Adobe CS5 Suite and Camera Raw

In April 2010 Adobe finally launched its Creative Suite 5 on a suspecting world. I've a deal of respect for Adobe; their products are generally good and they put a lot of effort into advancing them, but I'm aware of a strategy that's been seen in earlier upgrades that's mainly for commercial gain and not purely technical reasons. 

But before I launch a broadside at Adobe I should say that I understand their reasoning because I work in the software industry and I understand the economics of it. Many folks are just fine thank-you-very-much with CS4, CS3 and maybe even CS and feel no need to shell out over £600 of their hard-earned just to keep up with the Joneses, but the deciding factor will be the latest and greatest release of Camera Raw. Will Adobe make CR6 down-wards compatible with CS4 & CS3? Maybe not below that but their must still be a large community out there with no upgrade plans.

The great RAW vs. JPEG debate is well over now and most pros and serious prosumers will be shooting on RAW. RAW gives greater dynamic latitude for editing and is, in my opinion, a no-brainer...unless you're shooting for the World Cup when picture editors don't have time to mess around with levels.  So, where do you get your RAW fix from? CS or Lightroom? I use LR2 (soon to be LR3) and will upgrade immediately it is launched, but then a LR upgrade is pennies in comparison to a CS5 upgrade. LR3 will run quite happily with CS4 even if the CR version keeps creeping up beyond 6...which it will. Which brings me to my point...

Adobe have made a point about message dialogues between LR and CS when one is used to edit images stored in the other. For the uninitiated these messages may read quite scary, possibly tempting some people into upgrading CS4 to CS5 just to keep CR in step. CR is separate technology for both LR & CS and you "shouldn't" need to upgrade to CS5 just because its running a later version of CR, but Adobe "encourage" this thought and are quite happy to take your pounds, dollars, euros and kwacha...well maybe not kwacha, just so you have "peace of mind".

So come on Adobe, be honest about Camera Raw and don't make it mandatory to upgrade CS unless you can explain in good technical detail why.

Brian Wilson, May 2010