Towards the end of last year just when I was settling for just two of my many photo processing mistresses I had a change of heart, mainly out of disappointment with adobes suspected creative cloud related hassles and the quirks of trying to spread lightroom across a few computers, this lead me to see I was really carrying two separate photo streams, one for my RAW files, one for the Jpegs, with subtly different ways of moving the photos around. So why haven't I just bitten the bullet selected one format and one software package. Well if I did it would probably have to be Lightroom, but there is the rub, she is a very high maintenance choice, everything has to be done her way or not at all. She is really only good at one computer and one photo collection relationship. She can be wonderfully talented when it comes to lifting the magic out of a boring Raw file, but I she can demand a lot of time. She can process jpeg but seems to deliberately stops short of her best. She does have a nice companion now in the form of the Perfect Photo Suite from OnOne, which can undertake some of the areas lightroom falls a little short without creating any compatibility or reload issues.
Picasa was almost always there, and is on every computer antway, fulfilling the basic needs . She tackles the standard enhancement without fuss, doing them quickly and she seems to get along with other software and computers, not that she doesn't like taking control of her home territory, but she will accommodate the odd stray and share when necessary. Picasa, was slow to take up processing RAW but she can and does it in a very google I'm feeling lucky kind of way. Her talent is doing a decent job of the basic editing and management of my needs for Jpeg files but I'm not so sure of her on-line alter ego, google+ photos. She always seemed to love and nurture my collection of photos. I am finding AfterShot Pro is a nice compliment, she both sees the possibilities of further post processing and in handling the update of metadata in .xpm sidecar files.
The previous few post have looked at the combination of software I run on some different hardware in different work spaces. I think I will remain a man with many photographic mistresses for some time to come.
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