Hello, welcome to this tutorial on Affinity Photo 2,
an amazing digital imaging software for correcting photos.
It is available as a perpetual license for Windows, MacOS and iPad,
making it a great alternative to Adobe Photoshop.
In just 13 minutes we are going to see all you need to know to start using it.
As you open Affinity Photo,
its startup window appears with several options to start working,
such as creating a new document,
opening existing ones
or accessing your most recent documents.
If you go for a new document you can pick any ready template,
set its orientation above
and customize other parameters such as width,
height,
DPI,
color,
and margins.
Once you click on Create,
the document opens on the main workspace as a blank white canvas.
Go to File, Open to open images, RAW files and even PSD documents
with their layers listed on the right side.
Each file is treated like an independent document,
with its own tab and metadata at the top.
Each document is made by several independent layers,
which can be images, vector drawings or photo corrections.
The user interface consists of a large preview in the center
and several editing tools on the left.
When these show a white corner
you can right-click to show the grouped tools inside.
On the right, you'll find panels for different features
that can be also found under the Window tab.
Affinity Photo is made of five workspaces called Personas,
for different editing purposes.
In this video, we will see the Photo, the Develop, and the Export Persona.
The Photo Persona is very similar to Adobe Photoshop.
With the Crop tool,
you can adjust the size and aspect ratio of your document.
Scale the grid, move it around and rotate it as you need,
using the Escape key to reset.
Go to Apply or Cancel in the top left corner to apply or undo the crop.
To edit any element, select it from the Layers panel on the right
and enable any tool from the left,
then click and brush to apply your corrections.
You can adjust the preview by zooming with CTRL (or CMD) and your mouse wheel
and undo any modification with either CTRL (or CMD) and Z,
or through the History panel on the right.
Enable the Paint Brush Tool to brush freehand on the current layer selected
with colors set from the Color panel on the right
and brush properties from the toolbar on top, such as brush width,
opacity
and flow.
Click on More to customize your brush settings with a clear preview over it.
With the Color Replacement Brush you can apply any selected color
by preserving the original details and brightness.
Enable the Paint Mixer Brush
to blend colors by clicking and dragging on your image.
With the Dodge and the Burn tools
you enhance or diminish lighting tones within the Shadows,
Midtones, or Highlights ranges of the image, selected on top.
Enable the Sponge tool to adjust the saturation levels,
increasing with Saturate and decreasing with Desaturate.
With the Blur and the Sharpen tools you can increase or reduce blurriness.
Enable the Smudge tool to drag pixel colors by brushing over them.
Other tools are useful when correcting the photo appearance.
Enable the Clone Brush Tool
to replicate pixels from a source point and apply them as you brush.
Press ALT (or the Option key)
to set the source point before dropping your copied pixels.
You may switch to the Healing Brush Tool
to apply the same copies while saving the original brightness.
This is better if you want to repair images or remove large imperfections.
Enable the Inpainting Brush
to remove smaller imperfections with a single click.
With the Erase tool you can remove pixels from the image while you brush.
Checkered areas indicate where no content or pixels are present.
Switch to the Background Erase tool
to remove the background from the detected subject as you brush.
Now let's take a look at the Develop Persona.
This workspace is very similar to Adobe Lightroom
and works the best for professional corrections to your images,
especially under a RAW format.
On the right set the levels of exposure,
brightness,
contrast,
clarity,
saturation,
and vibrance.
Apply color tones with Temperature and Tint,
adjust brightness on Shadows and Highlights,
add lens correction,
reduce noise, and apply color curves and Split toning.
At the top, you can change the views to compare the original photo (before)
with your edited one (after)
to see the impact of your adjustments.
All these corrections are always applied to the entire photo
unless you specify regions with the Overlay tools on the left.
For instance, enable the Overlay Paint Tool
and brush on the image to define a red region,
that limits your next corrections within its area.
You can also refine the brush with the Overlay Erase Tool.
You can generate and manage overlays with the Overlays panel.
Click on Add Brush Overlay to create a new independent overlay
and select any overlay to apply more adjustments to it.
When you are ready click on Develop
to come back to your document in Photo Persona,
clearing all your overlays
and applying all your corrections to your image permanently.
To apply photo corrections within Photo Persona
you can use the Adjustment panel on the right.
Browse for the right correction
and tune it while checking the preview.
This adds a new adjustment layer, affecting all layers beneath it in the list.
You can click on the left icon to refine its properties again.
Now let's see how to draw and make illustrations with the vector tools!
Enable any Shape tool
and click and drag to drop it as an independent vector layer.
You can modify its fill, stroke colors and style from the toolbar above.
Enable the Pen tool to draw custom shapes,
clicking on the canvas to define straight segments
and clicking and dragging to drop curves.
Use the Node tool to adjust the shape and the curves as you need.
To add text enable any Text tool
and click and drag to define placement and size for the text,
then type the content
and adjust color and properties from the toolbar above.
To manage and transform the layers inside your document use the Move tool.
Click on any element to select it and click and drag it to move it.
You can also scale and rotate it by using its nodes.
Use CTRL (or CMD) and X to cut or remove a layer
and CTRL (or CMD) with C and V to copy and paste.
The cut-paste operation can be used to import images inside a document:
just select the image,
cut it entirely
and paste it as a new layer onto your desired document.
The Layers panel on the right
collects images, vectors and adjustments as individual layers.
Toggle their visibility on the right
and manage several options from the top such as opacity,
compound and blending mode.
You can also use the lock button to lock the selected layer
and prevent modifications when using the Move tool.
When layers overlap, you can move any layer up or down in the list
to adjust their order of visibility.
You can also select any layer and apply effects with the buttons below.
With Layer Effects
you can add blur, shadow or glow,
with the possibility to move these effects to another layer
by clicking and dragging the fx icon.
Click on Live Filters to apply dynamic effects instead.
You can use the selection tools
to modify limited portions of any selected layer,
for example when cutting and pasting,
brushing on images
or applying live effects and adjustment layers.
Enable the Selection Brush tool
to define regions by brushing on any layer
and the Flood Select Tool
to select areas with similar colors with just one click.
Choose the Marquee tools to select either rectangular or elliptical regions
and the Freehand Selection tool
to make custom regions by clicking and dragging.
Undo any selection with the Escape key.
Go to File, Save As to save your document
and reopen it whenever you need to edit it again on Affinity Photo.
To export your document as an image, go to File, Export.
This exports your entire document in various formats like PDF, JPEG,
or the PNG that preserves transparency areas if present.
You can also switch to Export Persona for more export options.
You can enable the Slice tool to define custom export regions
by clicking and dragging on the canvas.
These regions get listed under the Slices panel on the right,
ready to batch export with Export Slices.
You can also export a single slice
and set its format and properties on Export Options above.
This is all you need to know about Affinity Photo 2!
Make sure to check our YouTube channel and our official website
to learn more tips and tricks completely for free!