Affinity Photo was originally launched by software company Serif as a professional photo editing program to compete directly with Photoshop at a much lower price, alongside Illustrator and Publisher. Now taken over by online design company Canva, these three programs have now been rolled into a single program called Canva Affinity, now free for members.
These are somewhat confusing times for Affinity Photo users. First, Canva acquires Affinity and rolls the three desktop apps (Photo, Designer, Publisher) into one and second, Canva starts the integration of Affinity with its powerful and extensive web-based AI-powered design tools. Affinity Photo has become a small cog in a very big machine, so does it still have enough to tempt photographers?
If anyone is interested, I’ve recently produced a series of videos on Affinity Photo 2 for Amateur Photographer, covering everything from new features in version 2 through focus stacking, HDR merge, object removal, non-destructive editing and panorama stitching. Here’s a list, with links.
Verdict: 4.5 stars Affinity Photo 2 is not a huge leap forward from version 1 for photographers, but more a major refresh and rebranding for Affinity. It remains an extremely powerful professional Photoshop rival at an exceptionally low price. Its tone mapping is superb, its RAW processing can now be applied non-destructively and its central Photo personal is hugely powerful.
Choosing the best image editing software can be complicated. It all depends on what you look for most in your photo editing software. Here are 12 programs with their own distinct strengths.
Affinity Photo, Serif’s professional photo-editing application, is now available for the iPad. It’s not the first time a software publisher has produced a mobile version of a desktop application – take Photoshop Express and Lightroom Mobile, for example – but this time it’s different. Affinity Photo for iPad is not a simplified, cut-down accessory app…