Since I retired my photography related blog, I decided to occasionally do some photography posts on this blog. So, if you aren’t an uber photography geek, this would be a post to skip.
The Canon DPP freebie RAW processing software that is supplied with their DSLRs is usable, provides nice results and has a nice price tag. But for a fast workflow, I needed something better. Modern photography is not even half done when you snap the shutter. You can spend far more time post processing than you ever spent setting up the shot in the first place. So, fast workflow is important if you want to keep shooting instead of mouse clicking.
I am in the midst of deciding my RAW processing future. I used the free RAW Shooter Essentials and liked it enough to upgrade to the Premium version (RSP). I even added the Color Engine when it came out. I was very happy with this setup and the workflow, but then Adobe bought out the company and killed the product.
With my upgrade to a new camera that is not supported in RSP, I had no choice but to stop using it. To be fair to Adobe, they did provide a free downloadable copy of Lightroom, their new RAW processor, to all RSP customers. I have not really liked it nearly as much as RSP. After spending more time with it and reading the manual, it has grown on me a bit, but I’m still not that happy with it.
So, I downloaded an evaluation version of Bibble Pro. This package appeals to me for several reasons. I love that the lens distortion correction is integrated. Bibble also has a Linux version which appeals to me as I try to get off the Windoze platform. That said, I have decided to stick with Lightroom for awhile since Adobe is poised to own this market segment.
The problem is, Adobe is very likely to add new features in upcoming releases. Their current product is not mature. It’s at least usable now with version 1.2. The file management is horrid, but once you learn the quirks, you can do what you need to do. It’s just not intuitive. There’s no plug-in architecture (yet), but that is very likely to happen, probably in the next release. If they add lens distortion correction, that would further convince me to continue to use it. They have definitely decided to own this market segment. Their killing off the main competition and aggressive release schedule on a ‘built from the ground up’ RAW processor shows they want this market badly. This makes me afraid to lock myself into another product like Bibble Pro.
Oddly though, I may have to make the decision to go with Bibble anyway. I really don’t want to move to Windoze Siesta… err Vista… it’s just too slow and resource hogging. And as they’ve dumbed it down for the masses, it has lost power user features along the way. It will eventually go the way of those stupid product directions you get with assembly-required furniture. There are no words used, just pictures. Eventually, Windozes will be like that. So, my only choices are Mac or Linux and I’m leaning toward Linux which would mean Bibble since Adobe has not ported their apps to Linux yet, despite the fact that Photoshop is the single most requested Linux port request.
What’s a photographer to do? Life was simpler in the film days, eh?
