It happened unexpectedly, unannounced. One day I was minding my own business, reading email, and one popped into my feed. Oh, no, another ad. But this one was different. It was from that venerable king of creative editing software – Adobe. It was a reminder that my subscription for my Photography Plan would renew in a month. Ok, great. Then I saw it, at the bottom.
Near the bottom of the message was a notice. My new price would be 40% higher than my current price!!!
I’ve been aware of the new Adobe pricing structure for a while and had heard that many creatives were moving away from the behemoth because of that new price. I had locked in for a couple of years, so wasn’t feeling any pain – yet.
I quickly went online to check the validity of the email and noted that where there used to be a variety of prices and combinations for photography, there were now just two: Lightroom and Photoshop + 1TB of cloud storage OR Lightroom + 1TB of cloud storage. Cloud storage used to be optional and separate.
This told me two things.
- That Adobe is less focused (pardon the pun) on photography now and more focused on digital creation. This was in obvious evidence at the recent Adobe Max event. The program and plan options for those who “hallucinate” their creative work rather than shoot it with a camera are huge. Not so much for us shutter clickers.
- That Adobe is beginning the push to cloud based software, starting the process to wean legacy users of their self-managed products away from those products to those where the cloud plays a necessary role. That role is two-fold, in that it provides a “convenient” way to manage images across multiple platforms and it reduces the complexity of the software that has to sit on the computer itself.
Hybrid software or fully web-based software where much of the computing is done remotely (in the cloud) is the way of the future. The software itself is so complex now that much of it can’t reside on the local PC or if it does, it is so complex to build to account for all the possible hardware configurations (old and new) out there. Part of me is surprised that Adobe Lightroom Classic has survived this long.
I don’t actually fault Adobe for going down the road of hybrid and web-based software and I actually appreciate the software options available to me. I very much appreciate the functionality of the software – it has changed enormously over the past 18 months and for the better. What I don’t appreciate is the random pricing decisions that seem to have emerged from the behemoth over that same period, right on the heels of record profit reports.
Other software vendors offer multiple options for purchasing their products, including single forever licenses, basic subscriptions with basic editing functions and advanced subscriptions that include most of the AI-driven products emerging now. The subscriptions keep the software up to date. The forever licenses let you decide when/if to upgrade.
Adobe does offer another option: the Elements line of applications, which are slimmed down, more logically organized (IMHO) versions of their flagship products. It used to be that you could purchase an annual release and own it forever. Now even here, the profit gods get you. Instead, you now receive a license for 3 years. After that, the application(s) just don’t work anymore and presumably, you have to get the latest release. It’s an interesting strategy – providing a slimmed down version for hobbyists that includes some really interesting functionality like some of the AI tools available today in their big brothers, then brick it in 3 years and force you to buy again. It’s also interesting that their latest sale price for Elements is 40% lower than regular pricing, while my full featured subscription is 40% more.
After I recovered from all the frustration at this news, I made a decision. I would abandon Photoshop. I still need Adobe. While other tools provide good editing options, only Adobe provides the photo organization options I want. Not important to many, this is important to me. Lightroom Classic still offers the best way for me to manage my collection. So I bit the bullet and signed up for the Lightroom only plan – at the same price I currently pay for the full featured plan. I swallowed hard and held my nose.
Since subscribing to the new plan, Adobe has sent me numerous emails welcoming me to the family and offering links to educational resources – oddly some of which are 5 years old or more. Not a nice way to acknowledge someone who has been a client for more than a decade. I have unsubscribed to those emails.
But this story does have an unexpectedly happy ending. Adobe Photoshop’s main competitor, Affinity Photo, was purchased by the digital design company Canva and users have been waiting to hear what would happen with the photo editor and what purchase or subscription plans, if any, would come from them. In a totally unexpected move, they have made Affinity Photo (now just Affinity) FREE! I downloaded it immediately and spent an afternoon getting to know it. It is strangely familiar – with tools and capabilities that parallel Photoshop. It doesn’t, in the free version, include AI driven tools for image correction, enhancement and “hallucination”, but I don’t use most of those anyway, and am thankful not to be paying for them. I do still have the right AI driven functionality in Lightroom which is perfect.
Also unexpectedly surprising is that one of the developers of Affinity is an avid astro photogrqapher. As such, he has made available a suite of tools that help stack, calibrate and process my astro images. Another wonderful unexpected bonus.
So, the more things change, the more they remain the same. I still have a good price for my editing software and still have roughly the same functionality I had before this news from Adobe. Now if only someone would give me a quality asset management tool, I would step away from the behemoth completely. We will see what happens next year!
It is the time of year to shop around for deals. Hope you find some that appeal to you. Any my very best wishes for the holiday season!
oldgirlphotography.ca 