aphelps wrote:
In using Affinity to process Olympus raw files(.orf) I see a relatively sparse number of edits available. After "developing" there appear lots of editing options. My question is: what image format am I working on at this point? I know I can export to jpg or tiff. Why are the full range of edits not available in the raw stage?
When you first open a raw file in Affinity it is handled in the Develop Persona. Your raw file has to be converted into an RGB image before it can be further processed in Affinity's Photo Persona. After you click Develop the raw data is converted into RGB image data and transferred. In the Photo Persona you're working with a 16 bit RGB image as the normal Affinity default. You do have the option when you develop the raw data to specify a different bit depth for the conversion.
Affinity's Develop Persona is fairly modest by contemporary standards. Serif's model for Affinity places emphasis on the raster editing component (Photo) rather than the raw conversion component (Develop) and the options available in the software reflect that.