Sep 15 2021 6 mins 1
Luke wants to know, Do I need Photoshop or Lightroom to edit my photos? I was having a conversation with a friend, He said you don’t need Photoshop or Lightroom as there are plenty of other packages that will do the same.
Luke, thanks for your question. Yeah, your mate is right. You don’t really need Photoshop or Lightroom to do any of your photo editing, unless you have a specific reason.
Today I will be discussing,
* Using your camera software to edit photos* Using your operating software to edit photos* Free alternative to photoshop & Lightroom * When to use Photoshop or Lightroom
Software that comes with your camera
When I first started, I was using the software that came with my Canon 20D. The EOS Solution Disc came with software called The Digital photo professional. It was the editing software in the suite, it allowed you to edit your Raw and jpeg photos and also offered photo management.
I mostly used levels, contrast and crop tools to edit my photos using the software that came with my camera.
As a freebie with the camera I was given Adobe Photoshop elements, as you know it’s the kinda cut down version of photoshop, geared towards the consumer.
So, no you don’t need photoshop or lightroom because you will receive software with your camera to edit your photos.
Free alternatives for Photoshop & Lightroom
There’s software that comes with your computer like iPhoto, Mac photos or even the editing software that comes with Windows 10. These are free and more than capable to edit and even manage your photos.
Top free alternatives to photoshop:
* GIMP* Pixlr Editor* Photopea
Top free alternatives for Lightroom:
* darktable* RawTherapee* Irfanview
With anything that is free, there will be some drawbacks. Like the user interface might not be as refined or the feature might not be as extensive. The tech support might be limited, software updates not as frequent as their paid software equivalent.
But to be honest, all of these drawbacks might not even count if you only use the software for very basic editing. Barely scratching the surface of what the editing package has to offer.
Then you really don’t need paid software like Lightroom or Photoshop and the free alternative will do the job nicely.
If you do get stuck with any of the free software, simply use Youtube to find your answer. You would be surprised how many photographers use other software other than Adobe.
When to use Photoshop or Lightroom to edit your photos
It’s not to say that any other photo editing and management software, paid or otherwise, can’t do the same thing as Adobe’s suite of software.
They both have had their share of issues, But Adobe has had time to work on and refine both software packages, since 1990 for photoshop and 2006 for Lightroom.
Lightroom was designed for photographers. The features keep on growing and fit a specific workflow for event photographers.
For instance, the catalog I have, an online library for all my sports images. There’s over 10,000 images of editorial and club photos for 9 years of photographing sports.
All the photos have embedded metadata and keywords. So if you type the name of a player, game,
