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So what's going on at Adobe or what's Lightroom Classic
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10-20-2017, 09:59 PM Terry Mieger
Starting to get questions about what happened to Lightroom. Adobe has produced a whole new app called Lightroom CC WHAT THE...Yes Lightroom CC. They then renamed the Lightroom app we have and use,The Lightroom Classic Take about screwing thongs up with a nonsensical name change. The New CC is totally new and different it is 100% Cloud based which seems to be where the world is going like it or not. The are some really neat advantages. You can work on the files cross platform, anywhere on tablet or computer. Your full sized image files are stored in the cloud so need need for backups etc. Blazing retrieval speed (Ha, ha that's a joke). It sounds intriguing and the editing software look really limited, plugins don't work and not sure if the file system (no more Library Module) would work.
The LR Classic is an improve update for what we have been using. It will still save Smart Previews on the Cloud for LR Mobile. (So why the rename- just to confuse I assume). I recommend and what I will do is, unless you really need the club stuff. Is update your LR CC to LR Classic for now.

There are 3 price plans, then most of us have now - LR Classic+PS+20 GB etc for $9.99/month LR CC (cloud) + 1TB storage (no PS or Classic etc) for $9.99/month or LR CC +LR Classic + PS etc for $19.99/month
10-21-2017, 07:20 AM Roger Clark
There are a lot of complaints online about the new lightroom. If you have an old version of lightroom and elect the new CC, the install WILL REMOVE old versions of lightroom unless you check a box that says keep old versions (not sure of the exact text so look carefully). Once old versions are gone, people are complaining there is no way to get them back.

Second, the CC version appears to only work if you upload your raw files to the cloud. So you need a good fast internet connection, including fast upload. Forget that if you are on safari in Africa, or even a typical hotel in the US in the evening when every other hotel guest is trying to get online. Also, check your terms of service, there may be caps on upload amounts per month.

Alternatives to lightroom for raw conversion include Capture One (not free), and Rawtherapee (free open source, windows, mac, linux). Rawtherapee is more advanced raw conversion than Adobe has, has many more options, but is a learning curve. Rawtherapee uses the latest advanced raw conversion algorithms made by researchers in the field and in my experience it produces sharper images with less noise, even in shadows than Adobe's raw converter. I have used rawtherapee a little but am a novice, but my plan is to move all my raw conversions to rawtherapee. Some of my TWE images were done in rawtherapee.

Another application like lightroom is darktable (free open source). It runs on macs and linux (no windows). It includes raw conversion and image management like lightroom. I have not tried it.

Gimp image processing continues to improve. Versions with full 16 and 32 bits/channel are now available but may still be in beta. But it should not be long now before gimp is a reasonable replacement for photographers. Gimp runs on macs. windows and linux.
10-21-2017, 02:10 PM Christopher Loffredo
Roger, what about Canon's raw converter Digital Photo Professional (DPP) which is free with Canon camera's. I assume Nikon must have something similar. I believe what you are saying is that, if you have a newer camera, as long as you can convert your raw files, you can continue to use an older version of Lightroom, even if it does not support the newer camera. The more I use Lightroom the less I seem to use Photoshop, which I think is good. But then, my concern is am I becoming too dependent on Adobe?

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