Adobe Bridge Alternatives

[RM f/g]

I agree.

[Ninjas]

I have been using Adobe Bridge with Affinity Photo.

Works great.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6LCXWpyaIo

[Dewey]

I have ZERO use for anything made by Adobe on my Mac workstations these days , including Bridge , since installing Affinity 1.7 three years ago  . I have utterly banished Adobe products over their harsh marketing and licensing  requirements. I had the Creative Suite 5.5. I banished Adobe for being greedy , basically .  No more.

[George H]

Affinity is a fine replacement for CS 5.5. It only lacks for Bridge. As stated earlier, my preferred Bridge replacement is Raw Power. Does the job and integrates nicely with Affinity.

[Dewey]

To each their own . Thorston Lemke's Graphic Converter was the second app I acquired for my Macinstosh , back in 1995.  Photoshop 2.5 was bundled with the UMAX flatbed scanner I bought first.  I consider Photoshop to be bloatware, then and now. graphicConverter is indispenable for any Mac-based  graphics and photo user. it is not available on Windows

Your Raw Power app would live down in one corner of GraphicConverter  ( which is only for desktop Macs, not iOS phones and tablets) . GraphicConverter works splendidly with AP. It also does very many things no other image processing app offered by anyone can begin to approach , and works with dozens of distinct file formats  coming and going.  Goes way beyond RAW anything. Costs $ 35.00 , with the fastest tech support anywhere. GC is not for everyone since the learning curve is steep due to  thousands of editting permutations possible, but I've grown up alongside it these past  25 years . GC and AP work well together. I leave both apps open all day every day

 

[LondonSquirrel]

The question of Adobe Bridge replacements, and DAMs, crops up from time to time in these forums. In lieu of a DAM from Affinity I think it would not be a bad idea to have a post listing the DAM alternatives. At the moment the suggestions from everyone who has contributed some information is spread across n posts, making the information hard to read.

[Ninjas]

On 11/15/2021 at 2:31 PM, Dewey said:

To each their own . Thorston Lemke's Graphic Converter was the second app I acquired for my Macinstosh , back in 1995.  Photoshop 2.5 was bundled with the UMAX flatbed scanner I bought first.  I consider Photoshop to be bloatware, then and now. graphicConverter is indispenable for any Mac-based  graphics and photo user. it is not available on Windows

Your Raw Power app would live down in one corner of GraphicConverter  ( which is only for desktop Macs, not iOS phones and tablets) . GraphicConverter works splendidly with AP. It also does very many things no other image processing app offered by anyone can begin to approach , and works with dozens of distinct file formats  coming and going.  Goes way beyond RAW anything. Costs $ 35.00 , with the fastest tech support anywhere. GC is not for everyone since the learning curve is steep due to  thousands of editting permutations possible, but I've grown up alongside it these past  25 years . GC and AP work well together. I leave both apps open all day every day

 

I loved that app.  I use Win 10 now.

[kirk23]

People say Adobe made Bridge available for free to anyone.    I never tried it free myself although since I pay  Photoshop subscription.    But  I heard it's free for everyone  whether you have active subscription or not.  It just have  RAW processing features locked  if you don't have active subscription.

[wonderings]

26 minutes ago, kirk23 said:

People say Adobe made Bridge available for free to anyone.    I never tried it free myself although since I pay  Photoshop subscription.    But  I heard it's free for everyone  whether you have active subscription or not.  It just have  RAW processing features locked  if you don't have active subscription.

I think Adobe Bridge has been free for a long time. If it works for people I am not sure why anyone would not use Bridge, the price is certainly right. 

[Ninjas]

I use it with team in two separate locations, we connect via internet. 

Can view, open, close, edit,  images stored  on cloud. 

When we make changes to keywords in metadata, we export those to text file with a date.

Other members import the most recent  keyword text file so we can search for same images.

Works great.

[Fixx]

On 12/14/2021 at 2:41 PM, wonderings said:

I am not sure why anyone would not use Bridge

Because it does not show Affinity previews?

[Dazmondo77]

Neofinder does Affinity previews

[Dazmondo77]

https://cdfinder.de/guide/3/3.16/affinity_dam.html

 

[PaoloT]

It would be nice if Serif and the makers of NeoFinder and Graphic Converter collaborated together, instead of Serif trying to develop their own DAM. Those are solid and reliable solution, that only need to be deeply compatible with Serif's file formats.

In exchange to their compatibility, Serif could endorse them and help them in developing and maintain compatibility.

The same could be done on the Windows side.

No need to distract Serif from their core tasks (developing the three fundamentals of the graphic creativity).

Paolo

 

[RNKLN]

On 12/16/2021 at 10:36 AM, Dazmondo77 said:

Neofinder does Affinity previews

Same is true for Pixave. You can setup Smart Collections to show Affinity (Designer, Photo) files and then preview them. It's an nice piece of software for an incredibly low price.

[v_kyr]

2 hours ago, PaoloT said:

It would be nice if Serif and the makers of NeoFinder and Graphic Converter collaborated together, instead of Serif trying to develop their own DAM. Those are solid and reliable solution, that only need to be deeply compatible with Serif's file formats. ...

I pretty much doubt that Serif is willing to reveal their file format! - Instead they will tell that third parties can reuse (or make use of) the JPG-Preview portion inside Affinity files. The later is something the OSes and some third party tools already do support to some degree.

[PaoloT]

2 hours ago, v_kyr said:

I pretty much doubt that Serif is willing to reveal their file format!

But that is exactly the basis of a collaboration: sharing some code, that will remain only known to the members of the agreement. In exact age to this opening to the partner, one gets immediate access to one file format more, and the other support from some heavily needed software.

Both will widen their user base, being immediately known by the users of the other application.

Paolo

 

[Pšenda]

10 hours ago, v_kyr said:

I pretty much doubt that Serif is willing to reveal their file format!

The problem why Serif does not want to publish its format is, in my opinion, its constant development and addition. If they published it, even if only for some close cooperation, they would tie their hands, and the format adjustment will be much more complicated for them. At a time when applications are still being developed, not publishing a format is very convenient -  doesn't have to take anyone into account.

[v_kyr]

27 minutes ago, Pšenda said:

The problem why Serif does not want to publish its format is, in my opinion, its constant development and addition. If they published it, even if only for some close cooperation, they would tie their hands, and the format adjustment will be much more complicated for them. At a time when applications are still being developed, not publishing a format is very convenient -  doesn't have to take anyone into account.

Good point!

[Dazmondo77]

Neofinder 8 is brilliant and in addition to cataloging, showing all Affinity previews and giving options to edit meta data - it catalogs and stores info and previews of unconnected drives, discs and volumes - I've been a user since the late 90's when it was a very basic backup cd catalog library (CD Finder) what is great is it can still read and open those old CD Finder database then you can update the cataloged drive or disc (providing you still have the disc) which will give you previews - it also has menu bar quick access, which give me the ability to search for a file that could be stored on any of 84 cataloged drives, discs or volumes, in just a few clicks.

- Totally recommend -

[Dewey]

GraphicConverter also shows high fidelity previews of Affinity Photo files in its browser, and all metadata is available and editable. The only thing GC won't do is directly open an Affinity file, but that's not Thorston Lemke's fault...Serif's file format is proprietary.

I do  note that NeoFinder while similar to Graphic Converter does a lot less and  costs  a little more and comes with 'restrictions'.

[loukash]

19 hours ago, Dewey said:

NeoFinder while similar to Graphic Converter does a lot less and  costs  a little more and comes with 'restrictions'.

NeoFinder has a different purpose: Its main focus is to catalog media.
Whereas GraphicConverter – as the name hints – has always focused on editing bitmap files. The file browser came much later.

Vive la différence.
They both work just fine side by side, with some overlapping functionality which is all right by me.

(GC user since mid-1990s, CDF/NF user since 2000)

That all said…

SInce I still continue working in El Capitan, with no plans to change that anytime soon, they will pry my iView/Expression Media from my cold, dead hands! There's something in its workflow that I need and that still no other app can match. Since I'm using it mostly for working with standard bitmap type of images, I'm not all that in need to see the corresponding Affinity docs, if any. And if so, I'd simply add a small "Docname.afphoto.jpg" preview as a "sidecar".

[ashf]

Bridge is basically a file browser.
Why people here are mentioning cataloging apps?

[LondonSquirrel]

1 hour ago, ashf said:

Bridge is basically a file browser.

It does more than that. Tagging and keywords, for example, which can be arranged in groups. Searching of metadata, templated metadata which can be assigned, and so on. It's not just a browser.

[ashf]

3 hours ago, LondonSquirrel said:

It does more than that. Tagging and keywords, for example, which can be arranged in groups. Searching of metadata, templated metadata which can be assigned, and so on. It's not just a browser.

But it's not full fledged cataloging app.

iView Media was the perfect one as a cataloging app like loukash mentioned in my experience.