OT: Photo editing software I would OWN?

[Wunder]

I still use Lightroom 6 which was the last version before moving to a subscription model.

[benb]

It's totally reasonable for a company to want to get you on a subscription. Everything I've worked on for the last 15 years has been subscription only. All that stuff had a vital cloud component though, not a bolted on unnecessary one that was rammed down your throat.

But on a consumer level it is completely reasonable for you to not want to pay monthly or yearly software subscription fees for your hobby. All the benefits of subscription are 100% on the side of the software company.

Adobe is a giant bloated mess at this point, they are just trying to extract as much money as they can, and they have completely convinced "creatives" that the Adobe Tax is mandatory. It really isn't, it's just you've got an army of people trying to do their job and all the software is grossly overcomplicated so it's hard for them to switch.

If it's just your hobby, definitely try and avoid it. There are things like a new lens or a flash/light you can buy with that money after a year or two that will provide more benefit and you will actually own your new piece of gear.

This is especially relevant if the entire time you are renting the adobe software you're cursing at it cause it's performance is so bad and the customer service is non-existent and they're expecting you to get tech support from the other users on a forum.

[.RJ]

Originally Posted by benb

I stopped in 2020. The program had become so bloated and slow and the Adobe tech support forums were full of people complaining they just spent $6k on a brand new super high end computer and LR was still super slow. Adobe was pretty much telling them they were cheap and needed a better computer than they just bought, which was outrageous.

I think this must be an extreme case. I bought a new M1 Macbook Pro for ~1/3 that cost in 2021 and it blows through edits using Topaz in 30 seconds. Yes, the new tools are powerful and they need some laptop horsepower to run them, but you could also get similar results with a new Macbook Air for ~1/4 that cost.

Originally Posted by makoti

Not having any subscription service programs (I have very few of any kind. I hate the monthly paper cuts), I thought that if I stop paying, it all goes away. Not the case? I'm sure you lose access to everything in the cloud. If you back it up locally, you still have full useability, just no updates?

This was new to me, but, A quick google search shows that you lose access to the developer module if you stop paying, although you still have access to view/export/print all your work. So that kind of stinks, but, at the same time if you're going to continue to edit your work its the cost of doing business.

And if you think you "own" your house, let us know what happens if you stop paying the property tax bill.....even if you're not on a "subscription plan" with your bank.

[mhespenheide]

Originally Posted by .RJ

You still "have it on your computer", you dont need an internet connection (other than cloud backups) and you can stop the subscription anytime, its not like the software is bricked if you stop paying for it, you just stop getting software updates. Good grief.

I am not sure where the aversion for the subscription model comes from - going on cost, its really not much different if you planned to upgrade with each new version and you get the new features much faster instead of waiting 12-18 months for the next release. And if you use any of the other apps its much cheaper than previously buying them individually.

Again, if you're serious, its the best tool available and the wealth of knowledge available on youtube makes it very easy to get the most out of it. Intersecting masks is really an amazing time saver.

I don't think that's accurate. If you stop paying for the subscription, you won't be able to open the application once it tries to verify you. It checks about once a month, I think. You also lose access to the files you've stored on the cloud. Lightroom is also problematic that most of the work stays "inside" of the program, so if you're planning on transitioning out of Lightroom, you'd need to export the files you want to access later.

That said, while a subscription model annoys me (particularly given the issues others have raised with Adobe), I still spend far less on hardware and software than I used to spend on film. Far less.

[mhespenheide]

Originally Posted by .RJ

This was new to me, but, A quick google search shows that you lose access to the developer module if you stop paying, although you still have access to view/export/print all your work.

Okay, that's kind of nice. I didn't know that.

[.RJ]

Originally Posted by mhespenheide

I still spend far less on hardware and software than I used to spend on film. Far less.

Or you could be dumb like me and spend money on both.

[HenryA]

An older computer with an "owned" version around version 6 is the work around. You miss some of the modern features but they are not core to use of the program.

Adobe went subscription to smooth their revenue. When your model (driven by technology advances) was a major release every couple of years, in between the releases, revenue went soft. The subscription model fixed that so they have a nice predictable revenue stream that meshes well with stock price and development costs.

Around version 6 is where the gross development of features got to around 9/10ths of usefulness. Then development turned to how best to maximize profit and away from techonology innovation. There really wasn't much new to pack under the hood so they took advantage of their monopoly position and here we are.

[.RJ]

Originally Posted by HenryA

Then development turned to how best to maximize profit and away from techonology innovation. There really wasn't much new to pack under the hood so they took advantage of their monopoly position and here we are.

At the risk of starting to sound like an Adobe shill, I would encourage you to give the new versions a try - the new features really unlock a lot of new possibilities.

[benb]

Originally Posted by mhespenheide

I don't think that's accurate. If you stop paying for the subscription, you won't be able to open the application once it tries to verify you. It checks about once a month, I think. You also lose access to the files you've stored on the cloud. Lightroom is also problematic that most of the work stays "inside" of the program, so if you're planning on transitioning out of Lightroom, you'd need to export the files you want to access later.

That said, while a subscription model annoys me (particularly given the issues others have raised with Adobe), I still spend far less on hardware and software than I used to spend on film. Far less.

Lightroom lets you go into the application and search through your photos and do a bunch of other stuff without paying if you cancel your subscription.

It has certain things locked out but it leaves enough working for you to migrate your photos out of LR. My setup has been in this state for years now as I've never had time to fully migrate out of LR. If I have to go back and find something that I know is in LR I can do that, then I have to export it elsewhere to finish up.

You can't do stuff like edits, printing, using certain plugins, etc.. but you can find stuff, do some organizing, and move stuff out.

[Mr. Pink]

Another big reason that Adobe went subscription was to stop the "sharing", er, stealing of their software. It was no whoop for many users to use just one set of discs or even just drag it off of one computer to an external drive and plug into another, as long as you had the serial number. Combine that with the super low student price at the time, and it was almost Napster. I was convinced they allowed that on purpose, established market dominance, bought Macromedia, and, ouila, monopoly subscriptions.

[Mr. Pink]

I don't get the "bloated" criticism. How so?

[benb]

Originally Posted by .RJ

I think this must be an extreme case. I bought a new M1 Macbook Pro for ~1/3 that cost in 2021 and it blows through edits using Topaz in 30 seconds. Yes, the new tools are powerful and they need some laptop horsepower to run them, but you could also get similar results with a new Macbook Air for ~1/4 that cost.

This is not what I was referring to. Most of the problems occur as the library grows beyond the size of what can be stored on a laptops internal HDD. LR is supposed to solve the same kind of problems someone has who also has a closet full of slides they need to do something with.

Adobe sold the software as being able to handle huge libraries early on. At that point nobody really had a huge library. As time went on the software did not actually keep pace and improve/get faster as libraries grew.

You either needed to stop what you were doing and spend more time on managing and separating into multiple libraries or do other things that would cost time and money.

It's not about applying an edit to one photo after you found it. It's about finding the photo in a haystack, or applying edits to lots of photos, or classifying large groups of photos, searching for them, etc..

That is what LR is for, if you weren't doing that you didn't need to buy it.

I could build a giant desktop at this point that could fit my whole library on it and move from there, but even building it myself to save money I'm spending thousands to get there and that would just be to build a machine that I could unwind the mess on in a timely fashion.

I think for people that had to do this for their day job they long ago switched to tiny little disposable libraries on a per-job basis. Capture One for example is completely setup to work this way if you want to. You get really good performance for that, what you give up is the ability to search and go through tens/hundreds of thousands of photos for other use cases, which is what some of this software was originally sold as a solution for.

I switched to C1 for a while, then when Apple Silicon hit C1 wasn't ready for that, so I even stopped using that, and I just muddle through with the Apple Photos app, which is mostly fine for adjustments, it just doesn't really solve the library issues that LR mostly doesn't solve. I am sure C1 got good on Apple Silicon a long time ago now but my photo stuff has just been in hibernation.

[jamesdak]

Originally Posted by .RJ

And if you think you "own" your house, let us know what happens if you stop paying the property tax bill.....even if you're not on a "subscription plan" with your bank.

And if you quit eating you die...

Such a stretch....

[benb]

A lot of the jobs where you use the Adobe Software day to day to make a business run are difficult to make a living at. They are all basically creative semi-technical yet artistic fields where big business has done a really good job making lots of money while pushing all the people who build the content as far down as they can.

That is a background thing that simmers below all this. If you get really really into some area of it as a hobbyist or start contemplating selling your work, etc.. you start running into all this.

Adobe makes lots of money, lots of photographers do not. The grumbling is all about that balance of whether Adobe is helping them run the business or not, and what's a good use of time.

You're going to hate it if you work as a contractor in some media business and they expect you to bring your own computer to work and have your own license for the software.

You're going to hate it if you are an independent photographer that bills for sessions/work and you're up all night in the software and you feel like you could be doing something else with that time that was more productive.

If you have a great paying day job that makes 4-5x what a lot of the people in these fields make and you're just dabbling in small # of photos it just all seems fun and you don't really worry about the costs or get annoyed at the software.

[HenryA]

Originally Posted by benb

A lot of the jobs where you use the Adobe Software day to day to make a business run are difficult to make a living at. They are all basically creative semi-technical yet artistic fields where big business has done a really good job making lots of money while pushing all the people who build the content as far down as they can.

That is a background thing that simmers below all this. If you get really really into some area of it as a hobbyist or start contemplating selling your work, etc.. you start running into all this.

Adobe makes lots of money, lots of photographers do not. The grumbling is all about that balance of whether Adobe is helping them run the business or not, and what's a good use of time.

You're going to hate it if you work as a contractor in some media business and they expect you to bring your own computer to work and have your own license for the software.

You're going to hate it if you are an independent photographer that bills for sessions/work and you're up all night in the software and you feel like you could be doing something else with that time that was more productive.

If you have a great paying day job that makes 4-5x what a lot of the people in these fields make and you're just dabbling in small # of photos it just all seems fun and you don't really worry about the costs or get annoyed at the software.

THIS ^^^^^^^^^^^

And its not something that you can fault Adobe for. It is their job to make money. It does leave a bad taste in your mouth. This coming from someone who owned 2 paid seats beginning with version 1 through the Creative Suite beginnings. It was a miracle when it came out, but as the industry progressed it turned into a poorman's way of making a living. As in the old saying "Photography - a rich man's hobby and a poor man's way of making a living."