Affinity Designer

Kommentare: My overall experience with the whole Affinity brand is supremely positive. Every aspect of their service: from the products they provide to the support, tutorials and workbooks they offer is of a supremely high standard. I'm incredibly excited to see how this brand evolves and will definitely be purchasing any product they add to their catalogue in the future.

Vorteile: Designer is an incredibly deep application that can satisfy just about everyone's demands for digital illustration. It has a phenomenal feature set and works on multiple devices, thus enabling the user to maximize their output and enhance their workflow. The accompanying Workbook is a brilliant way to familiarize the user to the capabilities of the software, and as the only viable alternative to Adobe Illustrator, anyone making the transition will feel right at home - you can even open up your Illustrator projects in Designer! Another great function is the seamless integration with Affinity's other applications - Publisher and Photo. I have only scratched the surface of this application but am astonished at what can be achieved. I can't recommend it highly enough and think that there is nothing on the market than can compete at this price range. Five stars! 🏆

Nachteile: Since making the transition from Illustrator, I've honestly not looked back once. There is nothing in my workflow that Designer isn't capable of performing. As such, I have no cons and can't think of any reason not explore Designer and its capabilities.

Kommentare: Affinity Designer feels like a friendlier vector design option as compared with some of the other usual suspects. While old-school designers and illustrators may prefer a more traditional approach, A.D. doesn't make you work quite as hard for basic shapes, text, etc. On the other hand, the departures may make it a harder transition for more experienced users. And, while this isn't a reflection on the software specifically, as a newer addition to the space, there are fewer tutorials available. I don't use it exclusively in design work, but I definitely favor it in many ways.

Vorteile: The interface is user-friendly, although there is definitely a learning curve coming from other vector design packages. I appreciate that there is a library of built-in shapes. When I'm trying to work through a design, I'd rather not have to draw a call-out or a cog or a heart. It's nice to be able to just pop them in. I also find that the basic text tool is friendlier than other packages.

Nachteile: There are some features that don't work as intended or are missing entirely, when compared against other vector design software. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to auto-trace a raster image, which would be helpful for my use.

Kommentare: As the leader of a small-to-medium-enterprise and an educator in sound for media, many times I have the need to create simple graphics. From schematics and diagrams to icons and beyond. I use them for my company's internal knowledge-base, when I blog, for my presentations in classrooms, and even to create our own software graphical assets from mockups to finished product. First of all, it's no secret that working in vector is what every software developer should do, as it allows for the generation of all the graphic assets to be made in various bitmap resolutions, so your application looks clear and crisp in any device. Lately, even the Unity game engine introduced a pipeline to use vector graphic assets to create games, so that they render in any resolution, I definitely recommend checking this out if you are a game developer.
Anyway, Affinity Designer always delivered a great experience for me and all my colleagues said that I became a graphic designer, which is not true, but it is a great compliment, and I really own that to Affinity Designer.
The exporter feature is one huge time saver, you should check out the videos they have about this one and also the rest of Affinity team's video tutorials in Vimeo.
Overall, the experience of using the application can be described as smooth, fast and easy.

Vorteile: What I liked most about this program, is the workflow and interface. The developers managed to create a simple to use application for vector graphics, that everybody can operate. I can't remember how many times I got frustrated trying to make a simple graphic in other programs, while in Affinity Designer, the workflow is mapped so well, that everybody can use it. From computer graphics professionals around the world, to amateurs like me, it is straight forward to open the application and start creating. The online help system is awesome and omni-present and the graphical interface is sleek and looks good in any monitor that I tried it, even small ones. I also consider a great bonus that the company keeps a straight policy about pricing, they don't use the subscription model which is very good for SMEs.

Nachteile: Some advanced vector tools are missing, but the software is still young and I'm sure it will develop to a great tool. After all, the developers seem to have usability, ease of use and fast workflows in mind, so they add new features very carefully, to keep Affinity Designer the great tool that it is now.

Kommentare: It gets the job done. That's probably the best thing I can say about it. It gets the job done, but I trudge through every moment of the job.

Vorteile: It's surprisingly fully-featured for the price. Once you know what you're doing, it can accomplish just about any task you'd use Illustrator (the industry standard) for.

Nachteile: The workflows are just ... Annoying. Maybe it's because I'm coming from Illustrator, where everything feels effortless, but it feels like every aspect of Affinity Designer was made unnecessarily complicated. Using the program makes me want to pull my hair out, because I know how much quicker and easier and just ... More "common sense" the process would be in Illustrator. Also, and this is a big one: Most stock vector files are completely useless in Affinity Designer. If there's any degree of complexity (meaning more than one shape), it's going to be an absolute disaster to work with in Designer.

Kommentare: Absolute pleasure! I couldn't afford the Adobe package but now I have Affinity Designer and Photo and it more than meets all my needs for website graphics and photo editing and design.

Vorteile: So much cheaper than Illustrator / Photoshop and packs all the features I need. Easy to use, easy to learn. Many tutorials from Affinity as well as other skilled users. Use it for simple projects or very in-depth. Replace expensive and subscription services with this one-time very reasonably priced vector graphics software. They also have an iPad app that is just as powerful and neither suck up resources!

Nachteile: If you are very used other software like Illustrator, it will take some time to adjust at first. You may have to find different ways to do the same task in Designer, but it is just a quick look-up away from learning.