Not long before I switched to Linux, I switched away from the Adobe Creative Cloud to alternative apps. Things like DaVinci Resolve Studio (instead of Premiere) and Affinity Photo (instead of Photoshop).
After taking the step to Linux though, I had to leave Affinity Photo behind as it was unsupported under Linux. I tried running it in VM’s for a while, but it was painfully slow.
I was sent an Affinity Photo file today from someone that I needed to edit, so I figured I’d have a crack at getting it running again, this time using Wine instead of a VM. That’s when I came across this:
Following that, I now have Affinity Photo 1.10.6.1665 running under EndeavourOS. Presumably it also works with v2.x, but I’d need to upgrade my license to access that. One step at a time.
Edit: I hope I haven’t jumped the gun on this. I just want to note that I am experiencing some interface issues, where when trying to use a foreground application, interaction is still captured by Affinity Photo. This is under Plasma/Wayland, and my workstation has ongoing oddities with Wayland, so hopefully it’s isolated to that.
That’s a neat workaround. Wine has come a long way, and it’s impressive that Affinity Photo can run smoothly under EndeavourOS. It could make Linux adoption easier for those tied to specific design tools.
No, sadly not. They offer versions of their software for Windows, MacOS or iPadOS which are sold separately. With the latter priced at a much lower price due to the nature of being an iPad App. You could purchase an universal license that includes their whole suite of applications which isn’t restricted to Windows or Mac.
In general, as their pricing in comparison to Adobes subscription model is priced pretty reasonable.
I’m actually not that bothered by the fact. If I recall it right, I purchased the licenses for Affinity Designer as well as Affinity Photo, both for MacOS at a discount, late in the product life cycle of version 1.9.3 and didn’t really had the time to use them much due to shifted priorities. I don’t even know if those licenses are valid for their current versions.
I use RawTherapee to develop my raw file instead of Affinity since I moved to EOS. For my basic need everything is there. Did I do a side by side comparison with Adobe or Affinity ? no but it’s a hobby so for me not really important. Most if not all raw adjustments I use are present and I was rarely using anything else from Affinity. I would use it if they were to develop a linux version but they don’t at the moment. Maybe if more people move to linux to avoid the windows TPM and requirements issues and more people request it but I wouldn’t hold my breath on that.
That said installing Affinity is not as simple as installing a Windows program in Wine or in Bottle and run it. There are some steps required and not as straight forward. I’ve run many windows apps under wine directly without any issues.
I’m a big fan of RawTherapee and I too use it exclusively for raw processing. It’s really full featured, and rivals even Photoshop Raw, with the exception of Photoshop Raw’s HDR and panorama processing.
