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Luminar 2018
- Thread starter MCAsan
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Same thing happened to me, I was immediately charged the full upgrade price upon my pre-order (before I knew where to pre-order it correctly as a Luminar user). Sent them an email explaining and within 2 days, I had $20 refunded. They said normally they strive to respond to emails to their customer support within 24 hours, but they have been bombarded with questions about Luminar 2018.
I've been using Luminar 2018 for a couple of days now. It is extremely full featured and capable, but unfortunately it is not going to work for me, at least in it's current form. The problem is performance. Adjustments take far too long. Some take as much as a full second before a change is registered on screen. To make things worse, the histogram doesn't update until the mouse click is released. It reminds me of Lightroom just after the 5K iMacs were released, but perhaps even slower. Adobe eventually fixed that by adding GPU support. I wouldn't doubt that Luminar is not using GPU. If that is the case and GPU support is added, then perhaps performance can be improved. Until that happens I can't use it.
Perhaps this has to do with it being cross platform and therefore not making use of mac OS-only APIs such as Metal?
I would hope that isn't the case. They have plenty of Mac programming experience. Whatever the reason, it seems to be related to screen resolution. I'm running on a 5K iMac, and if I put the screen into low resolution mode, performance improves a lot. It's still not as smooth as either Lightroom or Photos, but better. Of course that's not really a solution because one would't normally run the machine at low resolution. Its interesting how closely this mirrors the situation with Lightroom. When the 5K iMacs were first released it was still at version 5 and performance was terrible. Version 6 added GPU support and performance improved a lot. It's still doesn't perform as well as Photos, however.
Being multiplatform means you are less likely to go all-in to a platform-specific API such as Metal. Similarly, it usually means they go for a weird custom interface instead of sticking to controls native to the platform. That was always something that turned me off of Adobe apps, they never felt native, and it is an issue with Microsoft Office and Skype, too.
Of course, I have no inside knowledge whether this is the case here, but it would make sense.
Luminar 2018 does feature a repair tool although it works slightly differently in that you paint over the areas to be repaired and then click done to see the finished repairs.
Very differently. The clone, repair, and erase tools are all very bad in their execution.
Do you use iCloud Photo Library? I just had my library messed up for a second time due to iCloud being out of sync between the Mac, Web, iPhone and iPad (different photos on each one). I like iCloud Photo Library, but I'm thinking of re-creating my library and just keeping Photo's local.
Updated.
Still have issues -
1. Processing a raw photo - upon exporting I get the indefinite "Processing" dialog / progress bar. Never stops.
2. If I use the clone / stamp, and end up with more than one layer on a jpg - same issue.
These two are big issues.
If I just do adjustments to a jpg photo - exports just fine.
* Now works as an extension for Photos.
Good thing I still have the previous version installed.
Still have issues -
1. Processing a raw photo - upon exporting I get the indefinite "Processing" dialog / progress bar. Never stops.
2. If I use the clone / stamp, and end up with more than one layer on a jpg - same issue.
These two are big issues.
If I just do adjustments to a jpg photo - exports just fine.
* Now works as an extension for Photos.
Good thing I still have the previous version installed.
I had been a fan of the old ON1 Photo for a few years. When ON1 Raw came out I was excited like lots of folk were. The program just was never stable enough to depend on for my needs. Lots of technical issues, crashes, and frustration. I finally just gave up waiting for improvements.
Ok, so its more about a product not ready for primetime, then anything else.
Not being a user of On1, and not really keeping up on the news, I was unaware. Thanks for the heads up
Is it just me or is obvious overuse of the Luminar sun-ray effect going to be the next photo fad?
Absolutely! I had a great example of its misuse in application come through my Facebook feed last week. It was a sunset and the rays were placed higher in the sky than where the sun was obviously behind some clouds!
Absolutely! I had a great example of its misuse in application come through my Facebook feed last week. It was a sunset and the rays were placed higher in the sky than where the sun was obviously behind some clouds!
I’ve seen a couple around the interwebs and it was just plain weird. The filter had caused a guy’s silhouette to be ghosted in half, kinda like a double exposure. Then another where the angle through the trees was so ridiculously incorrect. I don’t know, maybe I’m being too critical but I do fear that it will hinder more images than it supposedly “helps”.
The Photo RAW Browser module still has no import features for importing from cards, auto creating folders and subfolders, renaming files, and filling out IPTC. Lr Library does it and of course so does Photo Mechanic.
Just like sharpening, micro contrast, HDR....etc. All can be cranked up to surrealistic levels.
Just like sharpening, micro contrast, HDR....etc. All can be cranked up to surrealistic levels.
Absolutely! I had a great example of its misuse in application come through my Facebook feed last week. It was a sunset and the rays were placed higher in the sky than where the sun was obviously behind some clouds!
When the sun ray filter was announced and its use shown on several blogs, I never really got excited about it. My initial thought was that it was a filter I probably would not use much at all. I was more excited about the Brilliance/Warmth filter and making Dehaze a filter. The Brilliance/Warmth was a filter I used a lot in NIK. Also the ability to Dodge and Burn as a filter was a big plus for me. Like any filter in any application, you can go too overboard with them. It will be interesting to see what the DAM product Macphun/Skylum looks like. For me the ability to rename files, add IPTC info, create folders/subfolders on import, as MCAsan points out, is sometihng very important to me. So I am keenly interested in seeing what they create. But you've got to admit, for the price, their Luminar and Aurora HDR prodcuts, IMO, are well worth it for what you get in capabilities. The ability to easily create layers alone makes them very enticiing.
I have been using the 2018 version a bit the past week. As others have said, it is way too slow, especially if you are working with large raw files. The erase function can take several seconds to initially prepare, then 5 or more seconds to execute. Other programs are pretty much instant doing the same thing. The export is very lacking, no option to set the resolution in dpi that I can find. I was hoping this could eventually replace Aperture, but at this point no.
I realize that, and supposedly a DAM is coming in 2018. But even with the DAM, it really can not replace Aperture.