Dear all, welcome to this short beginner tutorial on Affinity Photo, one of
the best alternatives for Adobe Photoshop under a perpetual license,
without requiring any subscription plan. This works on Windows, Mac and
also on iPad with a dedicated App.
Do not forget to visit our YouTube channel and our website for extras,
giveaways and other guides completely free!
Affinity Photo is a digital imaging software able to correct photos,
manipulate pictures and realize custom drawings and illustrations. To start
working you can either create a new document or open an existing file by
going to File, New... or Open... respectively. On new documents you can
pick ready presets that you can customize on the right on width, height,
DPI, orientation and color profiles. Once you go to Create the document
opens on the workspace as a blank white page.
When opening images and RAW files these appear with their own size and
aspect ratio with their own tabs on top, complete with file names.
Affinity is also able to open Photoshop PSD files with their own layers.
Around the preview you have the editing tools on the left, the toolbar
options on top and several panels on the right. If any of these is missing,
you can recover it from the View tab.
Like Photoshop Affinity works with the documents composed by several
objects called layers, which include pixelated images, vector objects and
digital adjustments. It also divides its interface in five workspaces
called Personas, each dedicated to a specific task. The main one, called
Photo Persona, collects all the main tools you need to correct any photo.
Let's see the basic ones.
With the Crop Tool you can move, scale and rotate the central grid to
adjust the size and the aspect ratio of the document. Then use Apply or
Cancel above to finalize or undo the crop.
With the layer selected from the right you can start editing with all the
tools on the left side. Most of these are brushing tools, applying
corrections by simply clicking and dragging on the image. Some of these
show a white corner, collecting multiple tools inside. In this case
right-click on any to select from the full list.
Enable the Color Replacement Brush Tool to replace the color range you
hover over with your pointer with another color selected from the Color
panel. Use Paint Mixer Brush to click and drag the colors and mix them up
together as you brush on.
You also have the Dodge and the Burn tools to increase and decrease the
color tones on Shadows, Midtones and Highlights as you brush. Whereas the
Sponge Brush Tool increases or decreases the saturation levels, according
to what you choose on top.
With the Blur and the Sharpen tool you add blurriness or increase the image
details. With the Smudge tool you can drag the pixel colors where you
brush. Make sure to hold CMD (or CTRL) key and use your mouse wheel to zoom
in and out if you need.
From the toolbar above you can set all the brush options. If you go to
More you can check how your next brush changes with a live preview.
In case you make any mistake you can undo with CMD (or CTRL) and Z or with
the History panel on the right.
With other advanced tools you can adjust the photo appearance by covering
subjects or imperfections. Enable the Clone Brush Tool to drop copies of
the image pixels from a defined source point that follows your brush,
indicated by a cross. To start brushing, hold down the ALT key and click
to fix the source and then brush on the picture.
The Healing Brush Tool works in the same way but it repairs the image
pixels instead of dropping copies. Whereas you can use the Inpainting Brush
Tool to correct smaller imperfections with just one click.
You can also enable the Erase Tools to remove pixels from the photo, making
these completely transparent and shown as checkered areas.
To apply professional corrections you can switch to the Develop Persona,
getting several tools and features very similar to Adobe Lightroom. This
workspace is the default one in case you open RAW files.
On the right you can adjust Exposure, Brightness, Contrast, Clarity and
color appearance with Saturation and Vibrance. You can set white tones with
Temperature and Tint and correct Shadows and Highlights levels. On the
other panels you can add lens correction, refinement and noise reduction
and adjust color curves and Split Toning. As you correct the photo
appearance you can use the Split Views above to check how this changes
before and after your modifications.
By default all these corrections are applied on the whole photo. With the
Overlay Tools on the left you can brush on the picture to define specific
red regions indicating where to apply your next adjustments. Then you can
use the Overlay Erase Tool to refine or remove these regions.
With all the corrections made click on Develop above to apply all and come
back to Photo Persona. You can switch to Develop Persona to apply other
corrections or add new red overlays for other precise adjustments.
Affinity Photo also includes Liquify and Tone Mapping Personas used to
change perspective with meshes and increase the dynamic range of your
photos. We won't see these in this beginner tutorial.
You can apply advanced corrections by using the Adjustment panel, inside
Photo Persona. Just like Photoshop each of these corrections adds an
adjustment layer that affects all the layers below it in the list. You can
double-click on the left side to fine its options if you need.
Affinity Photo includes several tools to make artistic drawings with
vectors and color brushes from scratch. You can enable Paint Brush Tool to
draw freehand by clicking and dragging, specifying its colors from the
Color panel and its brush properties from the toolbar above. With the
Shape tools you can click and drag to drop regular shapes adjusting fill,
stroke color and properties above.
You can also drop pieces of text with the Text Tools, typing simple lines
of text or entire paragraphs within a frame, adjusting style, size, family,
color and distribution on top.
All the images and vectors inside the document are listed inside the Layers
panel on the right. Here you can use the checkbox to hide or show each
layer and move one up or down to change the order of visibility: if one
layer is placed on top, it is shown in front of all the other layers in
lower positions.
With the layer selected in blue color you can use several options at the
bottom. Click on Layer Effects to apply blur, shadow, glow, bevel and
overlays following the shape of the layer and on Live Filters to add great
effects on the overall layer, regardless of its shape.
You can also use the Move tool to move, scale and rotate the selected
layer on the preview. You can also use CMD (or CTRL) and X, C and V to cut,
copy and paste it. You can cut any layer to remove it quickly and use the
cut-paste operation to import multiple photos on a single document. Just
cut an entire photo first and paste it on the interested document.
Affinity Photo also includes the selection tools that define limited
portions from the selected layer so that, whenever you cut, brush or apply
live filters or adjustments only such region will be affected, leaving the
rest of the layer untouched. You can enable the Selection Brush Tool to
select as you brush on the layer; the Flood Select Tool to select wide
areas automatically as long as they share the same colors and the Marquee
Tools to define simple rectangular or elliptical regions. With Freehand
Selection Tool you can define closed areas completely freehand. To undo any
selection, use the Escape key.
To save your current document open go to File and then to Save As.
Whereas to export its result, open the Export Persona. If you go to File,
Export you export your whole document in several formats such as .pdf,
.jpeg or .png to save transparency. Go to More... to set advanced options.
Whereas to export just part of the document you can enable the Slice Tool
and click and drag to define your custom area. This will be listed under
the Slices panel on the right with all the export options, including the
file format to use. Then use the Export button on the right side.
Thank you for watching this tutorial! Do not forget to visit our YouTube
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