Affinity Update: It's now FREEmium...and more

[jwheeler]

Affinity/Canva made a big announcement yesterday (on the last day of Adobe Max):

Key points:

• There is now just one program for all 3 functions: photo editing, vector illustration, and page layout. It's simply called "Affinity"
• There are quick-switch buttons in the top menu that switch all of your tools and windows/pallets to vector, raster, or page layout mode. All of these are customizable, or you can make your own.
• The software is now free. They promised it would be free forever.
• However, they offer a premium subscription that provides access to AI tools...which I believe most people will want access to since they really help speed things up. I believe that's where they're counting on getting their revenue from. The premium subscription also gives you access to Canva "Pro" features. (It's still much less at $120/year compared to Adobe's $840/year)
• They added some really cool new features and filters and seemed to vastly improve variable data tools.
• Affinity will open native Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign files (along with .dwg and some other file types)
• Fully automated scripting is coming very soon.

See this review I did a year ago about the viability of switching from the Adobe Creative Suite to the Affinity suite.

(And no, I'm still not sponsored by Affinity)

 

[pippip]

Saw this screenshot on linkedin.

 

[chriscozi]

Saw this screenshot on linkedin.
View attachment 294459

And how is this any DIFFERENT than any other app's use of PANTONE?

 

[jwheeler]

And how is this any DIFFERENT than any other app's use of PANTONE?

I was thinking the same thing @chriscozi. What is your point or concern @pippip ?

 

[Magnus]

We’re spending around €50,000 a year on Adobe, so this is definitely something I plan to look into further.

 

[jwheeler]

We’re spending around €50,000 a year on Adobe, so this is definitely something I plan to look into further.

Whaat?! How many designers do you have?! That's enough for ~50 licenses!

 

[Magnus]

~40 Creative Cloud Pro and ~ 20 Adobe Acrobat Pro. We are running 3 printing sites and a designer agency.

 

[jwheeler]

~40 Creative Cloud Pro and ~ 20 Adobe Acrobat Pro. We are running 3 printing sites and a designer agency.

That's great! Congrats on a successful operation!

 

[AP90]

~40 Creative Cloud Pro and ~ 20 Adobe Acrobat Pro. We are running 3 printing sites and a designer agency.

Theres always gotta be that one guy who's a showoff.... just kidding man. Thats an impressive company profile and wish you continued success at it! And even cutting half of those subs with affinity would be a huge savings!

 

[wonderings]

I was on the team beta testing this. It has been interesting watching it develop and the idea of a single app that basically entwines Indesign Illustrator and Photoshop together. I personally would not switch our shop away from Adobe at the moment, but if momentum continues I think you might start seeing more and more people switching over as it is pretty powerful software for the price when they were selling V2 and even more so now when it is free. We deal with a lot of non profits doing their print, mailers etc. For the types of stuff they all do this software is perfect for them and saves them money at the end of every month and that is a good thing for charities. The subscription portion of this new version is for AI only. The AI models do a better job than Adobe did with the previous version. With the latest release Photoshop is way more expansive on how it handles AI and the ability to use different models. I will be adding Affinity to all our designers and prepress peoples computers as a tool to use and maybe someday will end up switching. A feature I do use Affinity Designer for is when an PDF file made from Illustrator is needing editing but they did not embed the file, you can open up in Affinity Designer and the file is there in full high resolution.

One big draw back of Affinity and has been since V1 is how it handles colours. I can never get my head around it, it seems overly complicated. I am obviously familiar with Adobe so know how it works but it seems so simple and straightforward opposed to Affinity. Others will not have an issue with it I am sure, for me it is the most irritating thing about the app.

 

[jwheeler]

I think you might start seeing more and more people switching over

Not only will you see current users switching over, but a whole new generation will be raised up on it. Since it is free, many (if not most) high school graphics teachers will switch to it, as opposed to dealing with the budget approvals for Adobe CC. Then, those students will keep using it as they progress on through college and into their careers since it will do everything they need without a costly monthly subscription.

 

[jwheeler]

One big draw back of Affinity and has been since V1 is how it handles colours

Can you expand on what you mean here?

 

[abc]

Does this new version actually contain the Pantone libraries, did they license them for this new app?

 

[wonderings]

Does this new version actually contain the Pantone libraries, did they license them for this new app?

They do have the Pantone libraries in the app, no extra payments needed for them

 

[wonderings]

Can you expand on what you mean here?

When I start on a new project in Illustrator or Indesign I like the simple basic colour sets it gives you for swatches.

It is simple and also drag and drop. So if I make a custom colour with the Pantone slides I can then in the Swatches panel literally just click on the colour and drag it into my list.

Now comparing to the Affinity way I am giving thousands of colours by default and creating my own colour swatch panel for the colours I simply want does not seem to be an option. I am no pro user when it comes to Affinity so maybe someone else knows a way to clean up a swatch list or to add to it. I find this sensory overload on colours. The colour can be added automatically but no naming convention for custom swatch colours and no list view. This might not affect everyone or be an issue for everyone. This has been my major gripe with Affinity since V1 and I really prefer the Adobe way of doing things.

For Pantones you have to hover over the square to get the Pantone name. You can search though which makes it super easy so not a huge thing, just more of a preference thing. Again I am sure a lot of is is surmountable with more use, just something so simple I find a little over done.

 

[jwheeler]

I just downloaded the latest version, and they seemed to have addressed these issues @wonderings .

The starting palette is now a simple rainbow of colors:

If you click on the menu arrow in the top-right corner, you can change it to a list view. And as you can see in the first color I made, you can change the name by right-clicking on any color. And you can change the Pantone colors to a list view as well :

There is also an option to set a custom color palette as the default for different color modes:

 

[SlaveToTheMan]

Also installed at work, I'd purchased one of the previous standalone versions when they were still "Serif" because it seemed like a viable alternative to Adobe & not being a designer by any stretch, I just wanted to see how files produced would travel through our environment.

That being said, this is pretty impressive so far! I'm going to make a push to convert existing clients in the Canva camp to Affinity where possible. It's a steeper learning curve but hopefully will make our lives easier in the long run.

 

[wonderings]

I just downloaded the latest version, and they seemed to have addressed these issues @wonderings .

The starting palette is now a simple rainbow of colors:
View attachment 294476

If you click on the menu arrow in the top-right corner, you can change it to a list view. And as you can see in the first color I made, you can change the name by right-clicking on any color. And you can change the Pantone colors to a list view as well :
View attachment 294477 View attachment 294479

There is also an option to set a custom color palette as the default for different color modes:

View attachment 294480

Thanks, the list view is nice for Pantones. It would be nice for the starting pallets if I could figure out how to delete all those colours. I find them unnecessary and just gives me a super long list when it is not needed. Again comparing to the Indesign screen shot I had shared it is very simple in Indesign. I have my base colours and I have saved a cut contour spot colour. Anything else I am going to do with colours I am doing with the CMYK sliders. And then if I want to save that colour into my swatches I can literally drag and drop. Unless I am missing something this is much more cumbersome in handling and working with colours. The simplicity of double clicking on a swatch colour and then making it a spot if I need to is so simple and easy. I have figured out on my own without AI or googling it how to make a swatch and again find it very unintuitive and overly complex with that various pallets to be in. Again it is workable and it is FREE. I have requested changes to the way they handle colours but never gotten a response for that since V1. I am sure it would get better if I put more effort into it. I work less and less directly with files as I am in a director role here so I am less inclined to really delve deep. I have added this to all our prepress, designers and CSR's computers though as a tool. It is also a free way for CSR's to be able to open PSD's, EPS, and AI files among others so they can at least look at something before handing it over to prepress.

 

[PricelineNegotiator]

Adobe was a dead company the moment they hired an Indian CEO. The amount of bugs present in the software is insane. I hope Canva and other alternatives completely choke Adobe dry - and hopefully PANTONE as well.

This same play will become pronounced in the coming years as alternatives to macOS and Windows mature and people can jump ship. They're already angry at the incredibly poor leadership of Microsoft and macOS is starting to show its own red flags.

The only issue with Affinity is that it is not open source.

 

[gtmo]

Adobe heading the way of Quark!