After nearly a month of trial and careful consideration, I decided to purchase DxO PhotoLab7 and use it as my RAW development tool.
I have been using ART for the past two years as my primary RAW development tool and have found it to be very versatile and powerful despite being free, but I have concluded that PhotoLab7 is more than worth the cost.
With ProhoLab7, I can finish my routine work with ART in a much shorter time and in a much more efficient manner. Below is a side-by-side comparison of the results of developing the same RAW data with the same adjustments as possible in ART and PhotoLab7.
I sealed off the noise removal and sharpness correction, which are PhotoLab7’s strong points, and worked with the sole intention of obtaining an output equivalent to ART. As usual, the approximation of color and brightness is insufficient, but we believe that output of almost the same quality has been obtained.
On top of that, the time required is 20-30% less than with ART, roughly by feel.
In particular, exposure/tone correction has become easier. Once the initial values for adjustment are left to the software, it will first adjust the image to a “good feeling” that “the contrast is well-defined, but not too bright or washed out.” Compared to ART, where all adjustments are done manually (which is also interesting), the difference in work efficiency is significant.
In addition, PhotoLab7 has powerful noise removal and sharpness correction that other tools cannot easily imitate, so I think it is a very worthwhile tool.
By the way, my history of RAW development tools started from a stingy motivation of disliking the high cost of Adobe Lightroom, so money is an important issue. PhotoLab7 is apparently reasonably inexpensive compared to the subscriber’s Lightroom CC. However, since there will be upgrades every few years and you will have to decide whether or not to spend the additional money each time, you can’t be too careful in terms of keeping the total cost down.
There is one more important thing,
PhotoLab7 requires a lot of machine power. This greatly affected the timing and budget for updating the work/home PC environment that we were just considering, a little earlier than originally planned & a lot more expensive than our original investment budget.
C’est la vie.
