EOL for Topaz Studio?

[MCAsan]

Yesterday I someone post on the Topaz Facebook page a message from someone at Topaz saying they were getting ready to pull the plug on Topaz Studio and replace it with something else. I had heard nothing about that from Topaz. So I wrote to their Support and asked if that story was true. Below is the response.


"Hi Michael,

That is correct. We will be making an announcement early next week once the details have been finalized. The announcement will be made through email. If you haven't already, you can sign up for our mailing list here!

Emily Dworkin
Support Specialist
M-F: 8:30am-5:30pm CST"

 

[robgendreau]

Oh geez. This is about the third re-vamp I've seen them make. They're starting to remind me of Macphun/Skylum. They seem to take discrete functions and repackage them in order to sell them again in a new form. This time it's by adding "AI" to the mix...sort of glorified "auto" button. Maybe if we wait another year they'll have a "Flex" like option for Topaz a la Macphun/Skylum's pivot back to plugins.

 

[MCAsan]

I wonder if we can refunds if this all goes south. Maybe, just maybe, we will hear a plausible narrative tomorrow.

 

[robgendreau]

This was in the forum today, from a VP of something:

I wouldn’t say “The End” it’s more of a new beginning. Topaz Studio will be succeeded by Topaz Art Studio. As the name implies it is heavily focused on the creation of different artistic looks and the user experience and workflows to do so. It has been in focused testing with multiple users over the last few months and will be entering into a closed beta later this week.

A more detailed letter concerning this topic will be published this week as well.

I will add that Topaz Art Studio is a re-imagining of Topaz Studio and shouldn’t pose any significant increase in hardware requirement other than the minimum Mac OS will be raised to 5.12 based on a low level library requiring it. Further, I wouldn’t categorize this move the same as from a legacy plugin to an AI product.
​

I myself use Topaz more for the artistic and special effects than stuff like raw development or retouching or say denoise, so maybe it's geared to me. I'll wait and see if they're going to just resell me the same stuff I already owned. But more likely going forward I'll just use the money for some different Photoshop actions and such; better investment long term. I got one of the suites (ADP Pro) for doing luminosity masks and it's phenomenal, a real time saver especially since my skill set in that arena is meh. I'd much rather invest in that than roll the dice with any other these other developers.

 

[MCAsan]

From the south of Topaz Art Studio, it is going 180 degrees from what I want and need. I do not want more looks of oil paint, watercolor, or charcoal drawings.

Evidently the new product will be called Topaz Art Studio.

 

[MCAsan]

Topaz dropped the name Art Studio (thank God) for the new Studio version. So they seem to just call it Studio 2 (works for me). I guess we will all know know more when it launches next week.


https://topazlabs.com/topaz-studio-2/

 

[robgendreau]

I was skeptical, but this actually makes sense. Topaz seems to be going in two directions: creative effects that are almost in the realm of digital design, and tools more for retouching and adjusting. Think watercolor transformation filters vs say just denoise. I use it mostly for the former, not the latter, so the new Studio will probably work for me. And for those of us who have paid for Topaz filters for use in Studio 1 they're going to give us credit up to the cost of the new Studio 2 (free if you've spent over $99US). Wish Skylum would've done that...but at this point probably wouldn't bother anyway.

 

[MCAsan]

Supposedly all will be revealed next week. That is at least a little concrete than a "soon" from Skylum.