GRAPHICXTRAS.COM TUTORIALS

Affinity Photo  Illustrator  Photoshop  Painter  E-mail

graphicxtras.com > tutorials > Affinity Photo Tutorials

Pixelate filter for Affinity Photo tutorial Beginner's Guide

By Andrew Buckle, Video Tutorial Creator / Designer

Updated : 2021

pixelate filter affinity photo tutorial

  1. Filter menu in Affinity Photo

  2. Distort

  3. Pixelate filter

  4. Set quantilisation

  5. Click apply

The pixelate filter for Affinity Photo can be found in the distort sub menu of the filters menu list. It is a fairly basic filter for square designed designs but as with all filters, you can manipulate the results in countless ways by using other filters or repeating the pixelate filter over and over.

Duplicate layer with pixelate filter in Affinity Photo and blend

duplicate layer and blend modes

Sadly there is no blending mode option for the pixelate filter but a quick workaround to that is to duplicate the existing layer.

  1. layer menu

  2. duplicate

  3. filters menu

  4. distort

  5. pixelate

  6. set value

  7. click apply

  8. go to the layers panel

  9. change blending mode for the duplicate to darken etc

All kinds of interesting combinations can be generated by using multiple layers with multiple blending modes and different settings of quantisation.

Effects combined with pixelate filter

effects blur and adjustments combined with pixelate filter

You don't have to use the pixelate filter in Affinity Photo just once or only that filter, you can combine the filter with others such as blur. You can also re-color the result using live adjustment layers such as curves

  1. filters menu and blurs

  2. gaussian blur

  3. set to 45 etc

  4. apply

  5. filters menu

  6. distort

  7. pixelate

  8. set value

  9. click apply

  10. layers menu

  11. new adjustment layer

  12. curves adjustment

  13. set value

  14. close panel

 

The result can be a lot softer pixelate. You can, of course, then apply a blur to the pixelate depending on the result required. Or perhaps use adjustments

Channels and pixelate filter in Affinity Photo

You can create all kinds of interesting color effects by using the channels panel

  1. view menu and studio

  2. channels

  3. select composite red

  4. apply pixelate filter and different setting

  5. select composite green

  6. apply pixelate filter and yet another setting

  7. etc

  8. click round arrow in channels to return to RGB

Selections and pixelate filter in Affinity Photo

selection of affinity photo pixelate filter

You can also just create a selection and feather that selection and use that with the pixelate filter. So if you have a face in an image and only want to obscure the face then simply select the selection tools and select that area and apply the pixelate filter

  1. select the elliptical marquee tool in the toolbox / toolbar

  2. create a selection over the face etc

  3. select menu

  4. feather

  5. set radius and apply

  6. filters

  7. distort

  8. pixelate filter

  9. apply setting