Adobe Tests Doubling the Price of Photography Plan With Photoshop and Lightroom

[prasand]

Possibly the term "art designer" was too specific, as a good portion of the people I talked to are in fact also doing photography professionally. All of them pointed out that they have pretty much zero difficulties of exchanging files with Photoshop and Illustrator users, as Serif's applications are more than compatible enough to the "industry standards".

The only two Adobe apps they usually admittedly have not replaced (yet) are Indesign (but many were full of praise for the Affinity Publisher beta) and Lightroom. But in the latter case, several people I spoke with specifically mentioned that they have not updated to the subscription based recent version.

Yeah, many just use Lightroom Classic for organizing because Capture One was lacking in that department (which it since improved but still has the social stigma despite their improvements). It really is just a familiarity thing, many are used to organizing their photos in Lightroom so they just stick to it. But considering that Capture One alone costs $20 per month, $180 per year, or $299 one-time ... I highly doubt those that are still with Lightroom will care about a price hike that brings it inline with the cost of Capture One (if they are paying for Lightroom currently).

I know people who use Affinity, but they still pay for Lightroom. They prefer Affinity because Photoshop is a bit dated, and lacks mobility. They use Capture One, Lightroom, and then Affinity (in that order of workflow and priority). Those who use Affinity are prone to also keeping Capture One updated to have the latest enhancements. They care less about Lightroom because it’s just a file organizer to them (thus doesn’t need complex features), not a creation tool. When it comes to their creation tools they want the latest. If they don’t want a subscription, they’ll pay the “one-time” Capture One fee annually with each major release, all for the sake of not having an actual subscription ... while paying for it like an annual subscription.

It’s just a delusional “ownership” thing when they don’t really own any of the programs.

 

[laurieballard]

Like others have said, if editing photos is part of your livelihood then this will likely not impact you much, $10 a month is not earth shattering in the grand scheme of things and if you are rooted into Adobe products, its unlikely you are going to move.

For the hobbyist it may well be the last straw, people will either Pirate it (its hardly difficult to do) or just move to a one time purchase deal of other software.

 

[elvislives]

The comments are going to be filled with a lot of upset users.

Photographer: Doesn't blink at spending $1500-5000 on a new lens, or $3000-5000 on a new camera body, or $300-800 on a new tripod, or $400-900 on a new flash, or $150 a pop on new UHS-II SD cards, or $800-3000 on a Thunderbolt RAID setup and SSDs, or $3000-7000 on a new Mac, or $800-2000 on a second and third display, or thousands of dollars on lighting equipment and backdrops and travel and paying models and grips.

Also photographer: Freaks out at having to pay Adobe a couple hundred bucks a year to edit, organize, share, and store all of their photos.

Y'all suck.

Ya but my gear is not on a stupid subscription plan. Adobe have lost the plot. Photoshop is a bloated and Lightroom is fragmented mess with Classic & CC versions. Plus its very slow compared to Capture One.

 

[dumastudetto]

This $19.99 photography plan is nothing new. It’s been around for a long while. It has been offered alongside the $9.99 photography plan since its inception, and both plans remain available to this day.

Adobe appear to be experimenting with how they market the different offerings to new customers, which is normal for any business. This is not Adobe testing doubling the price for everyone.

 

[icymountain]

This demonstrates really well why I do not rent software.

There is a total loss of control over the expense and upgrade policy. Adobe may decide to increase costs anytime, and users will be impacted sooner or later (e.g., at their plan renewal date). Also, I am not a fan of the rolling update thing (at least with the classical model, the users still decide when they take the update ---that may break their photo settings; in the "classical" model age, processing engine updates were well marked).

Also, there is a lock in effect due to the settings being in a software specific format, so the choice of the photo editing workflow should not be taken lightly.

The comparison with the price of lenses/cameras is bogus. These items stay for a long time, can be sold and purchased used, repaired, etc. I spend roughly $1000 on photography equipment each year, but this is just an average; I have had periods of several years with zero spending at all (lower income or purchasing house or sparing money for a larger purchase) and other years with much higher spending. On some years, I was even positive, selling things I was not using anymore.

The comment that good photographers should not need too much editing is even more ridiculous. Turning the image as shot into an image to be presented as final result has always included some interpretation, even in the early darkroom ages (which chemicals to use for which effect, which paper, what masking to do or not). Photo editing workflow software just mirrors that.

When they started to push people towards the rental model, Adobe lost me as a customer. I have moved to DxO, and found less bloated software and much better photo processing algorithms. And the company reacts much more nicely to user feedback (I love their forums).

I also evaluated Luminar (I did not like the workflow), and ON1 (promising). I have not looked at Affinity tools yet.
There are also some nice open source alternatives (darktable, lightzone, rawtherapee). All in all, I do not see many good reasons for amateurs to remain with Adobe.

 

[Steve121178]

Step one, create a barrel. Step two, get most of your customers over said barrel. Step three, gotcha.

No.

If they double the price I'll just cancel. Plenty of alternatives.

 

[prasand]

This $19.99 photography plan is nothing new. It’s been around for a long while. It has been offered alongside the $9.99 photography plan since its inception, and both plans remain available to this day.

Adobe appear to be experimenting with how they market the different offerings to new customers, which is normal for any business. This is not Adobe testing doubling the price for everyone.

In hindsight, I forgot that the 1TB Plan was $19.99. But you’re absolutely right, it always was. I simply pay less because I was on the 20gb and upgraded my storage in app (iOS), which gave me a discount @ $14.99 for 1TB, but the regular price was always $19.99 ... people are making a mountain out of an ant hill. It’s pure marketing / presentation.

 

[Manzanito]

Genuinely curious, how does one test prices? Double the price then measure how many customers you loose?

Not that I care about adobe. Switched to capture one the minute they went subscription only. Happy I did.

 

[mikethemartian]

This is actually standard practice on the app store. It's called A/B Testing and it's used to find the optimal price.

Apparently Adobe actually sells a product called Target to do that type of testing

https://www.adobe.com/experience-cl...MI4P-stPP-4QIVllcNCh2vwQfVEAAYASAAEgKgNvD_BwE

 

[Steve121178]

The $9.99 option is still available, Adobe have just hidden it:

http://www.adobe.com/go/photo18sptst

 

[Bone Ranger]

I wanted to buy a copy of Lightroom for my new iMac. Noooo, have to buy the CC monthly package?
Screw that, Ill buy a counterfeit in Bangkok for $3

 

[Michael Scrip]

This does indeed stink for those who were only doing the Photoshop/Lightroom combo but.....

The $59/month fee for the entire suite is cheaper per year than it was buying outright, if I remember correctly the entire suite was around $1500. With the current price scheme it is around $720/year and you get constant updates.

Actually... the entire suite was called the "Master Collection" and it was $2,600 to buy outright!

Adobe made smaller bundles... Design Standard, Design & Web Premium, and Production Premium... which were around $1,700 each.

And Photoshop had the legendary price of $700

But the big thing to remember is... Adobe never made this software for consumers or hobbyists. Nobody should have ever paid those prices unless they were making money with it.

I think the only Adobe product that the average person should buy is Photoshop Elements which was, and still is, around $100 to buy outright.

You're right... the $9.99/month Photography Bundle was somewhat attractive to hobbyists. And if this price increase is true... then those people will abandon it.

But for the most part... Adobe was never in the business of selling inexpensive software to the masses.

Today the modern equivalent of "Master Collection" is the $57/month CC subscription. You get every Adobe program, plus bonuses like Adobe Fonts (formally TypeKit which used to have its own yearly fee)

I will continue to pay for Creative Cloud because I do make money with this software. And I'm not looking to switch my entire workflow to a bunch of disparate apps.

But that's just me.
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All in all, I do not see many good reasons for amateurs to remain with Adobe.

As I said above... amateurs shouldn't have been using Adobe software in the first place.

Adobe software has always been expensive. And there were always cheaper (or free!) alternatives that were more suited for the average consumer.

It's funny to see the words "amateur" and "Adobe" in the same sentence.

 

[Imdougurnot]

Same here. If they raise the price from the $10/month I’m currently paying, I’m out.

I’ll go to C1 if/when that happens.

EDIT: Looking at their Twitter account and the angry people tweeting at them, it looks like the 20GB $9.99/month will not be going away.

People should have been this mad about the 9.99/mo and moving to subscription.
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The comments are going to be filled with a lot of upset users.

Photographer: Doesn't blink at spending $1500-5000 on a new lens, or $3000-5000 on a new camera body, or $300-800 on a new tripod, or $400-900 on a new flash, or $150 a pop on new UHS-II SD cards, or $800-3000 on a Thunderbolt RAID setup and SSDs, or $3000-7000 on a new Mac, or $800-2000 on a second and third display, or thousands of dollars on lighting equipment and backdrops and travel and paying models and grips.

Also photographer: Freaks out at having to pay Adobe a couple hundred bucks a year to edit, organize, share, and store all of their photos.

Y'all suck.

You’re neglecting one very important aspect, ownership. There is no ownership with the sub model.

 

[Steve121178]

The comments are going to be filled with a lot of upset users.

Photographer: Doesn't blink at spending $1500-5000 on a new lens, or $3000-5000 on a new camera body, or $300-800 on a new tripod, or $400-900 on a new flash, or $150 a pop on new UHS-II SD cards, or $800-3000 on a Thunderbolt RAID setup and SSDs, or $3000-7000 on a new Mac, or $800-2000 on a second and third display, or thousands of dollars on lighting equipment and backdrops and travel and paying models and grips.

Also photographer: Freaks out at having to pay Adobe a couple hundred bucks a year to edit, organize, share, and store all of their photos.

Y'all suck.

I'm not a photographer but enjoy using my camera when I have time. For hobbyists who don't earn from their images it's a sharp increase in costs for those of us on the Photography CC plan.

 

[Flight Plan]

Scenario: Ferrari doubles the price of their cars.
User: “Damn, I really want that Ferrari driving experience, but I don’t want to pay. Guess I’ll steal one.”

How is piracy of software any different from theft? Just because you can, doesn't mean you should.

Amen, brother.

Whoever invented the whole push to subscription models for everything, I fart in your general direction.

Amen, brother!

If this wasn't more profitable for Adobe, they wouldn't have done it. Just had a similar conversation in the Aperture thread and went to look at what continuous improvement all this subscription revenue is buying.

Here's the new feature list for CC2019:

• You can create a placeholder mask before putting an image in it.
• Content aware fill got moved to a new workspace.
• Cmd-Z for undo.
• Transformation reference point now defaults hidden rather than shown.
• Double-click to edit text.
• Commit text by clicking outside the box.
• Transformations now default to proportional for some objects.
• You can lock tool panels to prevent dragging.
• When you select a blend mode you can see a preview.
• If you use Photoshop to paint, you can mirror your brush strokes.
• Color wheel color selector
• New home screen lobby
• You can use your own images in the tutorials
• Distribute spacing of objects (like Adobe Illustrator)
• Math in number fields
• Hover to see the full layer name
• Match Font now supports Japanese
• You can flip the canvas horizontally
• Lorem Ipsum placeholder text
• Customize keyboard shortcuts for Select and Mask
• Preference to increase UI size
• Support for South East Asian scripts

I don't want to minimize the engineering effort required, but when "multiple undo" is on the highlights of a 2019 release, they're done. They're out of ideas, but still want you to pay like you're "upgrading".

That feature list is very anemic, except for the UI readability thing. I wish more software makers would do that.

I'm looking at affinity now, and it looks pretty OK.

I don't mind subscriptions, because developers have to eat. It's not realistic to expect updates forever for a one-time purchase anymore.

I don't think anybody in this entire thread has demanded "updates forever for a one-time purchase". Your premise is wrong, or you need to wear your readers. Or you need that UI improvement noted above.

Well I guess it's time to pick up AlienSkin Exposure and find a way to make the most of GIMP 2.10, until somebody else gets their head out of their arse.
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Yeah but that's only because Corel is such a crappy developer!

I don't know where this comes from. Corel has been fine.

If they lose less than half their users, it's a successful test (unless you factor in the storage difference).

Mathematically speaking, you are correct. The "come to capitalism" moment will hit them when they realize that pissing off individuals eventually will result in behavior and loyalty changes for small and medium sized companies.

Individuals own companies. Some work at corporations. Many of these are managers, purchasers, or other decision-makers for those organizations. If I was one of them, I'd be asking hard questions about all the money we spend on Adobe software. I might even push for a top-down audit of all the money we're paying for subscriptions.

The company I work for has even gone so far as to actively seek a reduced profile for software or hardware vendors who have burned us in some way or another. Adobe can't get away with this forever without paying the ferryman eventually.

How many people here will publicly decry the proposed price increase then quietly continue to subscribe if the price increase goes in effect permanently?

It's why these companies get away with crap like this.

You're right. I'm not in that category, but I'll bet you're right and most people just like to complain but won't make a change in their own plans; not really.

Am I the only one still using CS6 version of the Photoshop?

Yes, yes you are.

That's not really the way it goes and you know it.

Photographer: reads review for a fancy new lens. Deliberates about it for 2 years; finally decides to ask the wife. Two more years pass and as he combines 2 birthdays, major anniversary and 2 christmases to finally be allowed to buy said lens. In the meantime, that camera body is getting old. Goes to sell left kidney, but realizes that he lost that back in 2013 when he made the mistake of buying a "Trash Can" Mac Pro.

In the meantime, catches "The Speech" from the wife when she sees YA monthly Adobe subscription fee on the credit card bill and reminds the Photographer that he hasn't touched any of the pics from six months when the family went to Disney .. and that her sister's husband gets just fine results from just the kiosk down at COSTCO.

Your story is exactly right, except that it's not always the guy who is the photog. My sister is the one with the camera attached to her face, and she uses the kiosk at Walgreens. But otherwise the same, yep!

You must be a terrible photographer when you need to do such heavy edits all the time. Guess I'm still to analog in this regard - More then correcting exposure, a little color correction and curves isn't needed by me. What I need heavily is the management of the images.

I am far from a terrible photographer. But I often have a vision for my images that aren’t always possible to create in camera.

Yes, there's the ART part of "the art of photography". Thank you for standing up and defending the art!

From the people who brought you Flash.

You're a genius.

Yeah sure, for those professionals earning a living from it, the cost of Adobe CC is a drop in the ocean of their costs. But for us hobbyists, who outnumber the pros by a large number, these prices matter. I have $4,000 worth of camera equipment, and make no money from photography, and I wasn't willing to pay the $120/yr. Not because it's only $120, but because if I live another 50 years, its $6,000. And now they want to make it $12,000. That all said, I'm guessing their subscription model must be working out well if they're experimenting with doubling it. For me, I'm sick of paying rent, so have been looking at all my subscriptions, and cutting them to the bone.

Yes, me too.

This is a brilliant move. Think how much money Abobe will save on customer support. With half as many people using their product that can fire half the support staff and with the remaining customers paying double their income remains the same.

Even better, only their most loyal customers will stay and they need less suport. So maybe they can fire more than half of their customer support staff.

They should raise the price 100 times to $1000 per month and keep only 1% of their customers. But if each one pays 100X more they break even.

Scalable logic!

So "it worked" Adobe does not want you as a customer. Literally. They would prefer not to have to deal with non-professionals.

Likewise, I know someone who told me she was switching banks because of the fees. She asks what would happen if everyone like her left. I told her that was the intent of the fee. They don't need that $15 per month but what they need are small time customers like her to LEAVE. They prefer to deal with big companies and real estate developers and generally in multiples of millions of dollars.

I suspect that Adobe's customer service costs are sky-high and would be reduced if only profesional graphics arts people remain as customers.

The costs might be reduced, yes. But this is corporate shortsightedness. Let's say Adobe is successful in getting rid of the average hobbyist. Who's going to support the publication part of the industry? Who will see the ads and buy the products? I mean...once the "average person" no longer interfaces with Adobe products, what reason is there for me to approve that PO once it hits my desk, especially with that fat dollar amount?

No, this will be bad voodoo for Adobe. Making their bed...

Actually... the entire suite was called the "Master Collection" and it was $2,600 to buy outright!

Adobe made smaller bundles... Design Standard, Design & Web Premium, and Production Premium... which were around $1,700 each.

And Photoshop had the legendary price of $700

But the big thing to remember is... Adobe never made this software for consumers or hobbyists. Nobody should have ever paid those prices unless they were making money with it.

I think the only Adobe product that the average person should buy is Photoshop Elements which was, and still is, around $100 to buy outright.

You're right... the $9.99/month Photography Bundle was somewhat attractive to hobbyists. And if this price increase is true... then those people will abandon it.

But for the most part... Adobe was never in the business of selling inexpensive software to the masses.

Today the modern equivalent of "Master Collection" is the $57/month CC subscription. You get every Adobe program, plus bonuses like Adobe Fonts (formally TypeKit which used to have its own yearly fee)

I will continue to pay for Creative Cloud because I do make money with this software. And I'm not looking to switch my entire workflow to a bunch of disparate apps.

But that's just me.

As I said above... amateurs shouldn't have been using Adobe software in the first place.

Adobe software has always been expensive. And there were always cheaper (or free!) alternatives that were more suited for the average consumer.

It's funny to see the words "amateur" and "Adobe" in the same sentence.

You are right EXCEPT in this case: If Adobe software was only intended for professionals, then why all the print publications? Why all the ads? Why all the training and the gloss? No no, Adobe surely DID push the everyman hobbyist into their software. And now they want us gone. That's not gonna work out well for them. Eventually, they will have to raise YOUR price too for CC. Have fun paying $100 per month one day.

 

[juanm]

I don’t do much photography anymore, but it used to be that Mac + Aperture + Photoshop was clearly the best choice. How things have changed. When I pick it back, it’ll likely be Windows + Some cataloging software tbd + Affinity.

 

[ChrizON]

Test result: users are extremely angry
Adobe CEO: "Great!"

The only thing they are testing at this point is how badly users will take it in the ass before they finally revolt.

 

[icymountain]

...

You quote Photoshop prices, that were well beyond the budget of amateurs indeed.

However, Lightroom was proposed about ten years ago at a purchase price of $150. I got LR 4 with a discount at $75. Many people got it for free together with their camera. Upgrades were about half of the price of a full license, shipped every second year or so. People who were not interested could skip one or two updates.

The idea of LR was to propose a good RAW images processing workflow in a single box, that was 99% of what many photographers needed. It of course lacked many of the capabilities of Photoshop, but most would not care. Among the (many, many) photographers I know, very few used Photoshop at that time. On the other hand, many people, including a lot of amateur photographers had adopted Lightroom, and saw it a long term solution for RAW images processing.

For them the "plans" Adobe brought meant going from "$150 once + as few $ per month upgrading as you decide" (say $2 if you get every second upgrade) to "$10 per month for now" (maybe more later). In that case, the math turns a different result than whatever you get when considering a full Photoshop suite.

So, yes, Adobe marketed some of their products at amateurs. Yes, their products were adopted by them. And, no, the current pricing is indeed not good at all for them.


[I leave out the case of Photoshop Elements, which I did not like and found useless to my photography need, even when I got a copy of it included with one of my cameras]

 

[ChrizON]

I like how they list the most expensive plan as their most popular when it’s being tested lmao.

So it’s not just the increase itself that’s so brazen, it’s how unapologetically they will then lie about it!

 

[Spacetime Anomaly]

I remember getting Photoshop 5 and thinking it was the most amazing software on earth. I bought a WOW book (remember them?) and ploughed through it, making 3d text and putting brains in jars. All adobe products were eye-wateringly expensive, but they seemed worth the money and remained viable for years. Even now, if you have an old G4 laying around, Photoshop 5 could still perform most of the functions you need.

Today you’re asked to pay a subscription for software, so they can change some icons, or fix bugs they left in on release. People even rent word processors and note apps now. Note apps! Sooner or later you are paying in perpetuity for something that literally cannot improve in any appreciable way.

 

[Music Ambulance]

While adobe are gearing up to double their pricing, I hear Bauer Media are cornering photographers into assigning their copyright over, when the photographers sell the mags. A sign of the times.

 

[FairlyKors]

The comments are going to be filled with a lot of upset users.

Photographer: Doesn't blink at spending $1500-5000 on a new lens, or $3000-5000 on a new camera body, or $300-800 on a new tripod, or $400-900 on a new flash, or $150 a pop on new UHS-II SD cards, or $800-3000 on a Thunderbolt RAID setup and SSDs, or $3000-7000 on a new Mac, or $800-2000 on a second and third display, or thousands of dollars on lighting equipment and backdrops and travel and paying models and grips.

Also photographer: Freaks out at having to pay Adobe a couple hundred bucks a year to edit, organize, share, and store all of their photos.

Y'all suck.

I’m pretty familiar with how photographers feel about spending money on every one of the items you mentioned, and not only are your prices off base—even as placeholders—I don’t know of a single photographer who doesn’t value their money as much as anyone else. What you’re saying is, “Don’t be upset that the cost of tires just doubled, ‘cause you spent $30,000 on your car!!!”

I might have a CC subscription (until it runs out) but I don’t use Adobe to organize, share or store my photos, in part because that would involve spending more money in my case.

I also find myself using Affinity and ProCreate instead of Adobe’s five or six tangled PlaySkool apps on iOS that, when combined in the right order, are able to achieve roughly the same results—though with less fine control.
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I remember getting Photoshop 5 and thinking it was the most amazing software on earth. Bought a WOW book (remember them?) and ploughed through it, making 3d text and putting brains in jars. All adobe products were eye-wateringly expensive, but they seemed worth the money and remained viable for years. If you had an old G4 laying around, Photoshop 5 could still perform most of the functions you need today.

Today you’re asked to pay a subscription for software, so they can change some icons, or fix bugs they left in on release. People even rent word processors and note apps now. Note apps! Sooner or later you are paying in perpetuity for something that literally cannot improve in any appreciable way.

The ghetto, usurious rent-to-own business model has arrived on our digital devices and it diffing its claws in deep. Renting a note taking app is really nearing the pinnacle of absolute financial absurdity, even if it’s “just 99 cents a month.”

 

[carrrrrlos]

How about fixing all the bugs first.

 

[Smeaton1724]

I still have an iBook G4 running Photoshop CS2 very well, one off software licence cost and the hardware has a reliable keyboard.

 

[pika2000]

Cool, time for their users to test out ThePirateBay.

That makes no sense.
Resorting to piracy only solidifies Adobe’s stronghold as you won’t likely learn other software, and thus sooner or later, you’ll stuck with just Adobe. And by that time, when you are forced to use legit software for work or whatnot, Adobe is probably already quadruple the price.

I encourage those who use Lightroom to move away en mass. Give alternative software like on1 a try. The more people support the alternatives, the better they will be as a competitor. Adobe can do what they do right now because they are practically the “MS Office” of photography/image/vector editing software. On the bright side, plenty of alternative for Adobe Photoshop, but Lightroom alternatives that are good are still few and far in between.