Topaz Studio

6 Comments on Adobe Alternatives-Photo Software for 2019/2020

  1. Pingback: Topaz DeNoise AI - Updates and special offer - Andy Bell Photography

  2. Bo Vandenberg

    Thank you!

    Nobody has time or money to use all the software out there. So many of us make no appreciable income from our photography. You do a real service with your focus.

  3. Tom

    PhotoNinja is excellent, as is everything from Topaz but Luminar is so unstable and buggy as to be unusable, at least on Windows 10 … and Skylar is not quick to honour their offer of “full refund if not satisfied”.

    • AndyBell

      Hi Tom

      I’m finding Luminar works fine on both my Windows 10. Then again, i only use it as a standalone program for single edits.

      Its browser is pretty but lacks a huge amount of functionality.

      I hope Photo Ninja V2 happens – it’s been a long wait…

  4. Chris

    Hi Andy,

    As someone just starting out into the world of post-processing their photos I’m loathe to commit to the Adobe subscription model in case I struggle to get into it; or worse, become hooked on using them! What would you recommend as a good setup for a relative beginner who is keen to learn techniques and understand how the manipulations work (something I’m concerned about with all Luminar’s reliance on AI).

    As I understand it, there’s 3 (main) components; a pixel based editor (photoshop), global editor/batch processor (lightroom) and a DAM (also lightroom). I had been looking at Affinity Photo as a “like-for-like” photoshop replacement before but have been struggling to decide on something that might be the lightroom component (I don’t have a big library for DAM but best to get into good habits early).

    Would Exposure X5 fit the bill or one of the other Raw Converters with a separate DAM – e.g. Adobe Bridge as it’s free – be a better set up for batch processing, global edits and DAM? I get that there will be some redundancy in features but recognize they perform different roles. Do some play nicer with each other than others?

    Cheers,

    Chris

    • AndyBell

      Exposure X5 (soon to be X6) is a very good alternative to Lightroom. It’s as good a RAW processor as Lightroom and can do a whole lot more for your photos.They’ve just told me that those who get X5 now will get X6 for free when it is released.

      It all depends, of course, on your budget. I don’t believe there is one product that fits every need.

      Currently I use:

      X5 for DAM
      Luminar for RAW processing
      Topaz Labs tools for post processing.
      Affinity Photo for any other editing needs.

      No tool is perfect for DAM, but X5 is very good. The problem is that open systems, such as Windows and Mac, let you access your photos outside of the DAM program, meaning you can delete/add/edit photos without the toolkit knowing. They all have their way of ‘dealing’ with this – mostly by ignoring it, or silently updating their database behind the scenes. None of the tools are truly Digital Assest Management. They are useful and can catalog your photos, but don’t really manage them…

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