abacab Posted November 10, 2022 Share Posted November 10, 2022 44 minutes ago, Brian Walton said: If you shoot Sony, Nikon or Fuji there is a free version of Capture One Express you can use. Of course it lacks layers and some of the very high end adjustment tools of the pro version. That said I'd take it over LR6. I shoot with a Sony α700 (DSLR-A700), which is almost a vintage camera now. I downloaded the Capture One Express (Sony) and it is able to read my Sony .arw (RAW) files. So we'll give it a run and see what's up... At least the price is a DEAL! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Walton Posted November 10, 2022 Author Share Posted November 10, 2022 (edited) 11 minutes ago, abacab said: I shoot with a Sony α700 (DSLR-A700), which is almost a vintage camera now. I downloaded the Capture One Express (Sony) and it is able to read my Sony .arw (RAW) files. So we'll give it a run and see what's up... At least the price is a DEAL! Nice, I have an A58, A68, as well as newer Sony mirroless cameras (in addition to other brands), but I'm quite familar with the Minolta mount and the lenses that go with that camera. Have a ton of them. the Macro 100mm 2.8 being my favorite. Which I even got an LA-EA4 to adapt it to my newer Sony E-Mount cameras. Edited November 10, 2022 by Brian Walton Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abacab Posted November 10, 2022 Share Posted November 10, 2022 1 minute ago, Brian Walton said: Nice, I have an A58, A68, as well as newer Sony mirroless cameras (as well as other brands), but I'm quite familar with the Minolta mount and the lenses that go with that camera. Have a ton of them. the Macro 100mm 2.8 being my favorite. Which I even got an LA-EA4 to adapt it to my newer Sony E-Mount cameras. I already had the Minolta Maxxum 7 (35mm film) with some Minolta A mount lenses, so it was a virtual no-brainer to transition to the Sony Alpha DSLR with the same lens mount. Found some more used Minolta lenses in a local camera shop and grabbed them up! The only disadvantage was that the APS-C 1.5x crop sensor on the Sony digital pushed the effective focal length of these lenses out from the full frame film camera. So in effect my standard 50mm lens now became a short telephoto and now my 35mm lens was my "standard" lens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Walton Posted November 10, 2022 Author Share Posted November 10, 2022 15 minutes ago, abacab said: I already had the Minolta Maxxum 7 (35mm film) with some Minolta A mount lenses, so it was a virtual no-brainer to transition to the Sony Alpha DSLR with the same lens mount. Found some more used Minolta lenses in a local camera shop and grabbed them up! The only disadvantage was that the APS-C 1.5x crop sensor on the Sony digital pushed the effective focal length of these lenses out from the full frame film camera. So in effect my standard 50mm lens now became a short telephoto and now my 35mm lens was my "standard" lens. Yep, and some of the wider lenses like the 28mm 2.8 are fairly weak optically compared to the rest of the lineup. The 20mm 2.0 is great but quite rare to find. The APS-C is great for use with longer focal lengths to get that extra reach in wildlife photography though as anything past 200mm and a good Fstop in full frame world starts getting really expensive really quickly. So a 70-210 f4 beercan minolta for $100 looks pretty good for 300mm+ equivalant lens Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abacab Posted November 10, 2022 Share Posted November 10, 2022 47 minutes ago, Brian Walton said: So a 70-210 f4 beercan minolta for $100 looks pretty good for 300mm+ equivalant lens Got it! Great lens, but is a bit heavy, feels like carrying a brick. It's rare to get a fixed aperture at all focal lengths in a less-expensive zoom though, so it's a go-to for lower light at f4. Plus with the Sony anti-shake built into the body, you can take advantage of that with any lens! Another decent Minolta lens that I found used is the 100-300 APO. That's like 450mm equivalent and relatively lightweight. Unfortunately it's only f4.5-5.6, so you really need a tripod for that unless you are in bright daylight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
InstrEd Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 I thought I was in the dpreview forum for a moment ? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pseudopop Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 11 hours ago, abacab said: I shoot with a Sony α700 (DSLR-A700), which is almost a vintage camera now. I downloaded the Capture One Express (Sony) and it is able to read my Sony .arw (RAW) files. So we'll give it a run and see what's up... At least the price is a DEAL! If you're looking for alternatives for photography, there's some (sprawling and geeky) discussion about Affinity 2 update at Hacker News where people mentioned some alternatives. The three that came up most often are digiKam, RawTherapee and darktable. I haven't used any of them so can't say if they are any good, but they are all free. 6 hours ago, InstrEd said: I thought I was in the dpreview forum for a moment ? I have obviously spent too much time on the wrong side of the Internet, but I shall not elaborate that further least you think less of me. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMaartian Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 Has anyone figured out where v2 installs? I can't find the executables to create desktop shortcuts for. Windows 11. BTW, the latest update of Win11 sucks with what they did to Explorer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Walton Posted November 11, 2022 Author Share Posted November 11, 2022 4 hours ago, pseudopop said: If you're looking for alternatives for photography, there's some (sprawling and geeky) discussion about Affinity 2 update at Hacker News where people mentioned some alternatives. The three that came up most often are digiKam, RawTherapee and darktable. I haven't used any of them so can't say if they are any good, but they are all free. I have obviously spent too much time on the wrong side of the Internet, but I shall not elaborate that further least you think less of me. I've tried all three and while free and somewhat powerful. They are a chore to use, slowness and interfaces not designed by elite designers. I only recommend them to Canon shooters since they don't have a Capture One Express version for free. And also explain that paid alternatives will make the process less painful. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boxed Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 (edited) On 11/9/2022 at 7:49 PM, daveiv said: $100 for three cross-platform apps is a pretty good deal, but I wish they'd give me some upgrade discount. On 11/9/2022 at 7:59 PM, TerraSin said: Agreed. I was expecting some sort of upgrade discount but eh, $99 for all 3 is a really good discount in itself and I'm not worried about what others are paying, really. On 11/10/2022 at 12:05 AM, Brian Walton said: Indeed, they basically jacked up the rates and then offered a "40% discount" on release and no "upgrade" discount. I have loved and supported Affinity but this is one of the only things they have don't that I just don't agree with the approach. Each app was $50 for years at full MSRP. The new apps are now $70 MSRP but they are providing a limited time "discount" and all users get the same pricing even if they own V1 of all the apps. It would be different if the new features were mindblowing, but in general it just feels like what we would have seen with incremental upgrades that we did't get over the last 18 months. Lack of content aware AI of any kind is a glowing omission given the advancements Adobe, Skylum, and On1 made in the last two years....Affinity didn't offer anything and that stuff transforms workflows. The embedded adjust after the fact RAW stuff would be interesting if the RAW engine was overhauled to be competitive with C1 or LR but it isn't on that level. I'll buy it, but the anticipation I had for v2 was a let down due to the cost vs feature ratio. If they had the AI selections and that sort of advancement then the new pricing strucutre would make sense for an upgrade cost. As it is, basically it is a full re-purchase of the trio of apps to get a few current and then the promise of unknown future updates until v3. I was expecting about $20 per app "upgrade" pricing. That seems in line with previous pricing structures and general business practices. I think more people should call them out on the "rate hike" that went along with this release. For brand new users, $99 seems reasonble for the entire suite, it just stings for v1 owners of everything. On 11/10/2022 at 10:55 AM, aidan o driscoll said: That "limited time discount" for all 3 should at least be perpetually held for owners of V1 when one considers there is no upgrade price for same? Did you guys read the FAQ on the Affinity site? They said they have no way of telling apart those who own v1 and those who don't because of the different app store policies. Most people that own Affinity bought from the various App Stores and not the Affinity website. Apple and Microsoft simply don't give enough personal data to make the upgrade pricing work for the new cross platform Universal Licence (that covers Windows, MacOS, iOS and iPad OS). So they decided to offer the upgrade price to everyone including new users. Therefore launch price is the upgrade discount and it costs less than a 2 month Adobe subscription. Edited November 11, 2022 by boxed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Walton Posted November 11, 2022 Author Share Posted November 11, 2022 2 minutes ago, boxed said: Did you guys read the FAQ on the Affinity site? They said they have no way of telling apart those who own v1 and those who don't because of the different app store policies. Most people that own Affinity bought from the various App Stores and not the Affinity website. Apple and Microsoft simply don't give developers enough personal data to offer upgrade pricing for the new cross platform Universal Licence. So they decided to offer the upgrade price to everyone including new users. Therefore launch price is the upgrade discount and it costs less than a 2 month Adobe subscription. Yes, but I also think it is poor from to blame someone else for not knowing who your customers are. I'm curious where you got the "most users" bought it somewhere else stat, I've never seen that and most post discouraged the practice as it could be more difficult to get the included freebies, etc. Of course the Ipad versions are different and frankly wouldn't count them as included in the discussion anyway. What you seem to miss here is the "upgrade" price they are offering doesn't feel like a discount from what pricing used to be. $50 was the standard app price and would go on sale for $35 every few months and even hit rock bottom of $25 for a long stretch during the pandemic. It wsa only a few months ago they hiked up to $55 and now it is $70 at this new launch. Charging $41 an app doesn't exaclty feel like loyalty/upgrade pricing. The new MSRP is totally different than anything they have ever sold before. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abacab Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 Something I just ran across about Affinity v2 on Windows. It installs as a Microsoft App instead of with a traditional application installer. That may be an issue for some folks. According to the Affinity forum, there have been some problems launching Affinity Photo v2 as an editor from 3rd party raw programs and digital asset managers. https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/170529-extremely-disappointed-that-this-installs-as-an-app-and-not-regular-software-program/ 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TerraSin Posted November 11, 2022 Share Posted November 11, 2022 5 hours ago, boxed said: Did you guys read the FAQ on the Affinity site? They said they have no way of telling apart those who own v1 and those who don't because of the different app store policies. Most people that own Affinity bought from the various App Stores and not the Affinity website. Apple and Microsoft simply don't give enough personal data to make the upgrade pricing work for the new cross platform Universal Licence (that covers Windows, MacOS, iOS and iPad OS). So they decided to offer the upgrade price to everyone including new users. Therefore launch price is the upgrade discount and it costs less than a 2 month Adobe subscription. Strange. I assumed everyone needed an account with Serif when they bought it anyway so not sure why the "where" would matter? Either way, I bought it without a second thought because $99 is a good price for a version updatre on 3 different applications which is about what I expected to pay for the v2 upgrades anyway. I'm not worried that everyone else got the same price. Doesn't matter to me. I'm happy with my price. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boxed Posted November 15, 2022 Share Posted November 15, 2022 On 11/11/2022 at 2:28 PM, Brian Walton said: Yes, but I also think it is poor from to blame someone else for not knowing who your customers are. I'm curious where you got the "most users" bought it somewhere else stat, I've never seen that and most post discouraged the practice as it could be more difficult to get the included freebies, etc. Of course the Ipad versions are different and frankly wouldn't count them as included in the discussion anyway. What you seem to miss here is the "upgrade" price they are offering doesn't feel like a discount from what pricing used to be. $50 was the standard app price and would go on sale for $35 every few months and even hit rock bottom of $25 for a long stretch during the pandemic. It wsa only a few months ago they hiked up to $55 and now it is $70 at this new launch. Charging $41 an app doesn't exaclty feel like loyalty/upgrade pricing. The new MSRP is totally different than anything they have ever sold before. The standard price was $50 to draw more users to what was a brand new piece of software at the time. But this was arguably unsustainable in the long term for a tech company that is based in the UK and pays its employees decent living wages. So most people knew and expected prices to go up for version 2. And to be fair the new standard price is pretty reasonable especially for editing software that is stable, well engineered and competitive with Adobe. There are not too many other options out there apart from the Adobe Suite, and a few pieces of software like Corel Draw & QuarkXPress. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Walton Posted November 15, 2022 Author Share Posted November 15, 2022 10 minutes ago, boxed said: The standard price was $50 to draw more users to what was a brand new piece of software at the time. But this was arguably unsustainable in the long term for a tech company that is based in the UK and pays its employees decent living wages. So most people knew and expected prices to go up for version 2. And to be fair the new standard price is pretty reasonable especially for editing software that is stable, well engineered and competitive with Adobe. There are not too many other options out there apart from the Adobe Suite, and a few pieces of software like Corel Draw & QuarkXPress. I bought it today. But I don't really agree about the low entry point before until now. It was that price for ~7 years, this isn't a fly by night product. They heavily discounted it beyond that including 50% off and siad the sales numbers blew away expectation. I'm not saying the pricing is terrible, it is a good deal for new users. Old users are likely spending what they already paid for the suite again, and these updates frankly are not mind blowing. As much as I don't care for Adobe, the gap is getting larger not smaller in terms of feature sets. The Studio Link switching is a big advantage but most other areas just don't have the same tech. If we see another 6+ years of updates before 3.0 I'll be surprised. There are other competitors for photo and designer, but Affinity is my preference. They talked about something big coming. Which turned out to be Publisher on IPad. How many professionals are going to have that as the core of the workflow? I'm betting a super small percentage compared to the DAM that's been teased for years now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dubdisciple Posted November 15, 2022 Share Posted November 15, 2022 On 11/11/2022 at 12:42 AM, pseudopop said: If you're looking for alternatives for photography, there's some (sprawling and geeky) discussion about Affinity 2 update at Hacker News where people mentioned some alternatives. The three that came up most often are digiKam, RawTherapee and darktable. I haven't used any of them so can't say if they are any good, but they are all free. I have obviously spent too much time on the wrong side of the Internet, but I shall not elaborate that further least you think less of me. Each of those are more like Lightroom alternatives. Affinity is a good value version of photoshop Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abacab Posted November 15, 2022 Share Posted November 15, 2022 (edited) 19 minutes ago, dubdisciple said: Affinity is a good value version of photoshop I agree, and will probably stick with Affinity Photo v1. It has some features that I lack in my go-to photo editor Photoshop Elements, if I ever need them. Plus I also have the CorelDraw suite with Photo Paint and Corel Paintshop Pro to fall back on as well. All have slightly different feature sets for different workflows, but Elements is the only one with some pro oriented features deliberately stripped out (such as advanced layers and CMYK export for print). However Elements is still solid for the occasional edit in full (Expert) editor mode (not Quick or Guided). If I worked in a photo editor full time I would probably feel differently... https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/adobe-photoshop-elements "Elements makes a lot of the coolest Photoshop effects accessible to nonprofessionals. It offers a generous subset of the pro editor's features in a simpler package." "Adobe Photoshop Elements is an excellent option for photo hobbyists who don't want to pay a subscription or learn complex Photoshop techniques." Edited November 15, 2022 by abacab Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pseudopop Posted November 16, 2022 Share Posted November 16, 2022 6 hours ago, dubdisciple said: Each of those are more like Lightroom alternatives. Affinity is a good value version of photoshop I know. I was referring to the discussion that followed when abacab mentioned they have a "need for digital darkroom tools". 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TerraSin Posted November 16, 2022 Share Posted November 16, 2022 (edited) Funnily enough, Affinity comes with Pantone colours. Photoshop just lost them because of a pissing match going on between Adobe and Pantone and Pantone is now charging a monthly subscription for them to be in Photoshop. This is a really good video about what is going on. This is really going to help Serif get more companies who do professional product design moving their way. Disclosure, despite the clickbait topic, he's not suggesting piracy. Edited November 16, 2022 by TerraSin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abacab Posted November 16, 2022 Share Posted November 16, 2022 1 hour ago, TerraSin said: Funnily enough, Affinity comes with Pantone colours. Photoshop just lost them because of a pissing match going on between Adobe and Pantone and Pantone is now charging a monthly subscription for them to be in Photoshop. Well last time I checked, the CorelDraw suite included the Pantone colors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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