Moving from Adobe: the story so far

[Glevum Owl]

I'm done with Adobe.

Up until recently I defended them and their offerings, tolerated the bugs unfixed for years, put up with that distracting line around the full screen images in LR, worked through the constant changes to the UI necessitating me relearning where commons tools now were, spent time accommodating new, large LR catalogs rewritten every few updates, put up with changes under the hood that FUBAR'd my settings 'recipes' and ignored the unresponsive support. The recent Adobe 'ownership' announcement debacle and the ensuing mismanagement of the backlash were, for me, the final straw. So I'm well into a quest to rebuild my workflow by finding tools to replace LR/PS.

I'm a 'weekend' / family / amateur / hobby photographer so my needs are modest. I’m now entirely Mac based for photo and video management and processing. However, I'm fussy as heck and quite, er, particular about organisation: adding locations is a must have for me. Therefore, I want tools that do as I want in an efficient and effective manner without too much cost in terms of time, effort and money.

I'm perceiving less choice for Mac users than those using Windows but all is not lost for those of us who’ve bought into the Apple ecosystem.

Here's the story so far and please bear in mind these are first impressions.


ACDSee Photo Studio 10 for Mac
Excellent DAM, poor PP. I’ll use it for initial transfer / import and sorting of images & movies.

Pros
- ridiculously easy photo transfer / import from family iPhones via the simple, well thought out, free Mobile Sync app
- easy transfer of (some) LR catalog metadata
- simple but powerful renaming tools
- full, clear display of all metadata
- big ’n’ clear compare view that handles up to 4 images simultaneously with locked zooming & panning
- helpful folder display thumbnails
- once in the database, the Calendar view finds and displays images by year, month or day irrespective where the images are stored
- handles movie file organisation well
- useful, free, getting started videos
- even usefuller (sic), free tutorials available via YouTube
- generally fast operation (once everything is in the database and the folder thumbnails are generated)

Cons
- face detection & labelling = very buggy sometimes unusable. Frustratingly, when it works, it works well. This was one of the main reasons I bought ACDSee so I’m willing to persevere. In fairness this could be a newbie / operator error / Layer 8 Problem.
- so-so overall UI: some buttons too small/close together, not an intuitive layout
- pointless Media view mode
- weak PP tools: think what there was 10 years ago
- Save As (export) function is basic; no DNG export, no resizing
- locks away data in a proprietary database / catalog
- user forum (ACDSee Connect) only accessible via 'Mighty' app with non-standard UI that installs only on phones or tablets
- Mac version has none of the AI tools found in the Windows version.


ON1 Photo RAW 2024.5 (Mac)
On paper looks like a good all in one tool. In practice has a lot of quirks. Needs more thought and better PP. OK for sorting, labelling, finding. Currently I use this mainly for adding geolocation data.

Pros
- auto feature (Brilliance AI) isn’t too bad (see Cons)
- NoNoise works on all images not just RAW files
- quick and easy to add geolocation data
- clean import of LR metadata
- powerful export feature
- geolocation data written to sidecar file
- reasonable compare function: up to 4 images (ACDSee’s is faster and with a cleaner UI)
- handy time lapse movie creation
- well written PDF help manual (and it’s free)

Cons
- auto mode (Brilliance AI) sometimes produces weird colours and is frequently too aggressive
- other AI features aren’t that 'I'; portrait and face / age mode can be way off
- NoNoise AI default is too smooth
- forum type support is behind a paywall service called ON1 Plus (seriously, it costs almost 39GBP a year to ask fellow users for help though that does include access to training videos)
- poor, expensive paid for video tutorials (these are additional to the ON1 Plus content)
- takes a long time to catalog all existing photos (3 days for my 25K of images)
- no face detection
- mediocre PP tools
- annoying AI keyword function that adds irrelevant words (I’m having trouble editing keywords)
- crude panorama creation tool that is unforgiving: often ignores images that are only slightly out of alignment
- inconsistent speed of operation: sometimes 'hesitates’ (possibly due to my images being on an external drive?)


DxO PhotoLab 6/7
My all time favourite PP tool. Works well on (almost) every image I have. If DxO added some more half decent DAM tools this would be a real Adobe alternative.

Not much difference in main functions between 6 & 7 although 7 did introduce some hard core colour management features.

Pros
- fast display and operation
- PP that’s easy to get into but allows for some serious tweaking if needed
- excellent lens correction functions
- leading noise reduction
- no cataloging (thought there is an indexing function)

Cons
- no (serious) DAM features though more seem to be added with each annual release
- noise reduction works only with RAW files
- when processing, auto creation of projects that can’t be bulk deleted (in v6, not sure about v7); minor niggle of mine

I hope that might prove useful to fellow Mac users considering moving from Adobe. The main lesson here seems to be that there's no one product or even company to replace the LR/PS combo. Yet.

 

[Only RF]

Just to comment on one thing for other readers. Catalogues are not large. The catalogue has nothing to do with the files. It is just a database that works on the sideline so in the big picture it is actually quite small. I've been using it since 2011 and my catalogue is 6MB. I only remember a few updates over the last several years. I just delete the old ones to keep the Lightroom Folder tidy. It's currently 13-3.

The previews can get pretty large but you can delete those manually or set up it up to delete automatically.

I'm looking forward to the fall update. There is a rumour that Canon will provide the Codecs to Adobe to get true Canon colours, not emulations. I'm also looking forward to any Denoise AI improvements. I'm hoping for a Sharpen AI module.

Yeah there is a lot of hate for Adobe. The issues were explained by Adobe. They do not use your files in the cloud to train AI. They only use licensed stock photos. They do not scan your computers and devices. They do scan files in the cloud for things like illegal pornography, etc. I'm fine with that. As far as the lawsuit for making it tough to get out of the subscription. If found guilty I hope they get what's coming to them. Amazon is being sued for the same thing, These days both are much easier to get out of the subscription. I have personal experience with Amazon trying to drop it 5 years ago compared to a few months ago. I wasn't happy with Bezos, a guy who can afford his own rocket ship wanting another $2 a month for add free TV.

One last bit. The new Canon R5II had RAW support in June. We just got updates for LrC (13.5) and ACR (16.4) and they also added support for the R1 which won't be out until November. Since the R3 Adobe has been providing RAW support for new Canon cameras before customers got them.

I have no love for Adobe. I just like the product which comes with up to 5 personal websites. If they ever tick me off the cancel plan button is 10 seconds away.

 

[Only RF]

More recent video about the Codecs.

Start at minute 2:50

 

[Only RF]

Minute 9:08

 

[Glevum Owl]

Quick update on my experiences over the last few months moving from Adobe to something else.

ACDSee (Mac version)
Very good face recognition but sucks in almost every other department. It kept crashing initially although recent updates have steadied it somewhat. I’ll hang on to it for now.

ON1 Photo Raw (Mac version)
2024 worked well with a few niggles but 2025 version is better. It’s become my main tool with occasional visits back to DxO.

Happy to expand further on the above, if anyone’s interested.

 

[bastibe]

How is ON1 working out for you in comparison to Lightroom? Last time I checked it was rather unstable and inferior software, but it's been a few years.

 

[Glevum Owl]

How is ON1 working out for you in comparison to Lightroom? Last time I checked it was rather unstable and inferior software, but it's been a few years.

I have to say ON1 has come on in leaps and bounds since I looked at it in 2021 (2020?).

For many years I used LR for DAM, geotagging and a little editing before exporting images to JPEG to transfer to the household digital photo frames. Each January my DD and I select photos (using LR) for her annual Vistaprint calendar. And that was about the extent of my LR use.

DxO was my go to tool for serious or ‘rescue’ work. It still is. It processes most files better than LR especially the RAW output from my old Canon compact camera.

ON1 has completely replaced LR but it’s demosacing engine sucks compared to LR. Therefore I’m turning more and more to DxO. I’m not on the latest version but, as I’m now increasingly relying on it, I will probably upgrade later this month.

Andy Hutchinson’s YouTube review here pretty much sums up my thoughts on the current version of ON1 PhotoRAW 2025.

 

[bastibe]

Thank you for taking the time to elaborate on ON1. Good to hear that it's gotten better. Perhaps it's worth another look from me, too.

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

Yes, On1 is actually a pretty solid offering these days. It's not perfect, but it's a relatively affordable option, especially once you've purchased a version and can do the sale+upgrade approach. You can also have it work from a synced-to-desktop cloud storage folder, and your edits will transfer across PCs (provided you setup the same folder sync there, too). I haven't tried 2025 yet. I guess we'll see if I make the jump. 2024 has been pretty solid for me.

Believe it or not, another option is to just use a denoise program, save to JPG and then touch up in Photos. DXO PureRAW is insanely fast with the Neural Engine on the Apple chips, and Photos actually has a lot of features for editing these days and the sliders don't overcook. It's entirely possible to run such a setup with the base Mac configuration, provided you use a cloud storage.

Also, don't forget CaptureOne. It's more expensive, but it's pretty capable. It's my editor of choice for Fuji-X images, because it will respect the recipe you shot with, even the RAW versions. It's also pretty good on resources, performing well on older hardware and not sucking up massive amounts of RAM like On1 does.

 

[Glevum Owl]

I forgot to mention the software I’d looked at but rejected.

ACDSee (for Mac). Unstable on my Mac Mini. Nothing like its Windows counterpart, severely underpowered and underspecced. No AI functions. However my friend’s Windows version is impressive and she’s getting some great results. There’s a new Mac version due possibly later this year which promises to play catchup. I bought it and will persevere with it purely for the best face recognition I’ve ever used. (It ‘found’ 100’s of faces Adobe missed completely.)

Photomator Pro / Pixelmator. Fairly cheap and definitely overlooked. Easy to get into with plenty of powerful options lurking under the surface. I liked both programs, a lot. Unfortunately they are, currently, underspecced for my DAM needs. Apple bought the dev house just this month (Nov., ‘24) so I’m uncertain of their future. I’ll keep an eye on these for possible use by my DD who’s artistic but not technical. I might be tempted to a future purchase for use on my iPad.

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

Photomator Pro / Pixelmator. Fairly cheap and definitely overlooked. Easy to get into with plenty of powerful options lurking under the surface. I liked both programs, a lot. Unfortunately they are, currently, underspecced for my DAM needs. Apple bought the dev house just this month (Nov., ‘24) so I’m uncertain of their future. I’ll keep an eye on these for possible use by my DD who’s artistic but not technical. I might be tempted to a future purchase for use on my iPad.

Yeah, I suspect that it will eventually just get baked into Photos, or maybe Apple will finally bring back Aperture as a rebranded Photomator. They did that with the Dark Skies app, which is all pretty much integrated into Weather app now. MS did something similar years ago, buying the company that made an email app (Acompli) and eventually just baked in their office 365 stuff and called it what we know as the Outlook app today.

 

[dab]

There are few open source alternatives available:

• Darktable
• RawTherapee
• Gimp

Maybe some of them can cover the features you need. Plenty of reviews you can find online.

 

[doobs]

Another open source alternative:

• ART

 

[DaveNJ]

Another open source alternative:

• ART

I've been experimenting with this one lately. It's interesting in that it pulls in some of the best parts of Rawtherapee and of Darktable. That said it's not as powerful as Darktable and all of them lack the ease of use of commercial software (with stuff like AI mask selection, noise reduction,etc). With Rawtherapee and ART I like that you can use Adobe camera and lens profiles and Darktable local edits (via variety of masking) for all tools.

 

[doobs]

I've been experimenting with this one lately. It's interesting in that it pulls in some of the best parts of Rawtherapee and of Darktable. That said it's not as powerful as Darktable and all of them lack the ease of use of commercial software (with stuff like AI mask selection, noise reduction,etc). With Rawtherapee and ART I like that you can use Adobe camera and lens profiles and Darktable local edits (via variety of masking) for all tools.

The major downside to ART is there is no "healing brush" to hide things not wanted in the image. You have to export out to GIMP for that purpose. Once I discovered that, my enthusiasm dwindled a bit.

 

[Rick-Australia]

For GIMP I'd wait till release 3.0 as there are supposed to be significant improvements with this release.

 

[John King]

I'm done with Adobe.

. . .

I hope that might prove useful to fellow Mac users considering moving from Adobe. The main lesson here seems to be that there's no one product or even company to replace the LR/PS combo. Yet.

And, at my age, I'm not about to ditch nearly 20 years of experience with Adobe products while searching for unicorn ware ...

That's my single biggest contribution to this discussion.

 

[doobs]

For GIMP I'd wait till release 3.0 as there are supposed to be significant improvements with this release.

3.0 RC1 has been released. I did a quick install in a sandbox just for fun.

On the surface unfortunately there has been little change. I'll have to wait until somebody smarter than me does a tutorial or something on the new layer based features.

I've used GIMP for a while. Saying that it's not the prettiest thing in the world.

 

[Glevum Owl]

And, at my age, I'm not about to ditch nearly 20 years of experience with Adobe products while searching for unicorn ware ...

That's my single biggest contribution to this discussion.

Fair comment. I get it. Upon retiring I moved to Apple as I couldn't be doing with nursing along and finding workarounds for domestic devices based on Windows and Android. And I can't remember the last time I fired up anything Linux based. Life's too short. Also programs are a bit like cameras: there has to be a 'personal connection', it has to feel right. I was no longer comfortable with LR/PS hence the search.

I've never forgiven Adobe for buying Macromedia and killing Fireworks and Freehand but, apart from the dubious nature of the company, I was increasingly frustrated by unfixed bugs and constant changes to the UI or rendering engine. Recently, and certainly in the last two years, I've done more serious editing in DxO than PS and all my collages / creating in Serif's Affinity products (v1).

I'm happy to ditch 28 years with PS but then I am known by friends and (now ex) colleagues as a bit of a software whore. I thoroughly enjoy playing with new (to me) programs to see what they can do and trying to get into the minds of the people at the software house to work out why they did what they did. I've taken a lot of friendly ribbing about this over the years but who does everyone come to when they want advice on what software to get.....?

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

Even though I have a Linux machine, I've yet to really love any of the open source options. They get close, but there's always something that gums it up. Darktable works pretty well, but the interface is a bit clunky and uses lots of technical terms for features that make things less intuitive. It’s definitely a place where the for-pay software has a leg up when it comes to usability. My dream scenario is getting one of the for-pay solutions to work under Wine, but so far no luck.