Hi, David, Godfrey and Frank!
I share David's concerns re. Adobe. As the late Tom Petty sang, "The
boys upstairs want to see, how much you'll pay for what you used to get
for free." Or in this case, how much more you'll pay for what you
already paid for. "Rent my software," aka subscription, is becoming the
new normal. Just like "rent my server," aka The Cloud. Many of us have
made the mistake of thinking that the makers of our favorite programs
are our friends. But they are businesses like any other. If we become a
captive market, we likely will be treated accordingly. How long before
the "boys upstairs" at Adobe decide that $10 per month isn't enough?
That's why I now use open source programs as much as possible, most
notably Libre Office, Thunderbird and 7-Zip. Plus a bunch of tools and
utilities. But in the more specialized fields I play in, the major open
source programs like Gimp (image editor) or MuseScore (music notation)
have limitations and inconveniences I'm not willing to live with. I'm
glad to hear that Raw Therapee is open source. I may want to look into
it if my current Raw developer (Capture One) decides to behave like Adobe.
I very much like the open source model in general. By its very nature,
such software won't attempt to corner the market and then hold us and
our work hostage to their rent-seeking. Let's hope that better
open-source alternatives emerge for our more specialized needs. They
may. Remember the early 1980s? A text-mode word processor, spreadsheet
or database for the PC each cost $500 or more (over $1,000 in today's
dollars). That's why freeware and shareware emerged--regular people
didn't want to pay Fortune 500 prices.
Adobe's behavior is not unique. Consider Sibelius, the music notation
software I've used for years. As of last year, new users must subscribe
forever. If they stop paying, the software won't save files anymore. So
any long-term projects are effectively frozen. The company is literally
holding their users' work hostage. And they don't even fix their bugs.
Long-time Sibelius users such as myself were "grandfathered." If we paid
an $89 fee and upgraded to the current version, we could use it in
perpetuity. But we still lose support or the ability to upgrade further
if we don't pay the fee again every year. I paid the upgrade fee--once,
for "insurance"--and I am looking at another program. I am far from alone.
My Raw processor is Capture One. It came with my M8, and I've always
liked it. So I stayed with it, upgrading regularly, but occasionally
skipping a major version. A couple of years ago they began offering a
both subscription and a purchase model. Just last week I received an
email from them. It stated that I needed to upgrade from v. 8 to v. 10
soon, or else go on a subscription model. Otherwise I would lose the
right to upgrade further or get support. Hmm. Could this be the
beginning of a move to subscription only? I don't like where that may
be leading. But for now, I still find Capture One an excellent program,
and a more reasonable alternative to the "Adobe Tax."
What to do if you don't want subscribe to Adobe? You could buy the
perpetually licensed version of Lightroom, and don't buy any new cameras
it doesn't support. :-) Or switch to Raw Therapee. If Raw Therapee isn't
comprehensive enough, use it to do just basic white balance, then
develop your files to 16-bit TIFFs (yup, Godfrey is right). These will
retain all the information you need. Then do all your other adjustments
in a regular image editor. I use Picture Window Pro as my general image
editor. It does everything in 16 bits. As of this year, PWP is no longer
being developed, and it became freeware. It does everything I need that
Capture One doesn't do.
--Peter
------
Unsubscribe or change to/from Digest Mode at:
http://www.lrflex.furnfeather.ca/
Archives are at:
//www.freelists.org/archives/leicareflex/
