Adobe AE, PS and LR

[thoneter]

I'm sure this topic has been addressed on here b4. I'm tired of Adobe's CC autorenewel for 1 million dollars. I see there's Capture One Pro for $299 which replaces LR. Looking for something that will replace AE and PS. Tired of going broke using Adobe products!

 

[AeroJ]

DaVinci Resolve 15 free (for video) & GIMP (for photos).

 

[Steve Carr]

I recently started using Luminar which is a one time fee of $59. Luminar - The Best Photo Editing Software for Mac & PC | Skylum (ex-Macphun)
Also Aurora HDR from the same people for $99. It has a nice one click autofix plus lots of presets. Luminar - The Best Photo Editing Software for Mac & PC | Skylum (ex-Macphun)

 

[Ty Pilot]

Like you @thoneter I had to drop the Adobe Suite after over ten years due to the ridiculous costs forced onto honest people so that those in the third world could buy copies of these programs for as little as one US dollar; but I digress.

In particular I had to drop the Video Suite due to the fact that my CS4 can no longer work with the new video file types, however; I still have Adobe Photoshop CS4 and use it in my work to edit commercial photographs in DNG. There is a great work flow to use older Photoshop along with Adobe DNG converter - which is free. That is the for the photo side of course.

On the video side; After Effects really has no equal that costs less as it is not a video editor in the real sense - it is more of a computer graphics and animation processor. Premiere Pro on the other hand is a great NLE but here again costs too much.

The best way to address the problem is to ask yourself what did you do in After Effects that you just can't do without, then find the solution. For me there were certain things, like titles and so forth that I wanted to create on my own - I don't like the 'canned' 1980 types of effects and transitions that come with cheap editors so I try to find a way to integrate what I can and get along with what I must.

I have found for straight forward video editing - Cyberlink Power Director Ultimate is doing a great job of allowing me to directly import up to as many as four different kinds of video files types without any external converting - that is big. It gives adequate control over the all important render phase and while not as good as Adobe - for the price it is pretty dang good. On the down side; all of the attempts by editors like PD to allow things like; tracking, video stabilization, animation and so much more that AE was great at - is just in its infancy in Power Director and all others costing far less than Adobe.

 

[Eagle's Eye Video]

On the photo side, of course the other option is to go old school as Ty mentions... I recently did an upgrade from Photoshop CS2 to CS5. I have always been of the opinion that subscription based software is paying a continuing royalty as opposed to a one-time licensing fee for use, built into the purchase price.

As far as video, frankly DaVinci Resolve is a spectacular program... but between the true hardware requirements for smooth performance and the steep learning curve make it too much for most, unless you're running broadcast production level. I do not have experience with Power Director, but Ty Pilot's recommendation is an endorsement I'll go with.

 

[thoneter]

Thanks to all for the replies. Unfortunately my Adobe learning curves are behind me. $600/year is astronomical. As to the After Effects here are some that I did. Might want to lower your volume so you don't lose your hearing!

http://thonepc.com/thonepc/Vids/GoldenParticleIntro.mp4
http://thonepc.com/thonepc/Vids/Decay.mp4
http://thonepc.com/thonepc/Vids/GoldenParticleIntro2.mp4
http://thonepc.com/thonepc/Vids/LogoColorParticles.mp4
http://thonepc.com/thonepc/Vids/MarkDavisSmokeLogo2.mp4

So for me AE is beneficial. This dog is going to have to learn some new tricks. Thanks again for the input. TT

 

[record.play.rewind]

I'm sure this topic has been addressed on here b4. I'm tired of Adobe's CC autorenewel for 1 million dollars. I see there's Capture One Pro for $299 which replaces LR. Looking for something that will replace AE and PS. Tired of going broke using Adobe products!

I’ve done retouching commercially. Capture One is not a replacement of LR. Having Adobe products is an investment and its tool are quite useful, but it also depends on the degree that you use the for.

 

[YuKay]

I'm sure this topic has been addressed on here b4. I'm tired of Adobe's CC autorenewel for 1 million dollars. I see there's Capture One Pro for $299 which replaces LR. Looking for something that will replace AE and PS. Tired of going broke using Adobe products!

If you've got a Mac, the easy and amazingly cheap ($50) alternative to AE is Apple Motion. Now a standalone program for creating video animations, text FX, etc, it is faster than AE and much easier to get into as it's possible to create animations without keyframing. Of course, it's not as deep as AE but for the great majority of needs, it's a brilliant tool for the price of a meal.

Having learned AE from an early age, I love it; but I hardly ever need to use it nowadays.

 

[thoneter]

If you've got a Mac, the easy and amazingly cheap ($50) alternative to AE is Apple Motion. Now a standalone program for creating video animations, text FX, etc, it is faster than AE and much easier to get into as it's possible to create animations without keyframing. Of course, it's not as deep as AE but for the great majority of needs, it's a brilliant tool for the price of a meal.

Having learned AE from an early age, I love it; but I hardly ever need to use it nowadays.

Don't have a MAC but for the savings it would be nice

 

[Santa]

Has anyone had experience with CyberLink PowerDirector 16 or CyberLink PhotoDirector 9 for Windows PC?

 

[Ty Pilot]

Yes, Power Director 16 Ultimate.

 

[thoneter]

Looks like I'm going to have to go through each individual program to see which one works best for the bang. Seems like a daunting endeavor having to download and try each program to see what it offers. It really does suck how the US pays up the ying yang and other countries get it for a steal. Not such a fan of Adobe anymore!

 

[thoneter]

I’ve done retouching commercially. Capture One is not a replacement of LR. Having Adobe products is an investment and its tool are quite useful, but it also depends on the degree that you use the for.

I agree that the Adobe products are commercial grade and do more than I can imagine. I've been learning AE and love the final results. I've used the results for my businesses and personal enjoyment. My issue with Adobe is that they auto renew and have no break downs for cost for us plunkers.

 

[thoneter]

Found a very similar program to Lightroom called DarkTable. Very impressed with its capabilities and the price is comparable to Adobe products at $0. darktable - the photo workflow software You can toggle the various settings which is better than LR.