Back to using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC

So after several months of using my 2018 Apple iPad Pro 12.9" with the 512GB hard drive, I am back to using my 2013 Apple MacBook Pro with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC.  It is totally frustrating.  I've been using my Sony RX100 Mark VII as my main photography camera.  Apple has not updated the RAW engine so my photos are incompatible with iPadOS.  They are incompatible with Windows 10 as well.  Recently Adobe released the RAW software for the Sony RX100 Mark VII and the Sony AR7 Mark IV.  I absolutely love my Sony RX100 Mark VII.  It's my go to camera/camcorder.  I know the 2013 Apple MacBook Pro can handle editing pictures and 1080 video from the Sony RX100 Mark VI and VII.  Just takes a while to edit 4K footage.  

I was at Mud Lake for a bit today and I was thinking that I really want to use the photos from the Sony RX100 Mark VII.  I read somewhere online that Adobe finally updated the RAW plugins for its software suites to finally use the Sony RX100 Mark VII.  I'm going to use Lightroom Classic CC on my MacBook Pro for a while.  

I really wanted to use my iPad Pro with the iPadOS but iPadOS and the photography software is just not there yet.  Maybe give it another year and it'll be there but it's not there yet unfortunately.  The apps I use have to be fully upgraded for use with iPadOS and external hard drive support.  I'm just going to use Lightroom Classic and Affinity Photo even though I do have access to Photoshop.  I like Affinity Photo much better.

Subscription versus ownership

Oh Adobe how you had me before the subscription service.  I was a big Photoshop and Lightroom user.  Now, not so much.  ON1 Photo Raw 18.5 and Serif' Affinity Photo are my software packages of choice.  Just as feature rich, just as if not more stable, ON1 Photo Raw 18.5 and Serif' Affinity Photo are the software of choice of hobbyist, semi-pro and pro photographers photo editing software.  Starting at $9.99US a month just for Lightroom and Photoshop and ending at $82.99US a month for all the software plus Adobe Stock is just not worth it.

When I was using the $9.99US option with Adobe, I just used Lightroom for 99.9% of my edits.  Lightroom was just fine.  I never went into Photoshop at all.  Maybe once ever six months to see some new features.  But that was about it.  Paying $9.99US was just not worth it.

I had asked some of photography buddies to see what they were using.  90% were using ON1 Photo Raw 18.5. For $99.99US (as of this time) you get a pretty damn good Digital Asset Management tool.  You get a discount on it now as well her for a grand total of $49.99. So basically this is what you will pay for Adobe in 5 months in a one time payment.  I'd say that's a lot better.  And you own the license to the software.  With Adobe's Creative Cloud, there is no license.  Everything is stored in the cloud as far as licensing goes.  You can still store your photos locally on your hard drive along with the programs.  But as soon as you stop paying for the subscription, the majority of the program stops working.  

ON1 Photo Raw 18.5 has a slight learning curve but I seem to pick it up easily.  All the concepts are pretty much the same.  Just the interface is a bit different.  Both ON1 Photo Raw 18.5 and Affinity Photo are great, proven programs with pretty much the same features as Photoshop and Lightroom.  If and when Serif comes out with a Digital Asset Management software, I will be switching over to that.

Now I gotta pack up my stuff so I can go fly my drone so I can edit more videos.

Favourite duck

I go to Mud Lake often to shoot nature and wildlife photography and wildlife videos.  Mud Lake is located in Ottawa.  It's a lake surrounded by a lush green forest and is near a water filtration plant.  It's a peaceful refuge if you just want to get away.  It's got several nature trails and is really convenient as it's located within city limits.

You get a lot of turtles and various water fowl.  A lot of herons and a lot of various types of ducks such as the above Male Wood duck.  It's my favourite kind of duck.  It's not as friendly as the regular mallard duck as they don't seem to like going near humans.  But that's ok for us photographers with our lenses and large sensors.  We can crop our photographs to still get a nice image.

The importance of computers and post processing.

I have two Apple computers.  A late 2015 iMac with a 5k 27" retina monitor with a 2GB video card, 1TB fusion drive and 32GB of memory.  I also have an early 2013 Macbook Pro with a 2.7Ghz processor, a 500GB SSD hard drive, 1TB video card and 16GB of RAM.

I absolutely love both of these computers.  Why?  Because they just work.  They're responsive and I don't have to fix them every couple of days.  They just work.  I edit 1080p 60fps video on both using FCP X and edit 20.2 megapixel photos created with multiple Canon EOS 6D bodies and various lenses.

I use Mac computers because the administration and upkeep is pretty non existent compared to any Windows bases PC's.  I work for a federal government department that use Windows 7 and Windows 8 PC's.  Let me tell you, they are a headache compared to Macs.  Driver updates, software updates, hardware replacements etc.  For home, you go Mac or nothing else.  Yeah, Macs are more expensive, but you get what you pay for.  In my time, I've built my own Frankenstein PC's and used different MS operating systems from Windows 98 to Windows 10.  When I need things to work, I use an OS X based computer.