This is what Affinity Photo claims to do. It’s been argued that Photoshop’s incarnations are all based off the initial, now over twenty year-old architecture, and that computing processes and powers are so different today, that what’s needed is a complete architecture overhaul. There’s been a lot of talk surrounding this one ability, probably because Adobe products, Lightroom especially, are known to be utter resource hogs, so any speed improvement is welcomed with open arms. One of the touted benefits to Affinity Photo is speed. You can see for yourself how well it fills them right now, since the Beta version was released today, for free. With Affinity Photo, Serif seems to not only aim to match Photoshop, but to re-think it, and best it, with a focus on speed, efficiency, and price. I have little experience with Illustrator and none with Affinity Designer, but from all accounts it’s very good, and even more intuitive than its Adobe brethren. Serif made a bit of a name for themselves last year with the release of Affinity Designer, which was a more dollar friendly (read: low cost) alternative to Adobe Illustrator.

A company called Serif, is aiming to change that, and has just launched what appears to be the first real alternative to Photoshop. The problem is there hasn’t really been much in the way of options.

Not everyone wants to pay ‘premiums’ every month or year for use of the software. Traditionally, these programs haven’t been cheap, and Photoshop, in particular, has been quite pricey, which was a key factor in leading to the proliferation of Photoshop piracy, which in turn seems to have led Adobe to the Creative Cloud, which again, we highly regard. Now, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, because Adobe created the genre and have been tinkering away at it for decades, with every new version a bit more refined, and we love Photoshop and Lightroom. It always seems we end up with Adobe Photoshop, and Adobe Lightroom. Photo editing applications come and go, and really very few have any manner of staying power.

Affinity photo vs photoshop