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repeters

macrumors newbie
Dec 11, 2009
29
0
As great as all this is, I can't begin to imagine people are going to want to pay a monthly subscription fee to... see their photos.

And the last thing I want to have to do is sync 3GB of Raw files over the Cloud & Wifi... yikes.

Where did you you hear that syncing files over the cloud was required? You only sync anything to the Adobe cloud of you choose to do so.
 

Alphabetize

macrumors 6502
Oct 6, 2013
452
48
I'm also kind of hoping this whole transition will build stronger relations between the two companies.
 

soulbot

macrumors member
Feb 8, 2008
96
14
So, thinking short term, if LR6 is standalone, you're ok with that, even if Adobe's corporate personality indicates a risk of later LR's being subscription-only? With all the edit data stored in LR, you want to risk your lifetime's work to Adobe, and having to pay a lifetime subscription just to access your edits? When you stop working, and retire, and want to access your LR files under Creative Cloud, you pay till you die.

Do you trust Adobe?

With all due respect, I think you're getting all worked up prematurely…

So, "IF LR6 is standalone"—stop right there. Problem solved. Buy it, "own" it, use it until you die. Where'e the problem? Oh, the problem is that Adobe may jerk the rug out from us and go to a subscription-based scenario, while we sleep. With zero warning? It's not going to happen like that. Doomsday will be thwarted. How do we know? Look at all the apps that are now "CC Only", like After Effects. Adobe plainly and clearly said: this will be the last stand-alone version of this app. If you want continued access this is where the train stops. Was there an option for Adobe? How could they silently just lock people out of their projects, in the middle of the night, with no warning?? They couldn't, they didn't, people were warned and knew how to behave. We've all reacted accordingly.

So, if Adobe does change their mind, we will offered an exit strategy. How do I know this? Because Adobe doesn't want to face the largest class action lawsuit in software history. See, our photographs are not like some random After Effects project. They are personal, there's emotion and power there. There's nostalgia, history, memories. Adobe knows this—they get it. There is no way in hell they'd revoke access to all this without some warning and exit strategy. If they were going to go "cloud-only" (which they've PLAINLY said they do NOT plan to do for the foreseeable future) then we WILL be offered some way to maintain access. If you're paranoid that this option may not come to fruition then it's a perfect time for you to start planning for those "retirement years" and access to your photos by picking another software package to house your photos. You've got choices, maybe it's time to start exploring them. Now.

Do I "trust" Adobe? That's pretty vague. Adobe is not my friend, or family, and I trust those people. My "relationship" with Adobe, like yours, is strictly business. I try to anticipate what they may do and base my purchases on this. Do I trust that LR will remain standalone forever? Not really… Do I trust they'll offer a proper exit strategy when/if that time comes. Yes. They'll have no option. See above. They would have nothing to gain by silently imprisoning all our photos. And everything to lose.

Relax.

Not everyone can afford the monthly fee FOR LIFE until you pass away.

Thinking long-term is great. I think it's all going to be alright.
 

doelcm82

macrumors 68040
Feb 11, 2012
3,760
2,777
Florida, USA
I use Aperture to edit and manage photos for personal use and for my profession. I don't sell photos but use them to augment my reports and presentations. I don't need LR. I'll use Aperture for the next year or so till I see how Photos turns out. Might be adequate. If I get the lighting and exposure right when I take the picture I find I don't need much post processing except for cropping.

I'm with you. I rarely used most of the photo editing feature of Aperture. I got it because my photo library was huge, and at the time iPhoto was slowing to a crawl trying to manage it. I heard Aperture was better at handling large libraries, so I gave it a chance.

Honestly, I found the photo management in iPhoto much more suited to my needs, and I missed some of the features of iPhoto. Eventually, those features got ported to Aperture, and the Aperture library could be opened in iPhoto, and vice versa. But it felt a bit unnatural to do iPhoto things in Aperture, and I worried about whether opening the library in one app and then the other might cause me to lose something.

I have high hopes for the Photos app, and for photos in the cloud in iOS and OS X. I think the management of the files will suit my needs, and so will the basic editing features. If there's a feature or effect I want that Photos is missing, then I can buy an app that has that feature or effect. Then I'll be able to access my cloud library of photos from the app, and make a non-destructive change. Or I can access the app's features as a plugin from the Apple Photos app.

I think Apple is smart to provide a way to organize your photos and make them available to you anywhere you have access to the cloud. And they're smart to outsource the specialty image processing functions to others. Not everyone needs to have a filter that re-works your image in the style of Edvard Munch. But those who do, can add that functionality with little fuss or expense.

The real pros can still use Photoshop, of course. I bet Adobe doesn't wait too long before adding the ability for the Apple versions of their software (maybe the Windows versions, too) to read and write to Apple's cloud library.

I'm not considering Lightroom at this time. Their promotional material says your Lightroom photo library is available anywhere (just like Apple's cloud), but I think it won't be as integrated. Adding an image from your library to a text message or an email or a Pages document won't be as easy using Lightroom. Easy integration is important to me.
 

MagicHAM

macrumors 6502
Sep 2, 2013
289
139
Australia
So, thinking short term, if LR6 is standalone, you're ok with that, even if Adobe's corporate personality indicates a risk of later LR's being subscription-only? With all the edit data stored in LR, you want to risk your lifetime's work to Adobe, and having to pay a lifetime subscription just to access your edits? When you stop working, and retire, and want to access your LR files under Creative Cloud, you pay till you die.

Do you trust Adobe?

----------



That's a monthly fee until you die, assuming you want to access your photo edits through to your retirement.

----------



If I am short of cash, I don't go to Starbucks, but if you want to access your photo edits, even when retired with less income, you pay the monthly fee till you die. That's great for Adobe.

----------



Not everyone can afford the monthly fee FOR LIFE until you pass away.


I think you are just littering spinning things to suit your own agenda, which is CC is bad and paying subscriptions is a waste of money. If you want something in life and you have to fork out that money for it, then you do so. This is exactly the same scenario. You are talking that I'm planning on using Photoshop programming into my twilight years (which is a long time far off!!) which I won't be.

And second of all - i don't need to put my photos on the creative cloud if I don't want to. You make it sound like Adobe are not giving you a choice. They are giving you a choice, you don't have to put anything on the creative cloud if you don't. Your argument is a mute point because you are assuming that I'm putting my photos on creative cloud (which I am not). So really your argument is invalid - because you are assuming that everyone is going to use CC. I still use local storage. End of ramble. :p
 

doelcm82

macrumors 68040
Feb 11, 2012
3,760
2,777
Florida, USA
doubling down? What exactly does that mean? Why not just say 'doubling'
Good question. To double down is to take a calculated risk on a single act with a short term goal, after you're already invested, and when conditions seem to be in your favor. In Blackjack, when you double down, you double your bet, but you only get one additional card.

It makes sense for Adobe to say they are doubling down. Apple's changing product line gives them a possibility of increasing their user base among Apple users, so they're spending a little extra money to let us know they are out there ready for our business. It could turn out to be a good bet. Or it could be that most of us will wait until we see what Apple's Photos app is like, or that we'll be turned off by Adobe's pricing (Photos will be free). They're taking a calculated risk.

Tim Cook's use of the phrase doesn't make much sense. If he really meant double down, then the time frame for his risk has long since expired, and everyone who makes fun of him when there's an apple product leak is also getting it wrong. If he meant that Apple was going to be more secretive in the long term, he should have picked a different idiom, such as "redouble our efforts".
 

Philsy

macrumors 6502a
Jul 29, 2004
631
12
South coast of England
Good question. To double down is to take a calculated risk on a single act with a short term goal, after you're already invested, and when conditions seem to be in your favor. In Blackjack, when you double down, you double your bet, but you only get one additional card.

It makes sense for Adobe to say they are doubling down. Apple's changing product line gives them a possibility of increasing their user base among Apple users, so they're spending a little extra money to let us know they are out there ready for our business. It could turn out to be a good bet. Or it could be that most of us will wait until we see what Apple's Photos app is like, or that we'll be turned off by Adobe's pricing (Photos will be free). They're taking a calculated risk.

Tim Cook's use of the phrase doesn't make much sense. If he really meant double down, then the time frame for his risk has long since expired, and everyone who makes fun of him when there's an apple product leak is also getting it wrong. If he meant that Apple was going to be more secretive in the long term, he should have picked a different idiom, such as "redouble our efforts".

Thank you for a great explanation!
 

laurihoefs

macrumors 6502a
Mar 1, 2013
792
23
As great as all this is, I can't begin to imagine people are going to want to pay a monthly subscription fee to... see their photos.

And the last thing I want to have to do is sync 3GB of Raw files over the Cloud & Wifi... yikes.

Sorry if I'm being repetitive, but I think this bears repeating:

Lr is available as a permanent license for $149, $79 for students.

Only the photo catalog is in the proprietary format (which can be imported to some other applications, like CaptureOne), the photos always remain unchanged, and can always be accessed with other applications.

Cloud storage and syncing are optional parts of CC, you don't have to use them if you want to use local storage.
 

Soulweaponry

macrumors 6502
Mar 13, 2010
394
1
Did they think "doubling down" sounded just too cool when Tim Cook said it so they wanted an excuse to fit it in somewhere or what?

I'm doubling down on pooping right now.
 

FuNGi

macrumors 65816
Feb 26, 2010
1,122
33
California
Adobe better make some sort of aperture->lightroom migration tool. I switch over to LR from aperture a few years ago and because I had kept everything in the aperture library, the migration was incredibly complicated and took forever! And unfortunately, none of your edits transfer over. As I understand it, Aperture uses Apple's camera raw which is different from adobe camera raw?

Trying to get my 80 year old grandfather to switch to LR from aperture but the move is so tough I'm not sure it's worth it for him. I think his library is around 100k images over 8 years, seems too daunting to build the new LR library manually.

Was wondering the same thing. So are others over in the Lightroom forums. One link has a technical solution.

For now I suggest keep using Aperture. Wait until Apple's new software comes out and imports your Aperture library. Then decide if it suits you.
 

dragje

macrumors 6502a
May 16, 2012
874
681
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Sorry if I'm being repetitive, but I think this bears repeating:

Lr is available as a permanent license for $149, $79 for students.

Only the photo catalog is in the proprietary format (which can be imported to some other applications, like CaptureOne), the photos always remain unchanged, and can always be accessed with other applications.

Cloud storage and syncing are optional parts of CC, you don't have to use them if you want to use local storage.


True! I don't use CC for cloud storage at all. The RAW files of my libraries (work related for clients) consist of two terabytes of RAW files and by no means I'm even thinking about uploading these files in the cloud. For these kinds of serious amounts of data one needs a very good NAS system. I'm using QNap TS-870 Pro for this. It does where it's been build for: store items! Configured in RAID 10 mode so it requires two hard drives to go down before any data can ben damaged. Then you're not there yet, for better security a APC device is a must have! I use several including one for my TS-870 Pro device. It's power failure that can damage your data and what's most often the cause of many headache throughout the world....

And if it's toughly about important data, which it is in my case, you'll need another backup of those terabytes and store them on another location somewhere else so that even in case of an fire you'll still have your data safe.

The cloud is great for storing little things like addresses, documents etc, but not good for storing large files. And even for important documents I'm using the same treatment as I do with my raw files. It's an investment but worth while because you don't have monthly cost and with a backup stored in two different locations you're pretty much save, especially when the second backup is been stored just on a hard drive that's not connected to the internet.

The backup takes place on daily bases and the second back-up each half year.... 100% guarantee doesn't exist but this way your data will be secured in a decent way for sure...
 

roadbloc

macrumors G3
Aug 24, 2009
8,784
215
UK
It's a real shame Apple's professional products have gone to total trash. I guess Adobe may as well catch as many Aperture users as possible.
 

jopiek

macrumors newbie
Jun 21, 2014
25
48
Netherlands
I don't consider Adobe products very good alternatives, I also regret these steps by Apple, but I only use photoshop and illustrator (sometimes indesign) because there are no good alternatives yet: the computer gets hot if one uses these tools and I don't like the cloud push either, so Apple please help us out.
 

michelepri

macrumors 6502a
May 27, 2007
511
61
Rome, Paris, Berlin
The only thing that made Aperture superior was the organization of the pictures. In this respect Lightroom is so horrible that's beyond embarrassing. You need real talent to make something so bad. Then Lightroom has this division between Library and development which has o logic or practical basis.

Apart from those 2 issues however Lightroom software had much better and professional features, partly because Apple hasn't updated Aperture for years and they're doing everything to show the exit door to their professional users.

I think Apple will eventually regret this move, for now selling Iphones still gives them the arrogance to be able to pull it off, but even there, apart from nicer looking hardware, IOS is vastly inferior to Android, so I hope I won't see Apple sinking back to what they were in the 90s.
 

Sin

macrumors regular
Jun 25, 2007
152
0
Not London
I've been trying to work out Adobe's licensing for multiple users in a household, and/or multiple computers.

AFAICS, it's a strict single-user, 2-machine thing. Which is significantly more restrictive than Apple's, where my wife and I can share computers and use it on as many as we actually own.

So that £8.78 a month could be significantly higher, if we licensed the software to give the same flexibility we have now. I mean, we both do the majority of our editing on our own desktops, but occasionally use each others, and we also have several laptops that might be used depending on how much kit we want to lug about, etc.

Capture One seems to have the same restriction.

Anyone know how easy it is to switch the Adobe subscription between machines (i.e deactivate one computer and activate a new one)?
 

funkahdafi

Suspended
Mar 16, 2009
377
112
Planet Earth
Not sure why everyone is bitching about the Adobe subscription plan. No one forces you to subscribe to it, LR is available as a standalone app.

That being said, the standalone version costs what... 130 bucks? And how often do they release a major new release that you will buy anyways? Every 12-18 months? So that's roughly 130 bucks a year. Compare that to the subscription, you pay 120 a year, receive Photoshop on top plus cloud storage and other services.

Sounds like a good deal to me, compared to the standalone version.
 

iZac

macrumors 68030
Apr 28, 2003
2,596
2,778
UK
And we all know how effective it is when companies double down on things ...
 

maflynn

macrumors Haswell
May 3, 2009
73,470
43,392
I don't consider Adobe products very good alternatives, I also regret these steps by Apple, but I only use photoshop and illustrator (sometimes indesign) because there are no good alternatives yet: the computer gets hot if one uses these tools and I don't like the cloud push either, so Apple please help us out.

Adobe does produce some excellent apps, though bloat has crept into their apps over the decades since they initially released them. Lightroom is the exception being new from the ground up. Its not a bad app, though I preferred Aperture.

I used LR for a little while but I liked Aperture's UI and library setup, so I went back to it - A decision I regret
 

QquegChristian

macrumors 6502
Jun 24, 2010
472
544
Longtime lurker... But I have to chime in. The anti-Adobe posts are crazy. To repeat what a few people keep trying to say, Lightroom IS available as a standalone one-time purchase with identical features to CC. It's also on sale all the time for a reasonable price.

If Adobe one day decided to make Lightroom subscription only, this would NOT affect your life at all as you bought Lightroom 5, still own Lightroom 5, and will always own Lightroom 5. Will Lightroom 5 or a stand-alone purchase of 6 (when it happens) always work on new a new OS? Nobody knows, but it will surely be more up to date than Aperture that has already been officially abandoned.

Apple has proven that you can never trust new versions to continue to even be developed whatsoever, but as long as Adobe is selling standalone and current versions of Lightroom, what is the issue? Apple isn't remotely breaking the version of Aperture you own now and Adobe won't be able to do that to the version of Lightroom you can buy in a box, on Amazon now either. Your photos are not ever being held hostage by anyone. Such weird arguments. Software will always work for what you purchased it for, on the system you purchased it for. Period. You are far more likely to upgrade computers before an Adobe program breaks due to OS incompatibility.

As far as CC is concerned, I don't think those that are complaining are the market. When you've plunked down $2500 to buy Adobe software outright in the past and upgrade every year, you understand that it's VERY reasonably priced. I've built 2 careers on the backs of their software, so I definitely understand the value. If you don't need 8 of their programs in your line of work and just want to edit family photos, of course the standalone Lightroom purchase is the option you should undoubtedly go with.

After years of having to do work with clients that are always on different versions, CC finally puts everyone on an even playing field. CC also allows Adobe to not artificially hold back major new features for the next release, letting us have them immediately. It's actually quite refreshing to see a product getting continually added functionality at all times. It is as if the changes coming in iOS8 had trickled into our phones monthly over the last year. We could have had custom keyboards in a 7. update, but software companies need to have exciting version launches, something Adobe has done away with in CC. It also helps with the beta testing, as making the big changes incrementally allows them to really pinpoint what is causing a bug. Adding 100 major features all at once is far harder to diagnose.

All of that being said, Apple should really sell off Aperture, Logic, Final Cut, etc to a hungrier software company that isn't in the consumer/hardware business. Adobe DOES need competition (for innovation sake) and Apple is showing that they're no longer interested in being that. Adobe's patent portfolio must be pretty scary and proof that our patent system sucks. In graphics and design, there's really nowhere else to go. But people don't just pay the money because they have to, but because they make enough money using the software to justify it. Otherwise, they're in the wrong business.
 

maflynn

macrumors Haswell
May 3, 2009
73,470
43,392
If Adobe one day decided to make Lightroom subscription only, this would NOT affect your life at all as you bought Lightroom 5, still own Lightroom 5, and will always own Lightroom 5. Will Lightroom 5 or a stand-alone purchase of 6 (when it happens) always work on new a new OS? Nobody knows, but it will surely be more up to date than Aperture that has already been officially abandoned.
The issue is RAW processing, if you buy a camera with a new RAW file format, then you HAVE to upgrade to a newer version of LR. If that is then only subscription based, you're committed. I think at some point in the near future Adobe will force LR users to the subscription model. I agree though at the moment LR 5 is stand alone and its been out for a year, so we should be seeing LR6 in a few months - at least the beta.

You are far more likely to upgrade computers before an Adobe program breaks due to OS incompatibility.
I wouldn't go that far. I've had older versions of Photoshop fail because of an OS upgrade.

All of that being said, Apple should really sell off Aperture, Logic, Final Cut, etc to a hungrier software company that isn't in the consumer/hardware business.

I don't see them doing that, though I don't disagree with your idea. Instead they'll either kill it off (in Aperture's case) or dumb it down for consumers like FCP's case.
 

cube

Suspended
May 10, 2004
17,011
4,972
Not sure why everyone is bitching about the Adobe subscription plan. No one forces you to subscribe to it, LR is available as a standalone app.

That being said, the standalone version costs what... 130 bucks? And how often do they release a major new release that you will buy anyways? Every 12-18 months? So that's roughly 130 bucks a year. Compare that to the subscription, you pay 120 a year, receive Photoshop on top plus cloud storage and other services.

Sounds like a good deal to me, compared to the standalone version.

You're looking at it wrong.

Here the UPGRADE price is $80, while the rental is $15 per month.
 

QquegChristian

macrumors 6502
Jun 24, 2010
472
544
The issue is RAW processing, if you buy a camera with a new RAW file format, then you HAVE to upgrade to a newer version of LR. If that is then only subscription based, you're committed. I think at some point in the near future Adobe will force LR users to the subscription model. I agree though at the moment LR 5 is stand alone and its been out for a year, so we should be seeing LR6 in a few months - at least the beta.

Oh absolutely, I get the RAW compatibility, so I guess the question is how long you are entitled to consistent CameraRAW updates? From my experience, Adobe has been very good about supporting old versions of Lightroom in that respect. But if they ever switched to subscription-only, I'd say that's at least one step better than completely shutting things down as Aperture is experiencing. You'd have at least one option. The argument that software you buy today should support a proprietary camera that hasn't been invented yet tomorrow is more of an argument as to WHY subscription models can be fair. It's also an argument for an industry standard RAW format, but that's ridiculously too logical for camera manufacturers to grasp.

I think at the least you'll see freeware DNG converters popping up in the instance of any shift on Adobe's part... But I really do think the point is moot and Adobe treats Lightroom as one of its consumer products. Note that it has never had a CS designation and doesn't even have a CC designation when downloaded from CC. It's always been treated as a standalone product with no evidence to the contrary.
 
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