When comparing the two, Photoshop CC and CS6, it's clear that the CS6 users don't want to upgrade because of the rental business model Adobe enforces. But, what are the actual advantages, and, is it possible to be more productive and make more money when you deliver more work because it's easier to do?
Positive Aspects of CC
Selection tools in Photoshop have improved over the past few years. If you're starting with Photoshop now, you will never know the time spent on comping and masking out a character's hair to use in a different image. It was dreadful, and with CS6 it's still the case. There have been a considerable amount of updates over the past few years. And the business model Adobe is exploiting makes it possible to develop updates, use AI and integrate into the whole software bundle within Creative Cloud.
Negative Aspects of Adobe as Kingpin
I don't like renting software, no one does. And it's as if Adobe is dominating the industry in Photo-manipulation, video editing, motion graphics and, it makes it possible to work with all these types of media and software together. If there is no competition, we will all be paying our dues to Adobe for the foreseeable future. And it's not just the single user, it's companies and industries that will need to change, which is a much more difficult thing to do.
I don't really mind renting. I like the fact that I can pay a monthly fee and get the latest updates.
What I don't like is that Adobe locks me for a year and I only use my camera for 7 or so months per year.
It's cheaper to just order a new card lol so Adobe can't charge me for those 5 months I do not edit photos.
I'd like to see a proper monthly plan so that you don't have the annual commitment. Sure, it may cost a little more (they really want people to commit, and I can't blame them for that) but it would be nice to be able to 'shelve' your plan or go to a lower tier when you don't need it, or upgrade to a higher tier when you do on a monthly basis.
I don't mind the subscription as long as my work is generating income, but I do wish that they had an option for a perpetual license, even if it was a couple hundred dollars. For a hobbyist, however, a subscription really blows.
Perpetual would be great, but beside controlling effectively the copies of their product, they also fixed the upgrade skip that one could play with in the past. They would allow one or two version skip, then the user would have to purchase the full license if they missed too many upgrades. There will never be a perpetual license, this thing is way too profitable.
As a hobbyist, I don't mind the subscription model at all. To me, it is no different than my monthly Netflix subscription, or the cost of paying for time on a tennis court. $10 a month is not much to spend for a hobby that one enjoys. I prefer to look at it in context of the total cost of photography as a serious hobby. If one considers that most hobbyist photographers spend over $500 for their cameras and lenses (and usually much more), $120 per year for the post processing software, plus storage, is not really that expensive. Obviously, there are not-so-serious hobbyists who spend less on their equipment (e.g. use their phones, P&S cameras, etc), but my guess is that the majority of them are not using PS or LR to process their photos, if they process them at all.
I also look at it this way - would most hobbyists shell out $700 for an individual copy of PS plus several hundred for LR? I would venture to say that most wouldn't. So, does this not make PS and LR more accessible to the hobbyist?
In practical terms, all software has a cost in perpetuity. One can use a standalone piece of software for years, but eventually, newer hardware won't be able to run the older software, and the updated software will have to be purchased. The only way around that is to run antiquated software on antiquated hardware - which doesn't seem very appealing to me.
So selection. Is that the only real difference? Yep.
Photographers should know that they‘ve been financing a whole new 3D industry and new software tools who pay exactly the same as we do even though there are far less users and far more investments and innovations going in this area.
Unfortunately the competition isn’t mich to be reckoned with.
If CS6 alone costs $700, as much as I hate renting, if I needed to use PS, PS + LR for $9.99 a month actually ain't bad. It would take almost 6 years to "pay off" the $700, during which time, you get updates. 6 years is a long time as far as software is concerned.
Very helpful video. It confirms my decision to stick with CS6 as the right one. The key word for the new features is 'convenience' - I am extremely underwhelmed. There is nothing that I need Photoshop for that I cannot do in CS6.This also confirms my initial suspicion that the subscription model would provide no incentive for Adobe to actually make any significant improvements. They could give the development team a year off and it wouldn't affect their income. And it continues to shaft their users. If CS6 is eight years old then to have switched to CC then, would have now cost 8 x $10 x 12 = $960. Would I have paid that much for an upgrade to the new features? ROTFLOL. Not a prayer.
Whilst Affinity is not quite a replacement yet, I have bought it to encourage them and hopefully soon it will be.
I think it is worth reminding oneself that Photoshop will not make you a better photographer, and that most of the really great photographs in photography's history were taken before there was any such thing. It's just a tool, nothing more.