Adobe, a well-known name among photographers, finally made the decision that we as photographers will certainly not appreciate. They are no longer going to have a standalone licensed version of Adobe Lightroom after 2017. For those of us who have been a creative cloud user for a long time, deep inside our hearts, we knew this decision would come one day. Lightroom 6 is the last standalone version offered by Adobe outside of the creative cloud. Lightroom 6 will not be updated with bug fixes and camera RAW updates after 2017. So yeah, all the excitement about new dslr cameras to be released in 2018 will come to a full stop sadly. But let's talk about what has changed.
Lightroom has 2 version now, which is actually quite confusing as Adobe decided to keep the same name. One is called as Adobe Lightroom CC and the other one is Lightroom Classic CC. The one already on our desktops or laptops has been renamed to Adobe Lightroom Classic CC, and it is a part of creative cloud service. It is the full-fledged digital asset management and photo editing tool like it existed before. I personally didn't like the name change, it makes the Lightroom sound outdated. Lightroom CC is the online cloud-based version of Lightroom and has fewer features than the Lightroom Classic CC. Maybe Adobe decided to do make a lighter version to have an edge over Apple when it comes to Lightroom CC vs Apple photos battle. One positive aspect of Lightroom CC is the ability to sync easily whether you are using it on an iPad, Mobile or a laptop. Some of the features missing in Lightroom CC are:
Hotkeys
Keyword sync
Colour labels
Tone curves
DSLR Camera profiles or Lens Correction.
| Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC |
In this section, I want to talk about what has changed in Lightroom Classic CC. First and the major breakthrough is the drastic improvement in speed. Yeah, try it yourself. Switching modes is considerably faster now and so is importing/cataloging RAW dslr images. Importing a folder of 2000 Canon dslr RAW images took approx 6 minutes on my desktop. My machine specs for the curious minds:
250 GB Samsung SSD
8 GB RAM
AMD A10 Processor
No dedicated GPU
Windows 10.
In addition to this, there is a new feature called as range mask feature. It is located under local adjustment (linear, radial, etc.). If you think you will be okay with a monthly subscription with Adobe, Lightroom Classic CC is the tool to keep. But what are the possible replacements for someone who doesn't want to go for a creative cloud subscription?
Few of the photo editing tools I have personally tried include RAWTherapee, Darktable, Affinity photo, ACDSee, Capture One Pro and Photoscape X. All of them have their own place in the market, so it's hard to appoint one as the best replacement for Lightroom Classic CC.
If you think this post was helpful, share the photography love. :)
Related Articles
This post first appeared on Free Dslr Photography Tips And Tutorials, please read the originial post: here
