I’ve made hundreds of illustrations using Affinity Designer. There hasn’t been any idea I’ve had which I couldn’t create. Coupled with the seamless integration with Photo and Publisher while considering the price, it’s a no-brainer.
For sure! I'm still far faster in Illustrator, but I have 30 years of Adobe muscle memory to overcome! I have a fairly lengthy Affinity wish list, but they get more right than they do wrong. I'm still a bit nervous about being acquired by Canva. I guess we'll see how serious they are in future updates.
@@billbowman8747 There is certainly some uncertainty with Canva, but Affinity development had almost stopped. They weren't making any significant progress any longer like in the past. They seriously needed more resources and investment. Some of their basic ideas have been so much better than the competition, but they haven't really been able to take to the full potential. For example, I use Publisher mainly because of the better integration of all 3 tools into one. However, I wish they would allow you to create a custom workspace with any tool you want from all 3 apps. Also, the integration really falls apart with Art Boards. Many of the live effects from photo break in Art Boards. They all seem to assume you are working in a single document with a single refence point. When you move or add art boards, this often causes the look of the effect to change.
Yes, I started using Affinity Designer pretty much when it first started, and the program has made a lot of progression since then. Now if I have to use Illustrator for whatever it is quite a painful experience. Designer may not have all the bells and whistles Illustrator has, but it is very user friendly and nice to use and has very good performance.
What I love about your Affinity videos is they are from an Illustrator user's point of view which helps make learning Affinity much less frustrating for the rest of us. Keep 'em coming fella!
OMG! Are you THE Deke from Deke's Techniques or whatever PS tutorials were called about a million years ago??? Holy shmoly. You were my first photoshop tutor. So cool to see you again. You haven't aged a bit.
PLEASE create some tutorial courses for all the Affinity suite and the separate programs! Take my money! lol. I would buy them in a heartbeat! Especially for us fellow previous Adobe users trying to completely shift over to Affinity.
I teach both Affinity and Illustrator to Biology PhD students and while I do like Affinity Designer and think its great value for the money, personally I will still always use Illustrator for my projects. The main reasons: Missing features like the flexible way to handle Appearances with multiple strokes and fills and the option to apply any kind of effect to either; Missing Image tracing; no real vector brushes like pattern or art brush that can be expanded to be further edited; expanding a stroke in Affinity gives sometimes strange shapes; missing effects like transform effects, 3D effects, missing tools like the puppet wrap tool. Also I really don't like the way affinity is handling alignments, the key object concept is so much easier to use than "align to first/last selected". I also don't like the snapping in Affinity. While in theory all the customizable options are great, in practice I find it cumbersome to select the right snapping for what I want it do do. Also, in my course, I do present the great way that bitmap editing is integrated into affinity, however, personally when I design vector graphics. I really almost never use bitmap elements directly in the vector graphics.
Affinity Designer doesn't support AI. It opens the embedded PDF. *If* there is an embedded PDF, that is. And if you have one of these lighting, neon, shiny EPS from microstock websites, then you might be able to open it, but they are pretty useless, because transparency is flattened. Those are only editable in Illustrator, because there is an EI file embedded (which Affinity Designer can not open)
Great stuff Deke, was waiting for this, and I think I have a similar perspective on your take - while Illustrator is still the top dog, Designer is already quite capable and in some cases even better than Illustrator. And where it's not, there are usually workarounds. Not always though, not yet. But I just want Affinity to succeed so badly and have more serious players in this field, which has been dominated by one company far too long by now. So keep this up and your Patreon is indeed my next stop.
Many thanks Deke for starting the analysis of Affinity Designer. I think it's great to have an expert in Illustrator like yourself look into this software. Please continue this series. It is extremely helpful.
Thanks Deke. I only discovered your channel recently and find your way of presenting and your gleefully joyful voice so very uplifting. I have actually never been an Adobe user and came into graphic design/ digital art later in life. Affinity was very appealing to me from the start, and I have been a user since 2022. 2:30: I think you can drag your mouse over multiple artboards and ctrl+shift drag them to duplicate (or select multiple ABs in the layers panel and hit ctrl +J). But I am of course not familiar with how this stacks up against Illustrator. There are admittedly plenty of features in Ai and PS not integrated in Affinity, features I never thought I’d miss until I saw them 😅. Object blending (Ai) and the many image filter and texture options (Ps) being a few. I do think overtime we will see them implemented.
Designer has made enormous progress in recent years, and seems like object blending might be a quick add. Didn’t think about duping multiple artboards-but even so artboards are pretty clunky.
I’m using Illustrator since 1985. So I’m really experienced. I don’t use it very often nowadays, because it annoys me how it developed through the years. It has some advantages over Designer but after working in Designer for more than 5 years, I can’t stand the Adobe interfaces anymore. The present Illustrator 2024 is a mess. Affinity did a marvelous job. And Designer is getting better and better.
Scaling stroke with object is on a per object basis in AD. In Illustrator it's global. I think Illustrator is better about this. While working, 98% of the time, I want strokes to scale with the object, but there are times when I want strokes to remain the same size as I scale an object. I quickly uncheck the option and work momentarily, then I turn it back on to continue my work. In AD, I would need to check that box for every single object that I create! The things that are wrong or bad in AD are extremely bad and wrong. Layer management is another thing that is extremely bad. In my whole career in Illustrator I tend to have maybe 5 layers no matter how complex the art is. In AD, you'll have 5 layers as soon as you make 5 paths. By the time you've worked for a minute or 2 you could have 50 layers or more. But it's even worse because you actually need to mess with the layers just to do things like masking. So dealing with layers is not something you could even avoid. In Illustrator new objects create sub layers, and those sub layers do not expose automatically. They're hidden. So you have 1 layer, and all you see is 1 layer. And all of the 50 objects that you draw are on that one layer. If you actually wanted to see all of the sublayers they're all there just like in Affinity Designer, but you only see them when you want to see them. In AD you have a layer stack that could be 3 hundred layers. If you close up all of the sub layers, they will re-expose as soon as you touch an object. This is not just bad it's extremely bad. I don't know how that doesn't drive people crazy.
Well, in all fairness, you don’t end up with a zillion layers, you actually don’t have any. Illustrator requires you to work inside layers, Designer does not. Which means Illustrator protects you from seeing all your path outlines (unless you expand the layer). Designer puts them on full display, but permits you to assemble objects into layers if you like. It’s a different approach.
@@dekeNow "Well, in all fairness, you don’t end up with a zillion layers, you actually don’t have any. Illustrator requires you to work inside layers, Designer does not." I don't understand either of those two statements? How do you not end up with many layers? If you make 10 objects, you get 10 layers. They're exposed in AD and not exposed in AI. As for Ai requiring you to work in layers, that seems like the opposite is true. In AD, things like masking is done by dragging layers around. That means AD forces you to "work inside layers". In Illustrator, masking is done with simple keyboard shortcut. You don't even need to have the layers panel visible to do it. So, AD forces you to work in layers. Ai does not.
@@KuttyJoe You’re right in that in many ways, it’s a difference in exposure. (Put all those objects in a layer, and they’re no longer exposed. Calling each object a “layer,” well, they’re just loose.) I spend a lot of time in Ai working in the Layers panel, so I admire AD’s approach.
@@dekeNow "Put all those objects in a layer, and they’re no longer exposed." They are definitely exposed. Putting the objects in a layer does not prevent them from being exposed. Each object is exposed as soon as you make it whether you put them inside a parent layer or not.
HI Deke. Would be nice to learn moer about integration between the 3 affinity softwares. Like for example if it is possible to create a vector graphic in Affinity design, unit in affinity photo. And maybe have it linked so when the graphic is modified in Affinity design it will be updated in affinity photo.
I’ve made hundreds of illustrations using Affinity Designer. There hasn’t been any idea I’ve had which I couldn’t create. Coupled with the seamless integration with Photo and Publisher while considering the price, it’s a no-brainer.
For sure! I'm still far faster in Illustrator, but I have 30 years of Adobe muscle memory to overcome! I have a fairly lengthy Affinity wish list, but they get more right than they do wrong. I'm still a bit nervous about being acquired by Canva. I guess we'll see how serious they are in future updates.
@@billbowman8747 There is certainly some uncertainty with Canva, but Affinity development had almost stopped. They weren't making any significant progress any longer like in the past. They seriously needed more resources and investment.
Some of their basic ideas have been so much better than the competition, but they haven't really been able to take to the full potential. For example, I use Publisher mainly because of the better integration of all 3 tools into one. However, I wish they would allow you to create a custom workspace with any tool you want from all 3 apps.
Also, the integration really falls apart with Art Boards. Many of the live effects from photo break in Art Boards. They all seem to assume you are working in a single document with a single refence point. When you move or add art boards, this often causes the look of the effect to change.
Yes, I started using Affinity Designer pretty much when it first started, and the program has made a lot of progression since then. Now if I have to use Illustrator for whatever it is quite a painful experience. Designer may not have all the bells and whistles Illustrator has, but it is very user friendly and nice to use and has very good performance.
Yep about 6 years now using the Affinity suite 👍
What I love about your Affinity videos is they are from an Illustrator user's point of view which helps make learning Affinity much less frustrating for the rest of us. Keep 'em coming fella!
Will do!
These tutorials on alternative software other than Adobe are very helpful. I hope you continue this series. Thanks Deke!
I plan to!
18:05 If you want it to be dynamic, you could make your first shape as a symbol. All the copies, will fallow the modification.
OMG! Are you THE Deke from Deke's Techniques or whatever PS tutorials were called about a million years ago??? Holy shmoly. You were my first photoshop tutor. So cool to see you again. You haven't aged a bit.
That’s very kind of you. I have my face replaced weekly 😅
PLEASE create some tutorial courses for all the Affinity suite and the separate programs! Take my money! lol. I would buy them in a heartbeat! Especially for us fellow previous Adobe users trying to completely shift over to Affinity.
Oh, boy, that’s a tall order. We will see . . .
I teach both Affinity and Illustrator to Biology PhD students and while I do like Affinity Designer and think its great value for the money, personally I will still always use Illustrator for my projects.
The main reasons: Missing features like the flexible way to handle Appearances with multiple strokes and fills and the option to apply any kind of effect to either; Missing Image tracing; no real vector brushes like pattern or art brush that can be expanded to be further edited; expanding a stroke in Affinity gives sometimes strange shapes; missing effects like transform effects, 3D effects, missing tools like the puppet wrap tool.
Also I really don't like the way affinity is handling alignments, the key object concept is so much easier to use than "align to first/last selected". I also don't like the snapping in Affinity. While in theory all the customizable options are great, in practice I find it cumbersome to select the right snapping for what I want it do do.
Also, in my course, I do present the great way that bitmap editing is integrated into affinity, however, personally when I design vector graphics. I really almost never use bitmap elements directly in the vector graphics.
That’s a great list of Affinity cons! Especially the layered strokes-many reasons I cannot let go completely of Illustrator.
And here i like the way affinity handles alignments...i guess it's a matter of what one is used to.
Affinity Designer doesn't support AI. It opens the embedded PDF. *If* there is an embedded PDF, that is. And if you have one of these lighting, neon, shiny EPS from microstock websites, then you might be able to open it, but they are pretty useless, because transparency is flattened. Those are only editable in Illustrator, because there is an EI file embedded (which Affinity Designer can not open)
Yes, re: embedded PDF. (That’s how just about every Adobe product supports AI files as well.) I’ll have to look into the embedded EI. Thx!
@@dekeNow Sorry, that was a typo. Should have been AI. I have made a video about those some weeks ago: ruclips.net/video/LKsRt9DZl4M/видео.html
Woooohoooo - been waiting for this one. Thanks Deke!
Excellent!
Great stuff Deke, was waiting for this, and I think I have a similar perspective on your take - while Illustrator is still the top dog, Designer is already quite capable and in some cases even better than Illustrator. And where it's not, there are usually workarounds. Not always though, not yet. But I just want Affinity to succeed so badly and have more serious players in this field, which has been dominated by one company far too long by now. So keep this up and your Patreon is indeed my next stop.
Yay for my Patreon! (Yes, and competition is always good.)
Many thanks Deke for starting the analysis of Affinity Designer. I think it's great to have an expert in Illustrator like yourself look into this software. Please continue this series. It is extremely helpful.
Will do!
I am the same way about marquee settings too. I changed that setting FIRST THING when I started using the Affinity suite too.
HA! Awesome!
Biggest complaint is no AI! That alone sold me along with modest price, allows me to buy assets.
Yeah. No AI *and* no auto-tracing leaves me a bit cold at the moment. (Though many seem to dislike the AI in Ai pretty intensely.)
Great video! Would love to see more Affinity tricks.🙏
Noted, thx!
Thanks Deke. I only discovered your channel recently and find your way of presenting and your gleefully joyful voice so very uplifting.
I have actually never been an Adobe user and came into graphic design/ digital art later in life. Affinity was very appealing to me from the start, and I have been a user since 2022.
2:30: I think you can drag your mouse over multiple artboards and ctrl+shift drag them to duplicate (or select multiple ABs in the layers panel and hit ctrl +J). But I am of course not familiar with how this stacks up against Illustrator. There are admittedly plenty of features in Ai and PS not integrated in Affinity, features I never thought I’d miss until I saw them 😅. Object blending (Ai) and the many image filter and texture options (Ps) being a few. I do think overtime we will see them implemented.
Designer has made enormous progress in recent years, and seems like object blending might be a quick add. Didn’t think about duping multiple artboards-but even so artboards are pretty clunky.
I’m using Illustrator since 1985. So I’m really experienced. I don’t use it very often nowadays, because it annoys me how it developed through the years. It has some advantages over Designer but after working in Designer for more than 5 years, I can’t stand the Adobe interfaces anymore. The present Illustrator 2024 is a mess. Affinity did a marvelous job. And Designer is getting better and better.
Scaling stroke with object is on a per object basis in AD. In Illustrator it's global. I think Illustrator is better about this. While working, 98% of the time, I want strokes to scale with the object, but there are times when I want strokes to remain the same size as I scale an object. I quickly uncheck the option and work momentarily, then I turn it back on to continue my work. In AD, I would need to check that box for every single object that I create! The things that are wrong or bad in AD are extremely bad and wrong. Layer management is another thing that is extremely bad. In my whole career in Illustrator I tend to have maybe 5 layers no matter how complex the art is. In AD, you'll have 5 layers as soon as you make 5 paths. By the time you've worked for a minute or 2 you could have 50 layers or more. But it's even worse because you actually need to mess with the layers just to do things like masking. So dealing with layers is not something you could even avoid. In Illustrator new objects create sub layers, and those sub layers do not expose automatically. They're hidden. So you have 1 layer, and all you see is 1 layer. And all of the 50 objects that you draw are on that one layer. If you actually wanted to see all of the sublayers they're all there just like in Affinity Designer, but you only see them when you want to see them. In AD you have a layer stack that could be 3 hundred layers. If you close up all of the sub layers, they will re-expose as soon as you touch an object. This is not just bad it's extremely bad. I don't know how that doesn't drive people crazy.
Well, in all fairness, you don’t end up with a zillion layers, you actually don’t have any. Illustrator requires you to work inside layers, Designer does not. Which means Illustrator protects you from seeing all your path outlines (unless you expand the layer). Designer puts them on full display, but permits you to assemble objects into layers if you like. It’s a different approach.
@@dekeNow "Well, in all fairness, you don’t end up with a zillion layers, you actually don’t have any. Illustrator requires you to work inside layers, Designer does not."
I don't understand either of those two statements? How do you not end up with many layers? If you make 10 objects, you get 10 layers. They're exposed in AD and not exposed in AI. As for Ai requiring you to work in layers, that seems like the opposite is true. In AD, things like masking is done by dragging layers around. That means AD forces you to "work inside layers". In Illustrator, masking is done with simple keyboard shortcut. You don't even need to have the layers panel visible to do it. So, AD forces you to work in layers. Ai does not.
@@KuttyJoe You’re right in that in many ways, it’s a difference in exposure. (Put all those objects in a layer, and they’re no longer exposed. Calling each object a “layer,” well, they’re just loose.) I spend a lot of time in Ai working in the Layers panel, so I admire AD’s approach.
@@dekeNow "Put all those objects in a layer, and they’re no longer exposed."
They are definitely exposed. Putting the objects in a layer does not prevent them from being exposed. Each object is exposed as soon as you make it whether you put them inside a parent layer or not.
thanks deke, this is a great introduction
Good news!
Please do an video on Affinity Photo :)
Already done: ruclips.net/video/fFQQWuPmDTs/видео.html
HI Deke. Would be nice to learn moer about integration between the 3 affinity softwares. Like for example if it is possible to create a vector graphic in Affinity design, unit in affinity photo. And maybe have it linked so when the graphic is modified in Affinity design it will be updated in affinity photo.
That sounds like a great idea for the future.
Awesome!
Wow this is so good🎉
Thank you!!
amazing! more please 💜
Thank you!
Affinity designer is a future champ
Might be!
I dumped Adobe after 20 years. I now use Affinity and Davinci Resolve. Tired of Adob'e BS.
Use a Blackmagic but haven’t yet tried Resolve.
@@dekeNow Resolve is amazing. The Audio features are as good as it gets and the video editing is rock solid. The color grading is second to none.
Needs affinity one on one training
Must add to long list . . . 😅
I using Affinity now, i hope so watch more videos for your channel! Thank so MUCH! .