mwsilvers Loc: Central New Jersey

The image editing features in Faststone Image Viewer are very basic and are intended for those with minimal editing needs and who have no desire to spend the large amount of time and effort needed to learn a full featured program like Affinity. For those of us who understand how to get the best from the many excellent post processing software programs available today, Faststone is not a serious alternative. I use it only as a quick image viewer and for comparisons and culling images before I start serious image editing in other software. For those things it excels. if your editing needs are absolutely minimal, it might be a good choice for you. However, comparing Faststone to Affinity would be like comparing an inexpensive point and shoot camera to a professional level mirrorless or DSLR camera body. They are not in the same league.

gmw12 Loc: Indianapolis & Windsor/UK & Montreux/Switzerl

Faststone is basically a photo viewer with some editing functions in RGB. Affinity is a full blown photo processor recommended for those who do not want the steep learning curve and the mandatory subscription of Photoshop.
If you can get it as bargain, buy it!

rond-photography Loc: Connecticut

First, yes - you can process raw files in FastStone. Raw is what got me using it in the first place. I needed something that would let me open a raw file before I invested in a more advanced editor and FastStone did it. Furthermore, I have purchased multiple newer cameras over time and FastStone always opens the raw files from them - no messages about not recognizing the format. Just because a file contains more pixels does not mean the format of the raw file changed. That message from Adobe is just to get you to buy the latest version of whatever!

Affinity gives you the ability to do more creative things with the photo - gradient masks, layers, selections, etc. In short you can do most of what you can do in Photoshop. However, with that comes all of the complexity of learning what all those terms mean and how to use them! If you are getting the results you want from FS, you don't absolutely have to buy something "better". Do though send some money via PayPal to the creator of FS. It is an absolutely great piece of software!

I have Affinity and use it when I need something beyond Lightroom. I also have PS, but would love to know that some day I can cancel my subscription if money gets tight, so I use Affinity 99% of the time. That said, I now and then use FastStone to adjust a file, and I always have FS open because that is how I view the jpegs I export from Lightroom. It is so nice to just alt-tab over to FS and see how the jpegs look, set up a slide show, browse through libraries of photos, etc. I know there are capabilities in LR to do that, but it requires no brain power to just alt-tab and scroll!

Wilderness Images Loc: Apache Junction, AZ.

In one word; LAYERS!!!! and the incredible editing power that goes along with this tool. I use Faststone regularly as a viewing tool but I use Affinity for any work that requires any editing work that goes beyond its capabilities. BTW, you can't beat the introductory price of Affinity right now.

Jack Olson

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

Hardly. All you can do is convert a raw file to an RGB image in Faststone. It will do that incorrectly and make a mess. The word "process" suggests much more than a blind conversion done wrong. You have no ability during Faststone's defective raw conversion to moderate and/or make adjustments to the image which the term "process" suggests. It's very misleading to suggest that Faststone can process raw files.

47greyfox Loc: on the edge of the Colorado front range

Same here. Except for more sophisticated, I use PSE 19 or ON1 or LR 5.7. As for the poster, who stated that Faststone's raw converter "does it wrong." I do minor editing with the raw file and save my changes as a jpeg. So.... not meaning to be rude, but I disagree.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

How do you edit a raw file in Faststone? Edit means make a change. Change color or change how light/dark the photo is or change it's contrast, etc. FastStone has no option to do that when converting a raw file. Where is that option? As for "wrong." An RGB conversion from a raw file that has no ICC color space profile is wrong. That's not open for debate.

frankraney Loc: Clovis, Ca.

My observations also, Bill.

47greyfox Loc: on the edge of the Colorado front range

I didn't mean to confuse those who are confused as to what I meant. They are non-destruct changes, then saved as a jpeg, similar to LR, for example.

mwsilvers Loc: Central New Jersey

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

All the arguing over free or cheap software for probably expensive cameras. I am so glad I took Photoshop Classes and still able to use my pre-subscription version of Ps CS6 Extended. I mainly use the ACR app for a lot of my editing before even opening the full Ps program.

Ysarex Loc: St. Louis

That's another issue altogether. Some folks seem to be saying that Faststone can edit a raw file. It can not. It will show you a preview of the raw file, but it can not edit that raw data non-destructively or any other way.

From the Tools menu you can select the option to convert and in that case Faststone will do bad, wrong and ugly things to a raw file but it will not permit editing in that process.

I think people are confusing the fact that Faststone will edit the embedded JPEG in a raw file with editing the raw file. Cameras that save raw files embed a preview JPEG of the image in the raw file. THAT IS NOT THE RAW DATA. That preview JPEG can be extracted from the raw file and if you select a raw file in Faststone and then access it's editing tools it will edit that preview JPEG. YIKES! In order to save space most cameras save the preview JPEG as lower quality than the final output JPEG. Faststone can not edit raw files in any way.

Bayou

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

I use IrfanView a lot. It's a freeware viewer with some basic editing capabilities. It predates, but is similar to Faststone. I consider both of them to be a viewer rather than an editor although some simple editing functions can be done with either of them (note that both are Windows only).

When it comes to raw files you have the most data available for editing. You should be using an editor that can use all those data. I don't believe either Faststone or Irfanview fits that requirement. There are free open source programs that can do it for you if you are cheap frugal.

If you want a free file conversion program, try ImageMagick. It can do raw files but there is a learning curve to use it wisely.

Jim Plogger Loc: East Tennessee

Faststone does, indeed, convert RAW files.