Affinity = PS, but how to replace LR?

[CCS]

Hi All!

Two years ago, I terminated my CC-Licenses for Adobe-Photoshop (PS) and -Lightroom (LR). I tried ACDSee Ultimate as a replacement for LR and PS. But I ended up a bit disappointed. Though I have to admit, that Ultimate has some real good features , I stepped into some real strange problems. And many features are not as powerful, as seems on first sight. Especially the searching is less powerful than you would expect from a program that started as a DAM-System and not a Photo-Editor... Well, I guess that's not the right place to discuss the disadvantages of another program, my point is:

From what I can tell so far I think Affinty is a wonderful alternative to PS. But definitely can’t substitute LR. Wonder if I stick to ACDSee + Affinity, or if I keep on looking for other programs. What do you think? What programs are other Affinity users favorites, when it comes so DAM, Raw-Developing or editing of multiple files?

Thank You for sharing,
Conrad

[lphilpot]

I'm not a FOSS evangelist but just the same there are some good offerings. You may not prefer them, but being free it makes sense to at least give them a try if you've never used them. What's to lose? All three are vastly more capable than Photo's raw persona.

If you need DAM look at darktable (https://www.darktable.org/). Be aware: darktable is very powerful and can do wondrous things with images, but it requires (and will reward) effort in learning it. It's not a one-button-click product so don't expect to just "push a few sliders" and get top-notch results. That said, it's not so much difficult as just a little different. But that difference usually makes sense once learned. The emphasis on scene-referred editing may take a moment to grasp but makes sense once the difference between it and display-referred is understood.

If DAM isn't a requirement, RawTherapee (https://rawtherapee.com/) and the RawTherapee 'descendant' ART (https://bitbucket.org/agriggio/art/wiki/Home) are powerful raw editors, but they don't have any cataloging capabilities. Both of their editing approaches are more 'expected' (broadly speaking, conventional, i.e., Lr-ish) than darktable's but they're still unique products all in all. ART's UI is slightly more conventional than RT's particularly in a few areas (masking / local adjustments). Be aware that RawTherapee's support for (Canon) CR3 metadata is not complete. It can process CR3 raw files, but doesn't read the metadata so some otherwise-automatic things won't happen (e.g., lens profile selection, etc.). ART fully supports CR3 metadata.

darktable and RawTherapee have tons of YouTube videos in addition to excellent documentation. ART (which I use) has numerically less -- but not zero -- documentation however being a RT derivative the RT docs cover a lot of it. All three are powerful and targeted at users who want to know what they're doing. They have very active user communities (including the developers) at https://discuss.pixls.us/ Being a Discourse environment, just tag your question per the software and off you go.

...and then there's the whole commercial world. 🙂

[thomaso]

This was discussed in several threads in this forum, search for DAM or related keywords. – If you want to import LR catalogs: Capture One does.

[ashf]

Capture One or DxO PhotoLab could be a real alternative. but they are not as reasonable as Affinity.

[v_kyr]

10 hours ago, lphilpot said:

If you need DAM look at darktable

That's no DAM per se, a real DAM (Digital Assets Management System), as it's name implies, goes far beyond what image management/cataloging software only offers. So I won't call such software like darktable a DAM here. Another free app digiKam offers much more than darktable as a photo/image cataloging/management software, but it is also at best just a digital photo management application and so no full blown server capable DAM.

[lphilpot]

2 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

That's no DAM per se, a real DAM (Digital Assets Management System), as it's name implies, goes far beyond what image management/cataloging software only offers. So I won't call such software like darktable a DAM here.

In this context, it's pretty much considered DAM. But if it makes you happy we'll call it Imported Image Indexing, whatever. I'm not interesting in arguing the pedantic fine points of terminology. I was simply trying to offer some options and my intent was clear to anyone who read it in context.

Done.

[v_kyr]

1 minute ago, lphilpot said:

In this context ...

I've just replied to this, since in this private photography context over years the term DAM is somehow misused/abused by people, calling every silly photo browser & cataloging app etc. then a DAM here. - DAMs are usually much bigger content management systems which deal with much more than just images and videos and they are usually used by bigger companies & agencies.

Quote

Digital asset management
Content management system

Digital asset management ( DAM ) refers to software applications for storing and managing any digital content, especially media files such as graphics, videos, music files and text modules. In the media sector it is sometimes also referred to as media asset management (MAM) or more specifically as video asset management (VAM) . It belongs to the field of content management systems.

Main functions in classic digital asset management systems are:

• Import and export of files, if necessary with format conversion
• Enriching binary files with meta information for research purposes (e.g. IPTC-IIM standard )
• Find files by metadata, file names, or other properties
• Display, view (if necessary, listen to and view) files
• Combining files into packages (usually called collections, collections, albums)
• Archive and version files
• Provision of a web portal, often called a “brand portal” or “press portal”, through which advertising agencies, publishers, journalists as well as a company's employees and dealers can download current images or advertising material themselves.

Digital asset management can be addressed manually or automatically. Some systems are also accessible to external suppliers or service providers so that data can be exchanged more quickly during production. In contrast to an image database, a MAM/DAM system can be used to manage not only images, but all types of files, i.e. H. so-called assets of all kinds, for example documents from various programs, videos, animations.

Digital asset management can be composed of various individual components, computers, storage systems, etc.

The most common architectures consist of either a database or an indexer and locally installed application software or a web browser interface. The tendency of most manufacturers is towards a relational database and browser front ends.

DAM systems are usually offered for installation on on-premise server hardware or as a SaaS service, the latter in either a private cloud or public cloud, which can have a significant impact on the protection of the data managed .

Newer DAM systems focus on functions for integration into the corporate environment, for example the provision of assets in content management systems , web shop systems, product information management systems and web2print systems.

While older DAM systems were primarily seen as “containers” for media assets, modern systems are also used to produce media files and advertising material as well as to control publication processes. For this purpose, common application or authoring programs such as Microsoft Office , the Adobe Creative Suite , video editing systems and others are connected either via links or add-ons that must be installed additionally. The focus is on the function of loading files for editing from the DAM system (usually referred to as “checking out”), editing them and importing them again (usually referred to as “checking in”). Some providers also integrate process control functions such as correction management, release management or license rights management.

Metadata

All operating systems in use today manage files in a purely hierarchical directory or folder structure. This means that the diverse properties of media files can only be represented hierarchically and therefore only to a very limited extent, since directory and file names only allow a largely uncontrolled entry of just a few properties:

• The typographical errors that occur during normal use destroy a complete, machine-readable evaluation of file and directory names.
• It is not possible to use a list of desirable terms – a so-called “ controlled vocabulary ” in which the terms and spellings to be used are specified.
• Files can usually only be stored in a single directory hierarchy. For example, if images of buildings are stored in a directory hierarchy that is based on geographical terms such as the names of continents, countries, cities, etc., there is no possibility of clearly defining further properties, e.g. B. the type of building, material, architect, costs, condition, etc.
• In order to compensate for these weaknesses, file naming conventions are often used, but compliance with these conventions poses a disciplinary problem even in small work groups.
• Duplicates of files are also often created in order to give them additional properties based on their storage location. For example, a frequently used logo is often stored in folders that contain all the components of an advertising material production order.

To address these weaknesses, all common DAM systems use metadata.

An essential part of modern DAM systems are controlled vocabularies. In order to simplify the entry of metadata, to enforce uniform terms and to avoid typos, lists or catalogs are created on a field-by-field or cross-field basis in which the permitted or desired terms are listed. The manufacturers of the individual DAM systems take very different approaches in the structure of the metadata as well as in the operation, from simple lists that are stored field by field to cross-field thesauruses and taxonomies, automatic suggestions and multilingual thesauruses that are available to the user When entering terms in one language, you can essentially automatically translate many terms into several languages.

Metadata standards

In connection with DAM systems, a metadata standard is a defined standard with which metadata can be managed in a structured and clear manner. This standard includes a technical description and a number of fields. The technical description includes the file format of a metadata file or the embedding of metadata in the files to be described. Fields usually mean fields in the sense of database fields, which in turn have properties, for example that they can be used as a date field or as a text field.

Common metadata standards in DAM systems

IPTC (IPTC-IIM and IPTC Core)

The first DAM systems were called image database systems; The use of other file formats was not important in previous years. Accordingly, DAM systems almost always support the IPTC-IIM standard defined in 1991, today mostly in the slightly more modern XMP format in the form of IPTC Core. ^[1] IPTC Core essentially contains the fields that have been common since the early days of the systems.

Exif

The Exchangeable Image File Format is the most common standard for managing digital images. ^[2] Almost every digital camera writes technical image information to its image files in the form of Exif data, such as the aperture used, exposure time or ISO setting. Most DAM systems read and can display the EXIF information. However, Exif plays no role for organizing media files in classic application areas.

ID3

The ID3 tag ^[3] is mostly used for music files. It is the standard, especially for MP3 files.

Full text

Many modern DAM systems extract from text-containing files such as: B. PDFs , Microsoft Word , Powerpoint , Excel , OpenOffice files contain the text and save it in the database to use it like other metadata for full-text searches . Some production-related systems also offer similar functions for files from programs such as Adobe InDesign . In most cases, previews of different sizes are created from the title page or all pages of such documents, which provide a visual impression of the content.

Metadata standards from other application areas

The focus of DAM projects in companies today is primarily on integration into the existing system landscape. This means that DAM systems are connected to ERP systems, web shops and other systems. As a result, metadata from other application areas often play just as important a role in projects today as traditional metadata standards.

For installations in industrial and commercial companies, an article number and sometimes other internally used identification numbers play a role. The goal is always to have a consistent metadata inventory in all systems, from the ERP system and production systems to the web shop , the content management system and catalog production. As a result, there are occasionally functional overlaps between PIM systems , some of which also offer simple functions of a DAM system, and DAM systems, some of which also offer PIM functionalities for product data managementcontain. The consistency of identification keys and metadata is intended to ensure that the data is up-to-date and correct and to reduce error rates.

Important metadata standards in DAM projects include:

• EAN, the European Article Number; This term is outdated, but is still often used. Since 2009, the name has been the Global Trade Item Number (GTIN, Global Item Identification Number), an internationally unique product identifier for trade items.
• ISBN, the International Standard Book Number

The variety of metadata used, particularly in industrial applications, is enormous and ranges from EDIFACT with its numerous subsets to the type approval of a motor vehicle or the producer code of chicken eggs to in-house coding that a company only uses internally for its customers, suppliers, products or spare parts. Accordingly, it plays an important role in the requirements of DAM systems today to be able to handle a wide variety of metadata virtuoso beyond the traditional metadata standards. Some DAM systems offer plugins or modules specifically for connecting to certain third-party systems or have an extensive programming interface. For systems with a modern service-oriented architecture, the trend is towards the use of standard web services such as SOAP , because this can reduce the development effort for integration and project run times and the effort required for maintenance during updates. ^[4] [5]

Metadata from an image analysis

In the current versions of today's DAM systems there is often a function for finding images and similar files based on image analysis ( Content Based Image Retrieval ). Without the presence of metadata about the image content, it is recognized whether images are similar or identical. The trend is towards “autotagging”. By this new term, manufacturers mean the automatic assignment of keywords to images based on the image content without human intervention.

These methods are relatively new and in practice often prove to be useful for general images, but can be improved for specific specialist topics. The trend is therefore towards machine learning- based methods that use the metadata of an existing database to better assign new, similar images.

Metadata in assets vs. metadata in the database

The basic idea of the old IPTC-IIM standard, which comes from the press and news agency sector, is to add metadata directly to a photo so that the metadata is transmitted to the recipient as part of an image file. This is done by writing a separate block into the image file. This concept has advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages:

• The recipient receives all metadata with one image and does not have to view them separately. The condition for this is that he uses software that can also display the metadata from the header.
• If the DAM system fails and all metadata stored in its database is lost, the metadata from the assets can be recovered.

Disadvantages:

• It is no longer possible to subsequently update metadata written to assets after the transfer.
• Data can be accidentally transmitted that should not be accessible to the recipient. This includes, for example, fee data, bank details, etc.
• Data can be transmitted that undesirably allows conclusions to be drawn about the author or photographer. Example: the metadata that is automatically entered into digital photos as part of the EXIF header also includes the camera serial number and often the GPS position. This can pose significant risks for photographers working in crisis regions or countries with restricted freedom of the press and freedom of expression. ^{[6] [7] [8]}
• Generally less performant because read access to files has to be carried out again and again.

In contrast, metadata can only be stored and managed in the database of the DAM system. This concept also has advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages:

• No unwanted sharing of information
• Performant

Disadvantages:

• If files are shared, metadata is not included.

In modern DAM systems, a combination of both methods is common. The practical implementation follows very different approaches and ranges from practical to complicated.

System architecture

The IT world has changed significantly since the beginning of the first image database systems as the predecessors of today's DAM systems in the early 1990s. This resulted in repeated revisions to the architecture of DAM systems. The first applications in the years 1992–1994 were programs for individual users such as “Pixolo” ^[9] from the Swedish company Hasselblad , Canto Cumulus and later the “Photo Station” from the Norwegian company FotoWare.

1st generation: client-server architecture

Such solutions were expanded into client-server systems in the 1990s . Most systems were not based on the SQL databases that are common today , but on proprietary applications for managing indexes such as dtSearch , which are actually used for document retrieval , or more precisely for free searches in large amounts of text, and were similar to today's search engines. By contrast to a relational databaseWith its precisely defined field definitions and quite unstructured data storage, this type of architecture is now considered outdated and is only used in very few systems. In some systems there are still remnants of this system generation, e.g. B. by combining a relational database with search engine software.

2nd generation: from proprietary client to browser application

The generation of DAM systems that followed these approaches, which now appear outdated, in the early 2000s showed a clear trend towards browser-based systems. The main advantage over the early individual user programs and the subsequent client-server architectures was that software distribution of client applications was no longer necessary and central data storage could be enforced. The architecture that was also used for other applications at the time usually provided for an application in the web server using PHP or the .Net framework-Connect technologies with a database. In many systems of this generation, the very limited capabilities of web browsers to display multimedia content at the time of system development are supplemented by additional technologies - in the Woodwing Elvis DAM, for example, Adobe Flash , in the FotoWare systems Apple Quicktime . Among the better-known systems, only Canto Cumulus, Extensis Portfolio and FotoWare still use client software today.

3rd generation: from monolith to SOA architecture

The task for DAM systems was initially manageable, but grew immensely over the years. In addition to simply managing new file types, ever-increasing requirements for interoperability and an exponentially growing number of files to be managed, customers wanted to automate more and more work steps. The resulting scaling and functional expansions are increasingly leading to problems, as the monolithic architecture of most established DAM systems can make additional developments complicated. The connections to other systems, which were usually developed on the basis of the manufacturers' proprietary APIs , often have to be renewed or completely redeveloped at great expense during updates.

This problem gave rise to the new approach of building a service-oriented architecture instead of a monolithic architecture with proprietary APIs , in which standardized web services such as SOAP and REST are not only added later and used in the spirit of the proprietary APIs to enable simple queries, but are quasi the main part of the system to establish connections within the system and to other systems ^[10]. This architecture enables the systems built on it to be highly scaled, makes it much easier to develop interfaces to other systems, increases the security of updates and simplifies maintenance. The open system architecture enables secure integration of corporate applications and systems such as: B. PIM, CMS, e-commerce applications or ERP systems.

Areas of application

• Music industry e.g. B. to store pieces of music for further processing
• Printing industry to manage layouts, customer logos, images, photos etc.
• Publishers to manage media and control production processes
• Marketing or press departments in advertising companies, NGOs, etc.
• Press and broadcast archives
• Information and documentation centers
• Film projects
• CG and animation projects (3D modeling)
• Company or corporate archives
• Marketing portals in the B2B or B2C sector to manage media (images, videos, etc.) and control the production of advertising material as well as to improve product communication in connection with product information.
• Storage and organization of data from imaging systems in medicine; The term “DAM system” is rarely used in medicine, where we usually talk about PACS systems that work with metadata and transmission standards such as DICOM , HL7 and IHE . ^[11]
• Research data repositories

Articles about digital asset management solutions

Surname	Manufacturer	operating system	approx. costs	Language	Remarks
Canto Cumulus	Canto	, ,	from €10,000	multilingual	Since 1992. Client-server system and browser-based; Two products: OnPremise Cumulus (Cumulus is no longer supported/sold), Cloud/SaaS (Canto); Plugins for Adobe Drive, Microsoft Office, CMS, ERP, PIM, ECM, e-commerce, video, SAP. SaaS is based on Amazon Webservice Cloud.
cavok	PEAK-14	, ,	from €10,000	multilingual	Browser-based, SOA architecture (the core of the system is a SOAP/REST web service), focus on integration and automation with ERP, CMS, PIM, web shops etc., scriptable, Adobe InDesign plugin. On-premise or SaaS (hosted in Germany), similarity and duplicate search, audio and video conversion and streaming.
CELUM	Celum GmbH	, ,	SaaS from €34.90 per month and user	multilingual	Available as a cloud, SaaS solution. Browser based client. Connectors for Adobe CC, SAP Hybris, ERP, PIM, CRM, CMS, social media via HootieSuite, eCommerce.
censhare	censhare AG	, ,	k. A	multilingual	Runs as a cloud solution; Browser-based and native client (macOS, Windows, Linux); Plugins for Adobe InDesign and InCopy; Interfaces to WCM, ERP, PIM, CRM, social media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube), web analytics (Google Web Analytics), video transcoding (Amazon Transcoder, Sorenson Squeeze Server)
easydb	Programmfabrik GmbH	LAMP	k. A	multilingual	Browser based. Available since 2003. Based on PostgreSQL and the Elasticsearch indexing engine.
eyebase	CMB GmbH	LAMP	SaaS from €40 per month, license from around €3000	multilingual	Available as a cloud, SaaS or on-premise solution; Browser based; Plugin for Adobe InDesign; Interfaces to WCM, ERP, PIM, CRM, social media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube), compatible with Amazon S3 or Google Drive, eyeSync as its own Dropbox extension
Phraseanet	Alchemy	LAMP	Open source ( GPLv3 )	multilingual	Browser-based, particularly popular in France. Based on the Elasticsearch indexing engine.
Pimcore	Pimcore GmbH	LAMP	Open source ( GPL )	multilingual	Browser based. Actually a PIM system with some DAM components. Modules also for CMS and Commerce
ResourceSpace	Montala Limited	LAMP	Open source ( BSD license )	multilingual	Browser based; Image, video and PDF management only, uses IPTC/XMP/EXIF only
Pixx.io	Pixx.io GmbH	, ,	SaaS from € 9 per person/month	German English	SaaS solution, supports 190 different file formats, integrations: Shopify, ConHootsuite, Akeneo, Adobe Photoshop, Indesign, Canva, Contentbird, Contentpepper, Imory, Microsoft Office, Neos, TYPO3, WordPress

See also

• Image management
• Cross Media Publishing

 

[loukash]

Conceptually, my favorite DAM over the years was iView/Expression Media which I'm still using on MacOS El Capitan.
Still desperately looking for an adequate replacement for MacOS Ventura.

My closest candidate:
NeoFinder which can also import iView catalogs as long as they have been saved/exported in XML format.
It's an excellent cataloging tool – in daily use since 2000 while it still was CDFinder – but as a DAM it mainly lacks UI-wise.
It has documented "awareness" of Affinity documents incl. preview though.
To make full use of its DAM features like auto-cataloging, the "business license" would be necessary.

NeoFinder on its own can only recreate iView catalog sets as albums if they have been stored in the file IPTC. iView on the other hand can only write (readable) IPTC to JPEG, TIFF and PSD. It can write some XMP metadata to the obsolete MacOS resource forks of any files it can catalog, but no other app can actually read them these days.
I have programmed two rather "rough" AppleScripts – still a work in progress that needs quite some finetuning – to fully transfer iView Catalog Sets to NeoFinder's albums – which of course requires iView/Expression Media app to be running, so it's of no use with MacOS Catalina and above.

Also usable:
XnView can catalog any file format, not just images, including Affinity previews. But it lacks any advanced concept of individual catalogs sets or "meta" albums. I also don't like the monolithic database. After cataloging my home ordner (as you can't have individual databases without resorting to very clunky workarounds), the thumbs.db grew to 10 GB even at the lowest thumbnail quality setting. A nightmare to back up, hence I had to exclude it from any backups by moving it to ~/Library/Caches folder. Also, integration with MacOS is rather poor, not to speak of documentation for some of its advanced features. (After all, it's a work of just one developer, and it's free for private use…)

[RichardMH]

DxO Photolab is worth a look. I got a free copy of Photolab 5 Essential when I bought the Nik Collection and for many images its fine as a RAW convertor and has the usual adjustments and some masking capability. Has a basic DAM. Later versions have better features. Other option is the free Capture One Express if its available for your camera. Very good RAW convertor, basic adjustments but no masks and also has a basic DAM. Excellent highlight recovery.  I'm fussy about RAW conversions and use Iridient. I also use FastRawViewer for simple management and culling. 

[Maxbe]

I've used many of them, both professional and amateur products. In the end (I'm an amateur) I chose IMatch (https://www.photools.com/) by far the most complete (and not by subscription) IMHO.

Excellent product, extremely powerful and very well supported.

Try it!

Maxbe

[CCS]

Hi All!

First, I'd like to apologize for not answering your comments. It doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate them. Due to more urgent problems, I simply didn't find the time to take care of my hobby … So thank you all very much!!

 

On 9/24/2023 at 1:16 PM, RichardMH said:

DxO Photolab is worth a look.... Other option is the free Capture One Express if its available for your camera.

Well, no free DxO ... I bought an used license of an older version a few months ago at eBay, but it was very obscure - eventually I got the money back …

 

On 9/23/2023 at 6:06 PM, thomaso said:

This was discussed in several threads in this forum, search for DAM or related keywords. – If you want to import LR catalogs: Capture One does.

That's strange. I did search and even today when searching for DAM I get only 6 hits, all reffering to this post ... wander what I'm doing wrong?

 

On 9/24/2023 at 2:52 AM, ashf said:

Capture One or DxO PhotoLab could be a real alternative. but they are not as reasonable as Affinity.

 

My favorite so far is Capture One, but it is pretty expensive. And as I mentioned before I didn’t find time to take a closer look at the alternative mentioned.Okay, my hopes go for 2024 🙂

Thanks again

Conrad

[walt.farrell]

12 minutes ago, CCS said:

That's strange. I did search and even today when searching for DAM I get only 6 hits, all reffering to this post ... wander what I'm doing wrong?

If you're searching in a web browser on a PC or Mac (vs on a tablet or phone) the Search box has a Search Scope pull-down on the right. When you search from within a Topic, it defaults to "This topic". You want to choose Everywhere, instead, for this search.

[CCS]

Thank you @walt.farrell you've nailed it 😄

 

[AffinityMakesMeWonder]

On 11/2/2023 at 12:44 PM, Maxbe said:

I've used many of them, both professional and amateur products. In the end (I'm an amateur) I chose IMatch (https://www.photools.com/) by far the most complete (and not by subscription) IMHO.

Excellent product, extremely powerful and very well supported.

Try it!

Maxbe

Perhaps this is good, but, it would be nice if users here suggest cross platforms applications…

I’m pretty sure that many here use Mac computers, and, can’t use this…

[Maxbe]

1 minute ago, AffinityMakesMeSmile said:

Perhaps this is good, but, it would be nice if users here suggest cross platforms applications…

I’m pretty sure that many here use Mac computers, and, can’t use this…

You're absolutely right. I did not mention the fact that it runs on Windows only, sorry.

max

[CCS]

14 minutes ago, AffinityMakesMeSmile said:

it would be nice if users here suggest cross platforms applications…

Well, I'm using Windows, so I'm grateful for a good tip - even if the program runs only on Windows 🙂

But of course it is a good idea to mention a limitation in the OS.

[sat312]

Hi CCS,

I just replied on another question regarding a LR alternative. Instead of writing the same waffle I have added the link to the post. Hope it helps.