I found out the hard way that if you accidentally delete that complicated mask on a layer that took a long time to draw, you can’t undo that and get it back. Furthermore, some actions appear to not record in the Undo-Redo log, such as deleting a mask. There’s the basic Undo and Redo menu actions, but there’s no multi-step undoing and no visual record of what’s happening to the image being edited. Apparently professionals don’t make mistakes and don’t care to one-click check before and after versions of their complex, multi-step changes. One of the more glaring omissions is having no History panel. The first place I looked was the Preferences window, however I was stopped dead in my tracks at the only two tabs on the screen: General and Rulers. There’s a sizable amount missing from an editor considered “Pro” by name. While the interface looks aesthetically pleasing, once work began on photo editing I started to notice Pixelmator Pro begin to unravel in its functionality. Pixelmator’s statement on the issue is that they “feel a dark interface works best for editing images,” continuing, “but we haven’t ruled out a light option in the future.” Functionality Nino Batista has a great article to explore more on the subject if you are interested. Dark interfaces also strain my eyes more because my pupils have to stay wide open to gather more light, just like when forced to read paragraphs of white on black text. Generally, a middle gray is what I find best for photo editing a dark interface will usually result in darker images since they appear to be lighter than what they actually are in comparison to the surrounding darkness. Combined with low contrast gray tool icons and text, your eyes are in for a workout if you spend a lot of time editing.

The non-optional near-black interface is definitely going to be a turn off for some users.

Pixelmator vs affinity