Is Adobe Photoshop still focused on photography?

I'm completely in agreement with you..I'm a huge fan of Lightroom and very very occasionally I still edit something in PS.. I couldn't manage without Lightroom .. but I really don't need PS and certainly not AI .. maybe it's because of my age.. I think a photo should remain a photo and with AI you don't know what's real

Hi Nando

I share your opinion and can also relate well to Donald's opinion. I once started with Photoshop CS and later with Lightroom 3 and then version 5, which was even supplied for free with a Canon camera at the time.
Now I work almost exclusively with Lightroom and with Topaaz where necessary (noise and sharpening). Photoshop still comes into play occasionally when I have to work with multiple layers or a lot needs to be changed in the background or when distracting reflections need to be removed. AI is very useful for this (removing reflections in glasses in portrait photos is now a piece of cake).
What does bother me is that Photoshop refuses to edit photos that, according to Adobe's view, are 'offensive'. Then it suddenly has to be done the traditional way again. A pregnancy photo in lingerie or even covered nudity, for example, is refused for editing with AI. This therefore means that the photos we edit in Photoshop are checked every time. 'Big Brother is watching us ... '

Good luck still

Hi Nando, although I haven't used PS since the introduction of the subscription (rental), I started looking for an alternative because you then became dependent on the internet for everything and had nothing left when you cancelled. I have used Silkypix pro as a RAW converter from the beginning and I still do. For PS I searched and tried Luminar and Affinity. Luminar was/is still too fake in my opinion (replacing entire skies etc). You can continue using Luminar afterwards and sometimes there are still tools to use under editing, such as black/white, straightening etc.
For PS now Affinity 2 and that works fine
.

What is wrong with capture ome pro? I would like a follow-up to the existing course package

kok.f@ziggo.nl wrote on Tuesday 7 May 2024 at 11:41  | reply

Yes and no. For me too, LRc is sufficient for about 90% of the photos. Still, I wouldn't want to miss the possibilities PS offers for the other 10%. Besides being a photographer, I also want to be an image maker, and then I like to make use of the whole bag of tricks. Of course, LRc can do a lot nowadays with its masking techniques, but PS's adjustment layers still allow you to do more, and PS has even more tools that aren't in LRc. I do look forward to the moment when Adobe integrates PS and LR into one program.

Stefanie wrote on Tuesday 7 May 2024 at 13:00  | reply

I'm orienting myself towards Affinity Photo as a replacement for PS, Lightroom never really grabbed me and it's part of the same subscription formula that I actually want to get away from right now. From what I've found so far, I should be able to bring my own brushes with me to Affinity and the layout looks comparable, which should make switching easier (or am I wrong?) I have the feeling that Adobe is fully committing to AI, especially AI-generated images, and that's fun of course, but it's not what I want from PS (or any editing program) and you do pay for it ...

I agree with you that AI is actually a magic word that everything seems to revolve around. That indeed has nothing to do with photography, that also goes a number of steps too far for me. However, PS does have one major advantage, and that is working with layers. If, for example, I take a portrait photo and I am going to even out the skin, I do that in a separate layer, if I am going to clone away imperfections, I do that in another layer, if I am going to add highlights, I use yet another layer. This ensures that I can easily redo things by deleting 1 layer without losing a whole lot of other edits. So PS is indeed for photo editing, but it just depends on how you use it.

I agree. I've been saying it for years: Photoshop is actually an image manipulation program, NOT a photo editor! So the name was poorly chosen. But Adobe is good at that, judging by the misunderstandings about the different Lightroom versions that still haven't been dispelled... Lightroom is in fact focused on photo editing (and more). A very simple fact that actually makes this immediately clear: with Photoshop you can create a new image file 'from scratch', while with Lightroom you can only work (and that is moreover MUCH more than just editing!!) with existing (photo) files.

Photoshop’s layers functionality is increasingly and more extensively being taken over by the Masking capabilities in the latest versions of Lightroom Classic. Moreover, ALL edits in Lightroom are non-destructive, so they can be undone. Layers are no longer an argument for me to make the (for me scarce) excursion from Lightroom Classic to Photoshop. In fact, as Lightroom continues through the evolutionary phase it is currently in, more and more of those arguments are disappearing like snow in the sun...

Do bear this in mind, though: Reporter photography strives for pure reality and involves no creativity. Creative photography is first and foremost seeing things, not only as they are, but also as they could have been. Or rather: Good photography is proof against the mistaken notion that this art is merely an imitation of reality.

I agree with a number of things, others are more difficult for me. A fact remains -at least for me-that Photoshop also clearly remains superior for photography. It is indeed true that both that Beta version and part of the AI are being imposed on us rather forcefully. I hardly work with the Beta version, because it mainly operates in an experimental state, which I myself have little use for. AI sometimes offers astonishing performances, but equally very disappointing situations. It is clear and fortunately so that the human brain, although it works much more slowly than AI, on the other hand remains the unique solution for small but not unimportant additions and improvements. As far as I am concerned I use both LR (a very decent program) and PS.LR I mainly use for improvements and adjustments of a general nature. Nearly all my photos are subsequently exported to PS, where more local adjustments are necessary and where selections, and layers, and masks are dreamlike irreplaceable tools, which cannot be found elsewhere, not even in LR. What I do not use in LR is the archiving function: which undeniably has gigantic capacity, but -perhaps because I do not know it sufficiently- in which I have no confidence for fear of losing all my edited photos in the event of an incorrect action, which I have unfortunately experienced with quite a few photographer friends, and of course also because I ultimately export and edit nearly all my photos somewhere in PS anyway and keep them as Tif(so that selections remain preserved) alongside jpg. If you also make Power presentations then you simply cannot do without PS, in case you want to do more as a transition between the photos than classic successive slides flowing into one another. For example cutting out part of your photo (e.g. a waterfall), and by your own intervention replacing that zone with something else (via clone stamp), and subsequently sliding the original photo with falling water over the altered photo seems rather more spectacular to me. Or making three photos from one photo, with a tree cut out at 3 different sizes, projecting them one after another as a growing tree. You cannot do without PS there. In short Lightroom is a very good editing program for me (even somewhat better than the raw editing in PS), as archiving it has inexhaustible possibilities but with inherent risks. PS on the other hand allows the photographer to work out his photo completely according to his own wishes into a little gem. Remember this once and for all: good photography is only possible if you are patient and willing to take all the time for its editing.

Quote: 'Keep this in mind: photojournalism strives for pure reality' end quote.
I can still remember that during the yellow vest protests in France, a photojournalist published a photo of a huge fire that had been set. The photo was taken in such a way that it appeared to be a huge fire, but in fact it was a tiny little fire of nothing. Is that then 'pure reality'? The way in which pure reality is captured can in itself already be manipulative without it having been tampered with in Photoshop or any other editing software.

Is there no one who uses GIMP as a replacement for Photoshop?

Photoshop is and remains the best program after all. You don't have to use it but you can use it. Depending on what you want. For the majority it is the fear because it is often too difficult to learn because it contains countless possibilities. You can also ignore AI. But that is also the case with digital work. With one photo I do use it and with the other I don't.
I also often enjoy working analogue again but you manipulate in the darkroom too.
We see the world in colour so monochrome is actually already manipulation. Ever since photography began, people have been manipulating. Does AI have a future? Nobody can say. It depends on whether it is accepted by the user themselves. Think of 3D TV. People were lyrical and now you hardly see it anymore. Nothing is as changeable as people themselves.

Nando, GIMP can also be used on a Windows platform.

Nando, I know your opinion about Luminar. You are right that it is a revenue model for Skylum. However, Adobe’s subscription model is too. In the past, Photoshop was only accessible to the professional market because of the price. Now, with the subscription model, Photoshop has become accessible to a broad audience and that has certainly paid off for Adobe.
I generally find Luminar’s AI functionality better than that of Ps. In my opinion, Adobe jumped on the AI bandwagon much too late and is lagging behind in terms of functionality.
I mainly use Luminar to quickly get a photo ready for Facebook. I always do the serious post-processing in Photoshop.

Hi Nando,
A piece that clearly evokes (various) emotions.
I have been processing my own work since 1963, only b&w, since '97 on the computer, an old Apple my brother gave me, with PS 3.5 on it. with 8 Mb of ram you did need some patience😉, but back then, with my first (Epson) printer, I could also make color photos 'to size'. That old version was very limited, but most of what I needed/need was already in it. Over the years I grew along with it a bit, better PC, better ( read larger) printer (Canon Pro 200 by now), and by now also tried other programs. Lightroom did not appeal to me, the importing and the way of archiving. Nikon's own raw converter NXII ( I had to buy it) was quite good, but 'discontinued', replaced by a free version from Nikon, which does quite well for 90% of cases, but, if there is something disturbing in the image, or a color or opacity needs to be adjusted locally, I always reach back for PS. Although I bought Affinity after rave reviews, I can't make head nor tail of it, unlike my daughter, who uses it often.
In summary: PS still has a right to exist, I know nothing about the AI version, many of the AI I use is that of the Topaz filters, fun and sometimes excellent, but also often just not what you would want, one's own eyes,months and brain are still the only real I.

Post-processing has always been around. "Back then" in the analog era, it was done in the darkroom. In the digital era, much more extensive post-processing can be done.

That Adobe emphasizes using their AI functions is, of course, all about the way AI works. We, the users, are the teachers who teach the system how we want to manipulate our photos. Without our input, it is dumber than a toddler, because a toddler can independently study its surroundings. Without us as users, there is no input for the algorithms. Adobe obviously wants to be the best and therefore needs as many users as possible. It does seem a bit like toddler behavior again.

fortunately, most users are no longer toddlers.
You don't have to use Photoshop, no one is stopping you.

Yet it is mentioned in my comment see Tuesday 7 May....

The Remove tool is also the reason I use Photoshop. But I usually still have to use the clone stamp because Remove fills the selection with strange pixel patterns

luc.vc@icloud.com wrote on Wednesday 15 May 2024 at 11:00  | reply

Hi Nando,

Why was the step to LR so difficult? Was it learning to master LR ?