Passage of Adobe Creative Suite Alternatives
Adobe has shocked many in May 2013 when they moved from the sale of software retail box model their monthly " Creative Cloud " costs £ 46 per month for people - that's over £ 550 per year. CS6 currently sells for around £ 1,200 , so it's the equivalent of buying the software every two years . Many people will skip several versions if there are no tangible benefits , or simply because of the cost . So what are the alternatives?
Adobe products cover a wide range of disciplines - web design , image and video editing , design and layout and DVD creation to name a few . The best way to break it is to consider replacements like-for -like. There are some products that are difficult to replace , for example, if you use Dreamweaver templates to design a single file that maintains the look and feel of a site and then move on to another HTML editor will be problematic.
Take a look at the main products:
Alternatives to Adobe Photoshop
For many years was the first PhotoShop image editing software, but there are many free or paid for alternatives. Corel has several in its portfolio to meet most needs . Paintshop Pro , about £ 50 is the entry level . Painter takes a step , and also supports Photoshop files, but at £ 219 begins to be expensive . CorelDraw Suite includes Corel PhotoPaint , which is an incredibly powerful alternative. It has all the major features that you typically use , with a plethora of filters. The Smart Carver lets you easily remove unwanted from photos and also adjust the aspect ratio of the photo areas. As a complete package of the CorelDraw suite offers a formidable arsenal of tools, but at £ 479 it is not cheap either. Corel Painter takes things up a notch , with support for native Photoshop files and excellent control of the brush, so if you're serious about the " digital painting " rather than just image manipulation and basic with this account. At the time of writing Corel Painter and consolidation as a free inclusion with CorelDraw suite - normally it would cost you £ 275 alone.
Corel PaintShop Pro is the third image editing solution for a more pocket friendly £ 60. It was not the steep learning curve of the previous packages , so is suitable for beginners and intermediates alike. It comes with all the usual filters that you are likely to want as artistic styles of films, Black & White and the landscape. A range of tools makeover " can easily remove imperfections, wrinkes and red eyes , and photo restoration tools such as scratches , cloning and coverage fading correction nearly all correction tools that day to day users are likely to want .
Apart from the Corel times there are still several options. The open source GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program ) has an unorthodox interface for many, but its sustained and of course free good. Paint.net is another free alternative and boasts good results , even on less powerful computers, and has an interface not disimillar Photoshop .
Alternatives to Adobe Premiere Pro
The video editing software is Adobe 's flagship PC ruled the roost for some time . Apple users were loyal to Final Cut Pro, but the X version was too dumbed down for many, causing a mass exodus to alternative products . Sony Vegas is very well done that! Vegas is a premium product from Sony, which costs about £ 400 , but their entry level product, Movie Studio retails for around £ 60. I wanted to be like -for-like comparison I have for the most reasonable price. After many comparisons I took a look at Corel VideoStudio ultimate X6 . In addition to the now classic titling and motion tracking features, it now includes a plethora of new features, such as support for Ultra High Definition ' 4K image editing , a powerful assay system including Boris Graffiti renowned system and the ability to produce content for Blu -ray , DVD and the latest range of smartphones and tablets discs. It is also more socially aware , with the ability to upload to Facebook or YouTube. You can even create stop motion photography by connecting a digital SLR camera. Use of the software is quite intuitive , and Corel has produced a library of video tutorials on all major for those who do not want to wade through a manual. The final version sells for € 80 including taxes , with the Pro (minus a few features ) version € 60 - for the extra 20 EUR I am personally ultimate ... Pinnacle Studio is another sequel to consider , which sells for about $ 60 . It is a video editing tool Open Source - The VideoLAN VLMC . VLMC was not actually available at the time of writing , but the screenshots suggest a timeline based editor should meet the basic needs of those holiday edition and mobile videos.
Alternatives to Adobe Illustrator
Illustrator is a desktop publishing software based Adobe vector. While in publishing circles , it is considered the de facto standard , but there are several viable alternatives. Away with Corel 's CorelDraw suite. If you are looking to replace both Photoshop and Illustrator and Corel tick both boxes with PhotoPaint and CorelDraw . The DVD comes comes with an extensive library of additional tools, templates , clipart , images and fonts. After using both Illustrator and CorelDRAW I can say that my preference was generally with it. The interface is intuitive , the boundaries are blurred between DTP and image manipulation (because there are a number of image filters that you can apply in CorelDraw settings) . Turning to the road without cost and low , Inkscape is open source and available for Windows and Mac that covers most of the features you want , such as opacity and gradient controls . Serif DrawPlus , Skencil and Xara Xtreme are three worth considering .
Alternatives to Adobe InDesign
Adobe InDesign is a program of desktop publishing that can be used to create different types of content - brochures, magazines , e-books , posters, etc. The lines are a little blurred between InDesign and Illustrator for many , both can be used for certain tasks. As such, many of the products listed above could be adapted to make a note of your specific needs and searching for each alternative to make sure it meets your needs. If you have a subscription to Office 365 or have purchased one of the packages of higher end functions and Microsoft Publisher is also a suitable alternative. Quark Express is another old favorite for many, but expensive at about £ 800 . Towards Open Source, you can try Scribus.
Alternatives to Adobe Dreamweaver
For me, this is a sensitive issue. I used Dreamweaver since version 3 , when it was a Macromedia product . It is a strong sturdy product, which is hard to match . The biggest problem is that if you have written a number of sites using Dreamweaver, you probably built the site using the Dreamweaver template system . This means moving to another product, you should rework all of your models and then apply the new models to all pages. This may be difficult or impossible on a live site . Also, if you use other Adobe products such as Flash or Dreamweaver and ColdFusion is the ideal catalyst for these products. But if you're looking for a good HTML editor then there are plenty of free alternatives to Dreamweaver . Microsoft surprisingly found a free product called Expression Web . Another great product is Kompozer , which is open source. SeaMonkey is a suite of applications (including web browser, email , IRC, HTML editor and development tools . None of them will solve the issue of models, but for standard HTML and CSS editing , they should suffice.
Alternatives to Adobe Flash
The alternative that you select for Flash will depend a lot on what you currently use Flash for . If you use just to play movies online, then YouTube will work better - it provides many sizes, play on any device (including iPads / iPhones / iPods ) and you do not even have to welcome . For most of the other requirements of HTML5 web flash replacement if you are not a HTML / CSS Programmer done , then you will have a very steep learning curve. I now only use Flash to maintain certain interface demo CD - Flash has the ability to create an executable that works well on a CD. The closest thing to imitate Flash is not Microsoft Silverlight , but it is not nearly as well supported and still would require a steep learning curve. For many, Flash is a dying product . Apple famously went to war with Adobe Flash on rejecting the term of their iOS - powered devices , which actually applied to a mass exodus of developers. Nobody wants to develop a product to die .
Alternatives to Adobe Fireworks
Adobe Fireworks continued to grow in May 2013. To be honest , I 've never seen the appeal of it , because I'd also used Photoshop could do almost the same thing. Fireworks had the opportunity to cut an image into user-friendly web files, but in the era of CSS is less relevant than ever. Therefore, I suggest you consider one of the alternatives mentioned above PhotoShop , as they are essentially the same as Fireworks done.
Alternatives to Adobe After Effects
After Effects is a suite of edting video that allows you to apply special effects such as green screen , animation, text overlays and more. It benefits from tight integration with Adobe Premiere , which will again make it difficult for power users to migrate. But it can be done! Blender is a free and highly respected open source alternative. Key features of Blender include video editing , 3D modeling , texturing , UV unwrapping , particle simulation , fluid and smoke simulation , animation and compositing. Fusion Eyeon Software is a solution made for use by many Hollywood studios ' s , so has the power to save. Unfortunately, I could not find pricing information on their website .
Alternatives to Adobe Audition
Audition is a sound editing and mixing application. The application you choose to replace Audition depend very much on your needs. If you need to edit a single file , perhaps apply filters or noise reduction , then this will greatly expand your appropriate application list. If you want to mix multiple tracks or need more advanced features there are still options out there , but you need to be a little more selective. On the Mac the most famous product is GarageBand. The fraternity is abundent with open source options , Audacity , LMSS , Ardour and Traverso DAW are all free and tools capable .
Alternatives to Adobe Encore
Is still authoring DVD Suite Adobe . It is a very capable tool , and allows you to make DVDs with subtitles , chapters, scene selection , multilingual and multi -channel sound , just to name a few features . I've never been a big fan of Encore , the buggy and slow lying , literally taking hours to make a disc. Microsoft has one of the best free alternatives with Windows DVD Maker - part of Windows Live Essentials. It has a simple interface , but within literally minutes you can drag a movie , select a topic and start burning - depending on the speed of your PC, you can have a record of high quality burned in 15-30 minutes. The only major drawback is that it is not available for Windows 8. Video Studio Ultimate Suite Corel again covers the main functions of creating menus and subtitles , so if you replace Premiere it is obvious to select and to replace again . The Nero suite of applications allows you to create DVD , and features a host of other audio and video applications and in addition, it is worth considering. Pinnacle Studio, mentioned earlier, also has the ability to create DVD , although the site is not clear how much control you have over the process. Sony Vegas Platinum includes both DVD and Blu- Ray creation full menu creation and control. Other notable products include ManDVD , DVD Flick, Ashampoo Burning Studio.
Summary
I think you can probably see the same pattern that I saw. For many Adobe Corel products now have viable alternatives that will import your native Adobe files to give you a relatively painless transition. There are also many low cost or even free alternatives out there , so start with the free ones and see if they fit the bill. For daily , especially if you use several of these applications work , it is probably worth spending money on a suite like Corel so that you have the integration between applications.
