uruguay.

[@tombadil6761]

thx 4 the Video - very helpful! A few suggestions: Personally, I find the overall clarity too strong. Also, it should be applied - via mask - only to certain areas (waterfall and rocks). This way you could have shown the masking of an effect right away.

[@Yelwas]

Great tutorial, just would have been nice at the end to see side by side before and after...

[@Glynton]

In the RAW persona, I can’t find the output options in the context menu in the iPad version of AP2. It mentions it in the Help but doesn’t state where it is?

[@mrdev9843]

👍👍

[@chanchekim1944]

Why my image on affinity is completely red when I open it. Thk for help

[@remydukes1828]

This crashes every time I try to use the app. I have an iPad with the M1 chip(ipad pro)

[@BONLKWD]

How can I convert a curve setting from Photoshop to an Affinity Photo image? Photoshop is 0-255. Affinity is 0 - 1 ??? Since I can't import asd file from Photoshop, how do I convert the numbers to the Affinity curve settings?

[@frieder2635]

Leider die offiziellen Videos Alle ohne Untertitel. Für Menschen die NICHT Englisch perfekt verstehen ist es MEGA schwer alles zu verstehen oder erst einmal zu lernen. Wann Ändert ishc das endlich oder wird nachgeholt. Erfordert ein parr Stunden für Alle Videos aber ist für die deutschsprechenden Manschen mehr als hilfreich. Bezahlt haben wir ALLE mehr als genug.

[@scarletdragon1019]

WTF why not simply create a layer from the beginning like any other normal software that uses layers? I have to perform a freaking combo of clicks here and there just to do what an app can straight out do. I never had to search for a tutorial to use the brush tool until I got Affinity, it also seemed easier when I used the trial version, before the update

[@parker2969]

are you updated on your software? Mine have slightly different options when editing...

[@thegroove2000]

Thanks.

[@fandangofandango2022]

Affinity are a Big Yes from Me / No Subscription / Wonderful.

[@elmafudd9703]

Not sure this is basic stuff, but it is very good. Keep up the good work. Until I watched a video of you in the flesh (eh that sounds wrong) I though it was an AI voice. God life becoming complicated when your loosing a grasp on reality. I can only asume thats what they want. I dont understand the dodge and burn layer setup. Why dont I just add a curves layer to the image. Add a mask layer to that curves layer. Bucket fill that layer with black to nutralise the adjustments and then paint in with white on that mask layer to burn as I desire? I can do the same for the highlights. I must be missing something.

[@JamesRitson]

Thanks! Yes, over the past half a year or so, I've noticed more and more comments on the Photo videos complaining about the AI voice over. Being precise and processing the audio to sound pristine used to be a good thing! Now it seems everyone assumes it's just AI...

[@hammersharkk8595]

what about the Arabic language? Is it supported now?

[@Kristof_InsertRandomText]

I know this can also be used as a Lightroom alternative - but Affinity needs a proper more user friendly Lightroom alternative - this is what I'm looking for to move away from Adobe.

[@000CloudStrife]

When will you give us a better raw developer. This is very lacking. Doing as much in raw as possible before going to edit will yield better results to give to customers.

[@JamesRitson]

Not sure I agree on the last point-technically speaking, the pixel data when being processed in RAW is unbounded 32-bit float precision, and when developed becomes (by default) 16-bit bounded precision, based on whatever colour profile you have chosen. In a practical sense, however, 16-bit precision is more than enough for any kind of detailed, nuanced edits you wish to perform with non-destructive layer work. RAW files can also be processed directly to 32-bit via a preferences option: this is beneficial for editing HDR content (genuine HDR authored with an appropriate display, not tone mapped SDR) and for edge-cases where you need lossless colour space conversion. Along with non-destructive RAW introduced in V2, giving you the choice to re-develop if absolutely necessary, I don't see how doing more work in the initial Develop Persona would provide a better result for customers...

[@000CloudStrife]

@@JamesRitson so if I’m able to control colors with 32 bit precision on raw instead of 16 bit in photo that data isn’t lost? I can directly export from raw to jpeg and avoid banding? Especially when color graduation is important such as deep sky’s? The colors will stay as rich and deep when going from 16 bit photo to 32 hdr when printing? Would you make a video showing this. I would like to see two images side by side. Printed in bigger sizes than a normal magazine size.

[@000CloudStrife]

@@JamesRitson furthermore if we are speaking about technicals-you’ve explained frequency separation well but show the wrong way of using it when it comes to portrait(people) editing/retouching.

[@000CloudStrife]

@@JamesRitson well now that I’ve had time to reread what you said. 1 you didn’t agree with part of it. So you publicly agree that raw development needs work and is not good enough. 2. Processed directly or not you don’t have the precision you are speaking of. You don’t have slide for each of the main colors. So no you can’t give out the best work. Someone who has used affinity would see that this is lacking in the raw developer module. 3. Along with means that it is just enough. Once again admitting to the current limitations of the raw developer. You process raw file directly to 32 bit still means something is lost when going to the edit tab. What is being lost. How much date is being lost. Non destructive raw still takes you to a raw module which again does not have the precision tools even if you claim you have precision.

[@JamesRitson]

​@@000CloudStrife You may be reading into things slightly... 1. I have not publicly agreed anything relating to RAW development quality. I chose only to address the last part of your comment because I believe there is no technical basis to that claim. I actually think the development feature set is sufficient for anyone who is practised in layer based editing techniques, and simply needs to do some basic corrections or tonal enhancements to create a starting point for further work with layers. For those who wish to do most or all of their work using sliders and brush or gradient masks, they may find their needs are better met with more dedicated RAW development software. 2. I am not referring to the complexity of controls available to the user in the Develop Persona (or rather, I am not discussing the "front end")-this may be where we are misunderstanding one another. I am talking about 32-bit unbounded linear compositing which is used when developing a RAW file, versus the default 16-bit per channel bounded precision when the user chooses to develop that initial data and move to the Photo Persona. If a wide colour profile such as ROMM RGB is used, when combined with 65536 unique colour values per channel this is far more than enough precision for 99.9% of workflow use cases. The .1% is covered by having the optional choice of developing straight to 32-bit per channel HDR, so the document remains in that format from the initial RAW development. This prevents pixel values from being hard clipped, allowing for non-destructive colour space conversions, mapping extended pixel ranges to HDR displays and more. 3. "Along with means that it is just enough. Once again admitting to the current limitations of the raw developer."-apologies, I don't understand this sentence... "You process raw file directly to 32 bit still means something is lost when going to the edit tab. What is being lost. How much date is being lost. Non destructive raw still takes you to a raw module which again does not have the precision tools even if you claim you have precision." Perhaps it might be beneficial for you to look up how RAW data is actually processed, as Affinity Photo follows the same pipeline and operations as any other RAW developer. The greyscale bayer sensor data is demosaiced, any non-colour spatial corrections are applied, then the camera's colour space is translated to a standardised device space. This is ideally performed in unbounded floating point to avoid loss of precision, and any colour-based operations that cannot be floating point are best performed in a wide gamut space such as ROMM RGB (which you may know as ProPhoto RGB). By default, Affinity Photo will use this pipeline up until you click the blue Develop button. Typically, the document is then converted to 16-bit sRGB-for the majority of users and their imaging requirements, this is more than sufficient. For those who need more intense colours, or who need to move between different colour formats and profiles, a wider colour profile such as ROMM RGB can be specified when developing. And for those who need ultimate precision, as near-lossless as is practically possible, you can develop and move into the Photo Persona whilst remaining in 32-bit unbounded linear. Linear compositing is mathematically more sound and straightforward than non-linear gamma corrected compositing, and is traditionally favoured for VFX/video workflows. Just to try and answer your previous comment as well: "so if I’m able to control colors with 32 bit precision on raw instead of 16 bit in photo that data isn’t lost? I can directly export from raw to jpeg and avoid banding? Especially when color graduation is important such as deep sky’s? The colors will stay as rich and deep when going from 16 bit photo to 32 hdr when printing? Would you make a video showing this. I would like to see two images side by side. Printed in bigger sizes than a normal magazine size." Even with 32-bit float, which could potentially give you over four billion possible colour values per channel, you could not fully guarantee lossless conversion. Consider, however, that many VFX workflows using OpenEXR and other interchange formats regularly use what is known as half-float-i.e. 16-bit floating point-for their work, and this should tell you that having only 65536 unique values is sufficient for heavy compositing workflows. The lower file size trade off of using half-float precision is regarded as "good enough" by professional environments. Exporting directly from RAW to JPEG and avoiding banding... really, there is no way to sufficiently address this. JPEG is an 8-bit precision lossy format-combine these two factors and maintaining fine gradients will always be challenging. Dithering can be used to mitigate these shortcomings during editing, but ultimately harms compression efficiency for delivery. Lossless 8-bit data such as TIFF, however, is a more realistic proposal for avoiding banding-this is dependent on the image data, however, and whether the fineness or complexity of the gradient can be adequately represented by the limited range of 256 values per channel. Hope the above is helpful!

[@raeesmohammed3072]

It’s time to add up some AI support