Photoshop Elements

I am happy with Affinity Photo. I think it is way better than Elements and you pay a reasonable price once. It has a learning curve, but they provide very good video tutorials.

Those that use it say elements+ does a good job of reversing a lot of the limitations. That said i think one big downside is that I think you are limited to 8 bit once out of the raw converter. Maybe you care about that or maybe it makes no difference to you? 

@bleirer That is true. PSE only outputs 8 bit files. Since I don’t do much printing I haven’t noticed a problem.

I also use Nikon’s own NX processing software but it has it’s own short comings. It doesn’t read Adobes xmp or dng formats so you have to do it all in NX. Its features aren’t very user friendly either.

Perhaps DxO PureRaw3 can solve your problem. In PSE, you will then edit a DNG file that has already been corrected, sharpened and denoised. The one-month trial is free. Give it a try and see if it works for you. It's a great time saver and the results are very good.

@libor-vaic Recently grabbed the Christmas special on Topaz Photo AI. So far I’ve been very happy with it’s denoise and sharpening, especially for my birds and bugs photos. They are upgrading the product weekly, adding many new features in just the 3 months I’ve owned it. I’ve used it mostly as a plug-in for PSE. Perhaps I’ll use it prior to PSE (as you suggest for DxO) to see how good the lens corrections are.

When Adobe moved to a subscription plan I was very skeptical about that too. I was like you, I didn't want to pay for a subscription. But considering that you always enjoy the latest features and current software versions I don't mind it anymore. Perpetual licenses also have their cons; it is never a "one time" purchase because if you want to stay current or enjoy the latest features you'll end up buying another perpetual license again. 

In the end, Adobe's photography plan is not too bad. And Photoshop is still quite unique; there is no other software application that can replace it 100%.  

All I use is PE! I've tried many other raw converters including LR and the old CS series too. I'm a simpler is better kind of guy. I don't do a lot of manipulation so something simpler like PE works great. I have the latest version, but prefer the 2020 version for my older cameras as they changed the way certain functions work and I'm not too happy about those changes :). 

I will never use a sub plan for my photo software, even if that means I have to use only free raw converters in the future. I pay monthly for utilities and loans and rent, that's were I draw the line with monthly fees. Adobe is more likely to listen to users if they aren't on a monthly plan because sales of physical products demand more attention to the customers needs. 

Edit: I always edit raw files, I should add. I use jpegs for quick viewing and sometimes as an initial template, but raw is where it's at for me. I enjoy subtle fine tuning and my aim is always as natural as possible. Style counts for something, find yours and stick with it.

Posted by: @photofan

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Would love to hear from others that use Photoshop Elements instead of Lightroom or PS. Adobe provides great software, but I don't like paying an ongoing fee for my processing needs. So far I've gotten by with PSE although a few of the under-the-hood features that aren't accessible would be nice --I don't have any plugins like Elements+.

The biggest issue I have is the lack of good Lens Correction tools. The tools found in the Filter Menu are very basic. I wish PSE's version of Camera Raw provided the 1-click feature that takes care of distortion, vignetting and chromatic aberrations. The latter is the real missing feature. I can manually remove the color fringes, but it is too time consuming and usually negatively affects the overall contrast and colors.

DXO Pure Raw 3 will be your ticket. Not only is the noise reduction bonkers good, but it will output a DNG with near perfect camera/lens corrections for vignetting, distortion, sharpness falloff, etc.. 

That said, there are so many limitations to what PSE can do, I really do think the Lightroom+Photoshop combo is worth the $20/month, even for an occasional amateur. 

@mark-laidlaw Actually, the Adobe "Photography" bundle is just $9.99/month. The only difference from the $20/month plan is that you get just 20 GB storage rather than 1 TB with your plan. I don't use Adobe's storage, so the $9.99 plan works fine for me. For the price you get the entire Creative Cloud suite of applications -- about a dozen apps, including Lightroom and Photoshop of course.

While I respect others' approaches, I find it hard to understand complaints against the subscription plan (which you hear all of the time on photo forums). For about the price of a venti latte a month you get an industry leading suite of remarkably powerful software that gets updated regularly (several times a year), a suite of apps that really opens the door to growing and developing as a photographer. 

@delange It's like you say. Every coin has two sides. I am slowly coming to terms with the fact that I will be buying DxO PureRaw for the third time. But for now, I'm waiting for them to add the Nikon Z 400mm f/4.5 to the list of supported lenses. Then I'll take that as a signal to click the order button.

@nickg agreed

@libor-vaic I'm pretty sure it's supported. I use it all the time with my 400

@mark-laidlaw Unfortunately, the only supported prime telephoto lens in the Z line is the 800/6.3. That's not to say that PureRaw won't process photos taken with the 400/4.5, but the result is less than half of what it could be.

Check the supported cameras/lenses here: https://www.dxo.com/supported-cameras/

Well, good thing at least there isn't much that needs to be corrected on it