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If Adobe had competitors

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
I've been an Adobe user for 20 years or thereabouts. I am or have been a professional user of Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, Dreamweaver, Premiere etc. all of those years. In "the good old days", I bought the software I needed, or the complete package, used it without hick-ups (mostly), and when there was a new version, I upgraded.

Nowadays, it's all subscriptions. I have to deal with credit cards, passwords, logins etc. It's a mess. For some reason, my card couldn't be charged this month, so they changed my subscription to "free". What they also did was deleting my user data history, including previous invoices etc. Now, they want me to re-register all data from scratch, as if my previous subscription didn't exist.

It's not that it's a lot of work. What I find bad is the total lack of customer awareness. That, in combination with one of the most dysfunctional websites ever created makes me want so much to dump Adobe totally.

If Adobe had competitors, I would.

Rant over :lecture:
 

iiiNelson

Well-known member
I think you're in the same boat as many others. Adobe, by necessity, is the standard. There are many other good programs but for whatever reason there are limitations to them as well. Adobe provides a "universal" ecosystem for graphic design, video production, music production, web development, etc.
 

MGrayson

Subscriber and Workshop Member
If Capture One supported my camera, I'd be with them still. Their choice, but :cussing:

--Matt
 

CSP

New member
I'm looking into alternatives. Will probably go for C1 for RAW processing. For vector graphics and whatever photo editing C1 can't do, Affinity looks promising. Has anybody tried it?

https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/

Now I just need video editing (lots of that around) and publishing (InDesign alternative) software.

Edit: QuarkXPress still exists! Let's see how that works these days :)

Quark: Omni-Channel Content Automation Software

from the many photoshop alternatives affinity photo seems the most promising, in fact it has some features that are superior to what adobe offers like contend aware fill and repair or you can use any colorspace with curves without changing the file colorspace ! in a few weeks a version 1.5 beta iss available with a lot of new features.

https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/tutorials/photo/
 

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
from the many photoshop alternatives affinity photo seems the most promising, in fact it has some features that are superior to what adobe offers like contend aware fill and repair or you can use any colorspace with curves without changing the file colorspace ! in a few weeks a version 1.5 beta iss available with a lot of new features.

https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/tutorials/photo/
I'm currently testing it. C1 has better RAW processing though, much better. Affinity seems to have the same problem with saturated reds from m4/3 cameras as ACR had 5 years ago.
 

CSP

New member
I'm currently testing it. C1 has better RAW processing though, much better. Affinity seems to have the same problem with saturated reds from m4/3 cameras as ACR had 5 years ago.
you can use 2 different raw engines with AP : affinity and apple
 

Tim

Active member
Do you really need the current version? Is there some must have feature.
Couldn't you just revert back to the last full version you have.
I'm still using a lot of older software so long as it does the job.
 

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
Do you really need the current version? Is there some must have feature.
Couldn't you just revert back to the last full version you have.
I'm still using a lot of older software so long as it does the job.
It's a possibility. I do have access to CS6, and could use that in combination with C1 for RAW conversion.
 

Steen

Senior Subscriber Member

Does anybody know something about Corel Paint Shop Pro X8 - or Corel Paint Shop Pro X8 Ultimate - as perhaps a viable substitute to Adobe Photoshop ?

And does anybody know something about PowerDirector as perhaps a viable substitute to Adobe Premiere Elements (I just need some easy program to get started with video editing) ?

I'm asking because I have been considering Corel Paint Shop Pro X8 and PowerDirector and I could use some advice about these programs.

Any experiences would be welcome.

Thank you in advance

Jorgen, I hope these questions are not too off topic ?
 

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member

Does anybody know something about Corel Paint Shop Pro X8 - or Corel Paint Shop Pro X8 Ultimate - as perhaps a viable substitute to Adobe Photoshop ?

And does anybody know something about PowerDirector as perhaps a viable substitute to Adobe Premiere Elements (I just need some easy program to get started with video editing) ?

I'm asking because I have been considering Corel Paint Shop Pro X8 and PowerDirector and I could use some advice about these programs.

Any experiences would be welcome.

Thank you in advance

Jorgen, I hope these questions are not too off topic ?
They are very on topic, and I actually visited the Corel website only to be amazed to see how many interesting programs they actually make. Some are a bit pricey though.

I have downloaded Lightworks for video editing to see how that works out. The amateur version is free. It can't do 4K, but I don't have any 4K cameras :)
Apple Final Cut Pro X isn't too badly priced either at $300, but requires a Mac of course. It gets really great reviews nowadays (as opposed to when it was launched), particularly for the UI, which can really be a challenge with some of the video editors.
 

rayyan

Well-known member
I have CS6. But I mostly use C1.It does want basic post editing i need; without fuss and with a better output ( imho ).

I just gave up on Adobe.

The product, the pricing, the support, the hassle of it all.
 

scho

Well-known member
The latest debacle with the last LR update (2015.6 for Mac) was the last straw for me. They totally hosed CM in the print module and then ignored the issue that they created. I had to trash LR 2015.6, re-install 2015, and then update that to get back to the last update prior to the current screwed up version.
 
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