robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Unless you pay for the plan with cloud storage the only thing in the Adobe cloud/servers is your subscription info with adobe. The apps and storage are all on your computer if that is your choice. And the basic cloud storage the last time I looked was 1 TB, my internal photo drive is 4 TB and about 40% full so even if I had the plan with the cloud storage I would need to buy more.

Tommyg

Gene51, thank you for your reply. Do you think photos, iMac software, is an ok place to start in processing photos shot in raw?

adamsg Loc: Chubbuck, ID

I can strongly recommend Luminar by Skylum. It is a very powerful program and the learning curve is quite reasonable. There is no yearly fee and the price I paid, $69, made it a great bargain. I am having a great time with it and the results are excellent.

JohnBoy5562 Loc: Alabama

If you using a iMac and you like it and you have a iPad I use a app called Cascable it’s free to use but if you want to import raw files you have to pay. You can adjust you raw file on the iPad and it’s also a great learning tool for some one new like myself. I am new to raw so I’m still learning as I go.

Vigneron

Check out affinity photo. Available on Apple store for about $50. Excellent tutorials and support forum

JohnBoy5562 Loc: Alabama

I have it on both my iMac and iPad. And they are very good. I was suggesting Cascable for use on the iPad for when your out away from you Mac. This app lets you use you iPad or iPhone as a display to see what you see through the viewfinder. Also let’s you change the shutter speed iso. I’m still learning but it has a thing called recipes which let you change exposures between shots. I’m not sure as I am still learning but I think it would be helpful if you was trying to shoot a HDR photo. Plus it will let you develop your raw files on your iPad. It’s worth the price I think and it’s helps the developer improve the software with purchase.

https://cascable.se/

hassighedgehog Loc: Corona, CA

Agree 100%. I've used Elements since the beginning, even before I had a digital camera (had film copied to a CD). Now on version 15. Love Layers. First digital was Nikon E995 (5MP) in 2002.

Tommyg

Has anybody tried Cyberlink for macs?

leftj Loc: Texas

I am finding that Apple photos under the new Mojave OS is not compatible with RAW from Fuji X-T2.

pithydoug Loc: Catskill Mountains, NY

This is a first - you got better with jpg than editing a raw? My reaction would be what software did you use to edit the raw? I can ALWAYS get a better output file from the raw, at least with LR or ACR which are the same under the covers.

Anna M-W Loc: New York City

I think photoshop cc is the only way to go unless you are a wedding photographer. then go with Light room which I hate its too hard to uses . Anna

tomad Loc: North Carolina

I tried several different editors including Luminar, ON1, and Adobe Photoshop Express. There was not way to get the RAW file as sharp as the JPEG. When pixel peeping the JPEG was always sharper no matter what I did.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Remember the camera actually takes the image in RAW, then internal software converts it to JPEG, including sharpening. If you want a duplicate of the JPEG your camera puts out then just find out what those conversion settings are and you can duplicate it with RAW in PP and if you decide you want changes then the RAW file gives you more latitude.
It is also possible you are doing something in PP that kills sharpness or increases noise for the same result, doesn't look sharp, esp if pixel peeping.

jsfphotos Loc: New York, NY

I used Aperture and spent a long time looking for what to replace it with when Apple discontinued it. If you have been using iPhoto up until now you are going to have a very steep learning curve with Lightroom (LR). Aperture had a lot more capacity than iPhoto and LR is even more complicated than Aperture. I am currently using On1 PhotoRAW 2018 and just bought the upgrade. I think that On1 combines the best of both Lightroom and Photoshop (including Layers). It's browse function lets you scan and organize photos NO MATTER WHERE THEY ARE -- external hard drive, Dropbox, Desktop, Pictures files etc etc -- as opposed to LR where everything has to be imported into a LR Catalog. People say if you know Lightroom, On1 is an easy transition, but because I never really learned LR, this was a tough transition and I'm still learning. Having said that, and despite what I see as some major advantages of On1 over LR, I would not recommend that you move to On1 or LR.

However, there are two or three other options, some of which have already been mentioned:
-- Photoshop Elements (PSE), which combines a lot of Lightroom with a little Photoshop, but is much less complicated than either one and has an Organizing Module as well as an Editing Module. If you're not used to concepts like Masking and Layers, this will take some time to learn too, but there are lots of books and free tutorials to help you learn PSE.
-- Skylum's Luminar. This is not nearly as robust as LR, PSE or On1, but I have been trying all kinds of photo processing software post Aperture and found Skylum's offering gives me really awesome results using a very simple interface, lots of filters and really user-friendly editing tools. The lack of a real photo organizing capability is what prevents me from using this full time, but I've heard that Skylum plans to address this is the coming year (or maybe sooner).
--Apple's Photos app in combination with either PSE or Luminar. It can handle RAW files, and lets you do basic editing such as changing exposure, temperature, white balance, hue, saturation etc etc. When you want to take it further and get into much more complicated edits, take it into PSE

Delderby Loc: Derby UK

If LR doesn't have the ability to work in layers, I really don't see it as a complete editing program at all, but something rather inferior. If it is more about file management, I wonder what it's attributes really are? or is it part of the "label syndrome" enjoyed by so many photographers?