• Welcome to the Two Wheeled Texans community! Feel free to hang out and lurk as long as you like. However, we would like to encourage you to register so that you can join the community and use the numerous features on the site. After registering, don't forget to post up an introduction!

No Alternative to Lightroom?

Tracker

post tenebras lux
Forum Supporter
Joined
Dec 25, 2005
Messages
16,472
Reaction score
7,701
Location
Rowdylett, TX
First Name
Gary
It appears Adobe doesn't want me to download LR3 that I was fine with to put on my new PC.
Not really a subscription fan. Seems there's no other viable open source or budget alternatives to LR left?
 
You can still buy some older versions on disc.

[ame="http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Photoshop-Lightroom-Old-Version/dp/B00CH6ATMO/ref=sr_1_cc_2?s=aps&ie=UTF8&qid=1456068440&sr=1-2-catcorr&keywords=adobe+lightroom+retail"]Amazon.com: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5 [Old Version]: Software[/ame]
.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Adobe-Photo...495545?hash=item4af9523a39:g:g5kAAOSwDuJWw3xH

Before I got Lightroom I was using a combo of Picassa, PhotoScape and Gimp.
 
Last edited:
You can get a standalone version of the current release in stead of a subscription. If you were on a maco or Linux computer then there is the free software called Darktable that does a lot of the same stuff.
 
Rumors are that the current standalone Lightroom version 6 will be the last one "sold" (as opposed to only being offered by subscription)...
 
Rumors are that the current standalone Lightroom version 6 will be the last one "sold" (as opposed to only being offered by subscription)...

But still a rumor. Right now though the standalone only gets Adobed Camera Raw updates and bug fixes. The CC (subscription) version is done as a living product and gets new features every couple of months. Plus it includes the 800 pound gorilla called Photoshop.

I was very mixed as to which to get, but ended up with the CC version.
 
Old thread, but thanks for waking it up. I've been using the Classic CC version of Lightroom, so standalone desktop subscription, since it came out. However, I bought a couple of others to see if they would be alternatives. I got in on early bird specials on both. On1 Photo Raw and Skylum Luminar. Luminar had been promising a DAM (digital asset management) piece for a while and I was getting tired of waiting. That finally released and I'm under-impressed. On1 is faster for culling images and is very simple for DAM. It uses sidecar files for edit tracking. Editing in On1 is simple, Luminar is a bit more involved, but lots of features. One being layers, which Lightroom doesn't have. So you can do some edits on one layer and others on another layer and then turn certain layers off or remove them. Lightroom you can only step back through changes in history or just manually reset a change. Luminar also works as a plug in to Lightroom, which is nice for some of the effects they have.

However, Lightroom is still the king of asset management. It's catalog and keywording is way better than the other two. ON1 is going to/has a tool to migrate some info from LR catalog to their system, but I haven't tried it yet. It ia a one time transfer so I wanted to wait until after the holidays to do it.

If you just want a good editor for more than the occasional phone image, Luminar and On1 are good choices.

And yes, this means I'm still paying a subscription and bought two other products and paid for an upgrade to each. Each purchase was 1/2 to 3/4 the price of the LR subscription and the upgrades to those purchases were about 3/4 the price of the original purchase. So in real dollars, LR has been $120 a year. Each of the others has averaged $60 a year when you pay for upgrades. So half the cost. Of course, for me, it has worked out like two subscriptions for LR since I'm buying and upgrading two other products.

And I'm staying with Lightroom.
 
I use the Lightroom subscription. It recently got flagged as having an upgrade available. The new upgrade will ONLY run on Win 10. I run Win 7 and have no desire to upgrade to 10. So it looks like I will be using the same version of Lightroom for a while...
 
Been with LR for years and tried a few others when the CC came out. Just was too use to LR so went with the sub for LR CC Classic I can also do some stuff with Faststone image viewer as it's my go to when opening picture files.
Now, attempting to learn a bit about the said " 800 pound gorilla " LOL. Still just doing the lessons though.
 
Back
Top