To Adobe CC or not to CC

[Geoff79]

I use ACDsee Photo Studio Ultimate. works well for me. although you may find the same issue with OS versions

A free option is Darktable. It has a fairly steep learning curve, but seems to have a lot of functionality.

Yeah, I tried both of them after various recommendations along the way. Wasn't a fan of either, personally.

I think I said elsewhere, but to invest as much time as I have in PS and to give it up would seem a bit obscene to me.

[Glenda]

Firstly in regard to upgrading your iMac. I recently did this and am being forced to use an older version of Photoshop CC, ie 2021, because of the M1 chip on the mac. It's also preventing the use of some of the plugins I use, although companies are updating their software. With time this should be sorted out, but frustrating at present. However, 2021 CC is still a huge upgrade from Ps6.

Have you ever tried Affinity Photo? I haven't personally tried it but know some who use it and they are very pleased with its capabilities. It's apparently very similar to Photoshop and if I remember correctly was originally developed for Macs. I think I also read somewhere that it will recognise PSD files and allow you to work on them, but not 100% sure. The only thing which turned me off getting it was that my Topaz plugins wouldn't be able to be used.

[Geoff79]

Firstly in regard to upgrading your iMac. I recently did this and am being forced to use an older version of Photoshop CC, ie 2021, because of the M1 chip on the mac. It's also preventing the use of some of the plugins I use, although companies are updating their software. With time this should be sorted out, but frustrating at present. However, 2021 CC is still a huge upgrade from Ps6.

Have you ever tried Affinity Photo? I haven't personally tried it but know some who use it and they are very pleased with its capabilities. It's apparently very similar to Photoshop and if I remember correctly was originally developed for Macs. I think I also read somewhere that it will recognise PSD files and allow you to work on them, but not 100% sure. The only thing which turned me off getting it was that my Topaz plugins wouldn't be able to be used.

Yeah, I did have Affinity, I think. It's really good for HDR stuff, I think, isn't it? I used it a few times for really hard blends, but in the end always went back to PS.

Interesting what you say about your Mac and PS. How old is the Mac? I have a few glitches, mostly in Bridge, but generally speaking, my laptop has been okay with the new CC. It's slowed the computer down, but for the most part it's pretty decent. Far as I know I get all the functions I need from the new CC?

[Glenda]

The issues with mine are mostly with plugins which is frustrating, although thankfully Topaz Denoise AI now works. I upgraded to a new desktop a few months ago, mainly because my old one was so slow with Photoshop as it kept upgrading. The old one was about 11 years old by memory. I think you may be thinking of Aurora which is a Skylum software package for HDR.

[Hawthy]

Late to the conversation, but for what it's worth, I have used Adobe CC for at least 12 years. So at $14 per month I have paid over $2,000 in total. That sounds a lot but if you split a $16 bottle of wine four times a week with your spouse, that would have cost $40K over 12 years, so it's all relative. I just see it as a cost of my hobby.
I use Bridge to import photos from the camera and then use only Photoshop. I really like the flexibility that layers provide in terms of adjusting opacity on your adjustments. Lightroom just seems a bit...well...light, I suppose. Photoshop is as complex as you want it to be, or as simple as you want it to be.
There are so many online tutorials on every aspect of Photoshop that it is mind boggling.
As for system needs, I am using a PC that I bought on eBay in 2008. It has 8GB of RAM and an Intel i3 processor with four cores (I think). The best thing that I did was put Windows and other programs on an internal Solid State Drive and kept my old hard drive for file storage. For a couple of hundred bucks it really improved start-up time and overall performance.