Leaderboard

Except for PhotoLine, of course. Affinity Photo still misses some core features that are part of Photoshop and are also available in PhotoLine. I have both, but use PhotoLine for general image editing much more than Affinity Photo. Arguably PhotoLine's layer stack is much more flexible to work with than either Photoshop or Affinity Photo. Unlimited layer masks, adjustment layers can be applied to any layer, including layer masks and layer mask groups, each bitmap layer can have its own image mode, resolution, and bit depth set (which are retained even after switching the entire image to another image mode back and forth), smart objects (called "placeholder layers"), real-time referenced layer instances, colour profiles per layer, non-destructive throughout, and even external Photoshop compatible plugins can be applied non-destructively on placeholder layers. Not to mention an opacity slider with a range from -200(!) up to +200! Multi-layered EXR files are also supported. And vector drawing is built-in as well. One of the strengths of PhotoLine is its interoperability with other applications: it is possible to define links to external (image-compatible) applications, and send a bitmap layer or vector layer/group to an external application, work on it, and after saving PhotoLine automatically updates the layers. Super handy. Painting tools in Affinity Photo are better, but there is a bug in Photo that makes it impossible to draw precise strokes without wobbles (Windows). It is nice to be able to edit 360degree panoramas, though, in Photo. But neither come close to Krita for digital painting. Get PhotoLine, Affinity Photo, Krita, and Affinity Designer/Gravit Designer/Inkscape for vector graphics, and you have more than you'd ever need for general image editing and illustration at a fraction of the cost of becoming a serf in Adobe's digital serfdom. For 2d animation get the latest build of OpenToonz (blows Animate CC out of the water), and for video editing/effects Resolve and Fusion (and Natron). If you are an illustrator/comic artist you would do yourself a disservice if you'd not help yourself to a copy of ClipStudio EX. Brilliant drawing 'feel' - and the traditional frame-based animation features are pretty good, and ClipStudio exports directly to OpenToonz for production-proven 2d animation project management. The only missing link at this point is a good affordable alternative for InDesign. That's the one remaining Adobe application I still use for my own work. QuarkXPress is too expensive. Hopefully Afffinity Publisher will be an acceptable option. Trouble is, InDesign is really good at what it does, so I am not expecting Publisher to be able to compete. But we can hope. :-) Otherwise, all of Adobe's products are replaceable with inexpensive and capable alternatives.