Affinity 2 Suite Launch + 40% Discount

The much-awaited Affinity 2 Suite of apps for macOS, Windows, and iPad is now available for purchase to all. This includes Affinity Designer, Affinity Photo, and Affinity Publisher. For a few years now, Serif’s Affinity suite has provided designers, photographers, image editors, and publishers an alternative to the Adobe Creative Suite ecosystem.

Serif’s Affinity suite has been among a select few apps that have endeavored to reimagine image editing and publishing workflows beyond Adobe’s vision. Version 2 of the Affinity Suite has understandably been eagerly awaited, and brings in a raft of changes to the UI, performance boosts, and overall workflow improvements.

You can Try and Buy Affinity V2 Suite on their website. Click here.

Affinity Suite – Special Launch Discount Dates

Serif is offering a 40% discount on all Affinity Apps until January 25, 2023. This is because they are doing away with upgrade pricing which they used to have in the past. Instead, all buyers, old and new, will be able to buy a copy of Affinity V2 Apps, either individually for macOS, Windows, and iPad, or for all the apps and OSes together, with the new Universal License (which I recommend, as it’s a really good deal). Get it before you miss this offer. It’s unlikely to be back. You can try it out for 30 days before you buy.

New Features – Affinity Photo 2

The whole Affinity Suite has a rather formidable list of New Features, Updates, and Improvements. However, we’re going to focus on Affinity Photo 2 since most readers of this site come from a photography background, or are interested in photography and image editing. Let’s look at some of the highlights of Affinity Photo 2

Non-Destructive RAW Develop

This feature allows you to apply settings to your RAW file and then develop it into a pixel-based .afphoto file, yet still retain the ability to make changes to the RAW image layer. The RAW image can either be embedded in the affinity photo file, or it can be linked to the actual RAW file externally. This allows for images that are placed into a document in Publisher 2 to be fully editable with all the RAW development settings. RAW processing is GPU accelerated.

Live Masks

Affinity Photo 2 brings a number of dynamically updating mask features, which allow you to fine-tune selections, while always allowing you to change your mind, or to adapt to necessary changes on the fly, and entirely non-destructively. The live masks could be based on:

• Hue Range: Dynamically updating masks based on a chosen hue.
• Band-Pass: Powerful tool for retouchers to select sections of an image based on frequency layers.
• Luminosity: Isolate luminosity ranges so that you can retain (or change) how it looks.
• Compound Masks: Create compound masks with multiple masks using booleans like Add, Subtract, Intersect, and XOR. This allows for non-destructive mask workflows.

Live Mesh Warp

Another Live feature, that allows you to warp pixels while remaining entirely non-destructive. Images can be warped in Publisher 2’s photo persona to fine-tune any distortion.

Improvements to the Brush Engine

The already powerful Brush engine has been enhanced, allowing you to drag/drop nozzles to reorder them, you can use any swatch for intensity brushes, including gradient and bitmap fills. In addition, a new distance controller, brush tip interpolation, and overall improved performance and accuracy have been added.

The Hardware Specifications needed to run Affinity Photo 2 are rather low compared to Photoshop and some other apps, so that’s a positive aspect for beginners, and students of photography and graphic design.

Affinity V2 Pricing

Affinity v2 apps remain a one-time purchase, and are available, as before, subscription-free & reasonably priced. Serif is currently offering a 40% discount on the Affinity 2 suite, so it makes sense to grab it now if you were planning on getting the apps anyway.

Affinity 2 Universal License: Users who would like all three apps are offered a nice discount in the form of the new Universal License option, where for a reasonable price ($169.99) they can purchase all three apps, for macOS, Windows, and iPad. For users who use all three apps, this is an incredibly generous offer. The additional 40% discount offered right now makes it a no-brainer to make this purchase at $99.

Affinity Desktop Apps (macOS and Windows)

• Affinity Photo 2 – $69.99 (currently discounted to $40.99)
• Affinity Designer 2 – $69.99 (currently discounted to $40.99)
• Affinity Publisher 2 – $69.99 (currently discounted to $40.99)
• Affinity 2 Universal License (includes all Desktop and iPad Apps) – $169.99

Affinity iPad Apps

• Affinity Photo 2 for iPad – $19.99
• Affinity Designer 2 for iPad – $19.99
• Affinity Publisher 2 for iPad – $19.99
• Affinity 2 Universal License (includes all iPad and Desktop Apps) – $169.99

Serif allows for different licensing options for Individuals, Businesses, and Educational Institutions. They’re also generous with the number of computers on which you can use Affinity suite apps.

Know More About Affinity Apps

We’ve written about Affinity Photo before, so you can read what we think (both the good and the bad) about Affinity Photo at this link.

The Affinity team is also putting out new educational video content on their YouTube channel, so be sure to check it out for deep dives and tutorials about how to use Affinity Photo, Designer, and Publisher.

If you’re an Affinity user, leave us a should in the comments below. Will you be upgrading? Why? Let us all know, please.

Image Credits: Serif (Europe) Ltd.