[Design Software] Serif Affinity (by Canva) Designer/Publisher/Photo now free

[Brian Walton]

3 hours ago, antler said:

True. But let's also not forget MeldaProduction and Image‑Line (and probably a few others that have slipped my mind) have been good on their word for free updates so far.

I've been an Affinity fan since v1.  But I also think that beyond the question of will it be free or not there is a lot of concern about how the development will progress.

Adobe was stagnant for years with material updates but in the last 3 years have completely obliterated the pace of Affinity in workflow and feature enhancements.

 

Even the move from v1 to v2 felt like almost nothing and then when they launch v3 about the only big deal is vector trace and getting all, not just some, of the photo tools to show up with what is effectively studio link that we had for a long time now.  

I need to mess with it more but as a weekly Affinity user (close to daily), I got a number of errors trying out some features in this new version.  

When they were bought by Canva they promised development would explode.  Since it has been about a year in development since the last real update I'm not sure I agree we have seen that promise fulfilled yet.

All that said, I'm thrilled I didn't have to drop another $130ish on an upgrade like I had to from v1 to v2.  And as a volunteer photography educator, nothing is better than telling students high quality tools are free.  Now if Capture One had not abandoned the free version, and only have the $300+ model....

 

Edited November 1 by Brian Walton

[Promidi]

6 hours ago, antler said:

But let's also not forget MeldaProduction and Image‑Line (and probably a few others that have slipped my mind) have been good on their word for free updates so far.

Arturia Pigments and UVI Falcon have had free updates (and they add useful feature, not just fluff).

[swijaya]

In my system, as long as Affinity has internet connection, this option can't be turned off, or rather, I can turn it off, but it will be on again the next time I open Settings. Only after I blocked it with my firewall, then it's off & stays off.

So, this option is actually an internet connection detection 😀

 

 

Edited November 1 by swijaya

[Kirean]

52 minutes ago, swijaya said:

In my system, as long as Affinity has internet connection, this option can't be turned off, or rather, I can turn it off, but it will be on again the next time I open Settings. Only after I blocked it with my firewall, then it's off & stays off.

Have you gone through your Canva account in browser and disabled all the fluff there as well?

For me that setting was turned off (although I think it asked about it when I launched the software the first time)

[swijaya]

16 hours ago, Kirean said:

Have you gone through your Canva account in browser and disabled all the fluff there as well?

For me that setting was turned off (although I think it asked about it when I launched the software the first time)

I believed I've done that, but guess what I found was on:

I must have missed that. Or could it be that it wasn't there before?

Anyway, thanks. Now the aforementioned Affinity setting stays off even after I opened its firewall block.

I don't think I've ever encountered such convoluted settings (between an online account & an installed software). This is worrying.