freeware vs Adobe

[NathanFranke]

I last used Adobe Creative Suite stuff seriously back when CS1 was new. Now, I don't have money, but I need software. I've used Gimp some, and I understand that Inkscape and Scribus are the Illustrator and InDesign counterparts (based on 10 seconds of googling).

the question:
How well do the programs work together? Is Adobe worth the hundreds of dollars more given that I already know the GUI, or are hours of tutorials worth the lack of price?

What other options are out there for free ware?

edit: just remembered Corel etc, but not sure how to change the poll.

[andyw]

Depends on what you want to do.
PS is a pixel manipulator. If you don't want or need to do loads of stuff and only need basic corrections then lightroom is better.

There are loads of cheaper alternatives out there some good, some bad.
As with everything, you get what you pay for basically.

[ArmySoldier777]

Just out of complete curiosity, do names get listed by what you choose on the poll? lol. Incase anybody did download Adobe from a torrent site instead of paying the ridiculously overpriced $1000 for the suite, I'm sure they wouldn't want their name out there . I've never clicked on a poll, so I wasn't sure how it worked lol.

That being said, that in no way was me saying I did or didn't pay for Adobe lol, just a curious statement.

And while there are other programs out there that may cover the same basics that the Adobe suite does, none of them come close to the advanced things you can do.


David

[NathanFranke]

I'm not tracking names if you got PS for free.

I currently use lightroom, and I've got GIMP for the small stuff that I used to use photoshop for. It's taking me twice as long to do anything in GIMP that I used to do in PS, but that's probably just learning curve talking. A long long time ago, I heard of GIMPshop, which is GIMP with the Photoshop look and feel + keyboard shortcuts. Haven't used it though.

Mostly I'm just curious of opinions of the various options. See if Creative Suite is worth saving my hard earned bucks, or should I use the freeware options and then train myself on still more software.

[UlpilotSC]

How much is creative suite if you find a teacher to buy it for you? I wouldn't mind paying a couple hundred dollars for it, but that's about my limit. I'm getting ready to build a new desktop, upgrading from cs2 might be nice. It was a big change from 6.0...

[NathanFranke]

Creative Suite Design Standard (Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, acrobat xpro, Bridge, Device Central) is 1299.00 base, 299.00 as an educator/student.

Design Premium (Photoshop Extended (what's the difference?), Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver, Flash Professional, Flash Catalyst CS5, Fireworks, Acrobat X Pro, Bridge, Device Central) is 1899.00, 449.00 for educators/students.

Substantial discount, but I did read somewhere years ago that legally, if you're using the educator version, you can't be using it for business purposes. Not sure how they track that, or even if it's true.

[Zeke Menuar]

I use Irfanview for basic post processing.

[Matthias099]

I use neither one of the listed ones. Paint Shop Pro X3 Ultimate....

[karen_s]

I use the Adobe Creative Suite at work (for graphic design) but do not have it home.

At home, I use ...

• Lightroom
• An old Photoshop Elements (v.4 I think) for Mac instead of Photoshop. It was about $80.
• Open source Inkscape instead of Illustrator.
• iWorks (iPages specifically) for page layout instead of InDesign (I think this is Mac only but not sure). I think it was about $100 for the suite.

Here are some of my thoughts on Adobe vs the others ...

• Lightroom fills 95% of my photography needs so I have not felt the need to buy Photoshop at this point or download and give Gimp a try. Elements fills in the other 5% pretty well.
• I use Illustrator a lot at work and Inkscape a little at home. I much prefer Illustrator but will say Inkscape is pretty nice. I have done some simple illustrating in it and it works well. It's a different interface and the drawing tools took some getting used to but I do like it. I also had some issues with kerning that I've not quite figured out.
• If you work on a Mac, you might look into iWorks for some page layout. It is no InDesign but for the light work I do at home, it's quite nice. I have only used this to make items that are printed at home and not for commercial printing. I looked into it though and the consensus seemed to say it can work, just have to make sure your printer can take the file.
• At work, I would not want to work in anything but the Creative Suite. My software has to be supported, reliable, and have every sophisticated tool possible. At home, I'm not quite as demanding because I mainly use it for my hobby.
• So far, I have not run into compatibility issues. I have worked about the same as I do with the Adobe suite. It's probably not quite as seamless, but so far so good.
• There is a learning curve to the open source, but the support communities are pretty good. I learned the basics of Blender (3d modeling) and Inkscape through their respective support communities and YouTube videos.

Hope that helps a little.

[RLucas]

I marked the freeware option, but that is not entirely true. I do use Lightroom. A lot! But I still go in to GIMP quite a bit, especially when editing images from the critique section, just to see what could be done.