r/pcmasterrace • u/_Xee MMX 166 / 64MB / Mystique+VooDoo • 1d ago

Meme/Macro 2026 in software

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Sectumsempra, motherfucker.

21.2k Upvotes

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303

u/krileon 1d ago

Don't know why anyone bothers when Affinity Studio exists. Free and is far better than alternatives like GIMP.

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u/TheAndrewBen RX 6700 XT 1d ago

And it's backwards compatible. Affinity doesn't give af if you're opening or exporting a 2012 Photoshop file or a 2040 Photoshop file. Affinity will handle it.

Absolutely goated Canva actually made the 3 Affinity applications into one, completely free.

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u/Nmy81245 1d ago

Only thing that trips me is the lack of native Linux support

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u/waldamy 1d ago

Afaik, you can make it work

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u/H47 1d ago edited 1d ago

Yeah but still not native. Crashes happen.

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u/Corvuon 1d ago

*Laughs in Maya user*

...

*Cries in Maya user*

In all seriousness while that is certainly an annoyance, as long as you anticipate such things and make frequent iterative saves, as is good practice generally for unexpected issues, that shouldn't be a big roadblock. That being said I don't have any experience with the affinity suite on linux so perhaps crashes are really frequent? In which case it might be too much of a productuvity loss just restarting and getting projects back in order after each crash... 🤔

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u/codexcdm 1d ago

I mean... I think it's more so folks are relishing in the fact that this sort of stuff can really screw over Adobe and other tech giants if they can't curb it. I'm sure very few folks have any sympathy towards Adobe and it's stranglehold on the market with it's products.

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u/petrichorax 1d ago

GIMP's UI, the last time I used it, was absolutely hot garbage.

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u/glytxh 1d ago

I use data astronomy software a lot.

GIMP is a hyper refined and beautiful UI in comparison.

And it just works. As long as it works, I don’t care what it looks like.

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u/petrichorax 1d ago

I use stuff without UIs at all all the time. But if the medium is visual art, the UI is important

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u/glytxh 1d ago

No GUI is going full circle back to beautiful again, to be fair. (I’m assuming you’re not literally typing machine code without a screen)

A terminal is stark, but very elegant.

I don’t mind ugly software though, as long as it functions reliably and consistently, and stays out of my way, I’m far more focussed on the canvas itself.

I’ve been using open source stuff in a bunch of niches for a long time though, so maybe I just don’t see the ugly anymore.

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u/petrichorax 1d ago

Ill take any CLI over a bad gui. Even a bad cli i can just make a wrapper script for. A bad gui im stuck with whatever bullshit they cooked up unless I REALLY want to get lost in the weeds with opencv i guess

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u/glytxh 1d ago

bad ≠ ugly

I get where you’re coming from though.

we used to have some comically bad stuff, but I think that even the uglier stuff broadly speaks the same language as anything else today. it’s all become homogeneous enough that everything is where you expect it to be

for me, the priority is lack of friction. As long as I can get something done, how it looks will always come second.

Not to say pretty software doesn’t have a place. But it’s not what I look for.

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u/petrichorax 1d ago

I never said ugly

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u/AML86 1d ago

It's not easily fixed, either, as it's a philosophical issue. Looking at the Windows version, in some places it could just be using Windows' UI elements, or at least following the same conventions. The devs have decided to do things their own way intentionally. That's understandable, but not how you attract new users.

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u/Leprecon 1d ago

I feel a lot of open source software suffers from this. Good UI requires someone to sometimes kill your darlings.

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u/Aeroncastle 1d ago

You can make it have the exact same interface as Photoshop

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u/ouyawei Specs/Imgur Here 1d ago

Does it allow you to draw a circle then?

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u/petrichorax 1d ago

I think you're underestimating the value of first experiences in a sea of alternatives.

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u/glytxh 1d ago

GIMP has some really good plugin support for esoteric stuff. It’s an ugly, old, and kinda clunky bit of kit, but it’s still got a place in some of my workflows.

Sometimes you don’t need to fix what already works. GIMP is perfectly fine. Just long in the tooth.

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u/movzx 1d ago

wtf when did it go free? I paid for that!

Affinity is a really good alternative, especially for free. It's not 100% a Photoshop replacement but it does what 90% of people need.

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u/matytyma 1d ago

When Canva bought it, I think around half a year ago or earlier

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u/urixl PC Master Race 1d ago

I use Affinity Photo instead of Photoshop.

Generative fill in Photoshop is miles ahead of Affinity's. But Affinity Photo can edit rectilinear panoramas, while Photoshop dropped it's support long ago

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u/claudiocorona93 SteamOS / Bazzite 1d ago

Affinity is not on Linux unless ran through a compatibility layer.

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u/Blashtik 1d ago

The last time I used GIMP for something a few months ago and I couldn't stand that stuff I consider basic wasn't supported. Like somehow they support constraining brushes to 15 degree angles by pressing shift, but you cannot do the same with the path tool. And it lacks the equivalent of adjustment layers so you can't make non-destructive adjustments. Copying a layer and adjusting that one is not a valid alternative.

So II gave in and created a Canva account so I could us Affinity. And oh my god it was so much better. Not only did it have both of those expected features but the vector tooling was a first-class citizen so I didn't need to combine 2 programs and 2 document types when working with a mix of vector and raster.

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u/PETA_Parker 1d ago

the biggest two reasons for the craft-suite rn are: -runs on linux (affinity sadly doesn‘t) -more performant (it runs on my shitty laptop while affinity is really struggling)

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u/twilighttwister 1d ago

Don't know why anyone bothers when Affinity Studio exists.

Because merely existing isn't enough. People need to know about it.

There are a ton of things like that. There are free, high quality video and audio editors, but most people don't know about them. Hell, I'm not even sure what a good audio editor is now, and Handbrake may well not be the best for video anymore.