Luminar vs ACDSee

By Eva Williams 13 days ago, Software Reviews

What is better, Luminar or ACDSee? Both programs have basic tools and advanced functions necessary to create and edit pictures or any other graphic files. Although they have similar functionality, they still have some significant differences.

Luminar is standard photo editing software with more than 35 unique filters. There are handy tips that help beginner shooters improve their editing skills. The program supports batch processing, which allows you to edit a great number of images simultaneously. Plus, there is a wide array of free Luminar presets.

ACDSee is a multifunctional package of retouching tools. Photographers can change the visual properties of files and remove various defects. You can use a wide array of tools, filters, and professional extensions.

What Is Luminar?

luminar logo

Luminar is powerful photo editing software for beginners with a wide set of filters, shooting modes, and RAW support. You can use the program separately or as a plugin for Lightroom, Photoshop, or even Apple Photos.

In the editor you can adjust color, contrast, enhance the sharpness of images or blur them. You may download images to the library and edit them. The program has several working environments for completing specific tasks.

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  • luminar interface
  • luminar interface
  • luminar interface

    Luminar: Strengths and Weaknesses

    Landscape Enhancer. Such tools as Dehaze, Golden Hour, Foliage Enhance allow creating the ideal combination of contrast, sharpness, and color to remove fog effects in aerial photographs or mountain landscapes.

    This tool also helps improve shots taken through the glass. All these options are helpful not only for landscape photographs but also for real estate, travel and nature shots.

    Composition AI. It is a smart tool for auto cutting. When you use Composition AI, it automatically identifies an object and offers the best way of adjusting framing. It also fixes any issues with image alignment and removes distortion.

    Sky AI. This intuitive tool allows you to adjust the lighting of a scene depending on the sky, add atmospheric fog, or even change the white balance.

    AI Skin Enhancer & Portrait Enhancer. The program automatically detects blemishes and removes them with one click. You may also make the skin smoother. The Portrait Enhancer allows you to quickly make a portrait look professional. You can use it to edit the face, eyes, lips, teeth, brows or remove dark spots.

    Professional editing of RAW files. Luminar 3 has an accurate and fast RAW Develop Engine processor. It can work with DNG files as well RAW images taken with cameras of popular brands.

    The program also supports Advanced DNG and HDR RAW files. You can add your custom profiles. The Luminar’s RAW Engine differs supports an enhanced dynamic range, which makes it different from other similar options.

    Low performance. If you use an old computer, you risk facing some performance issues. Remember to check the hardware requirements before buying this software.

    Lacks some options. Experienced users, especially portrait photographers, won’t be satisfied with the functions available in the Portrait Mode. In fact, there are only three sub-menus that allow you to work with portraits using several sliders.

    Skylum hasn’t designed Luminar AI for professionals. It is a beginner-level program.

    What Is ACDSee?

    acdsee logo

    When comparing Luminar vs ACDSee, you will notice some important differences. ACDSee is a multifunctional software for photographers who are interested in professional image retouching. It allows adding shades, adjusting transparency, and editing text, fixing drawbacks. Thanks to the dynamic correction feature, you can freely experiment with effects. You can also use the batch processing feature to process a great number of images at a time.

    Professional photographers appreciate the high processing speed and the fact they can work with the highest quality image format. The program supports cloud service and social network integration. With it, you can create content for your blog, site and can cut out frames from video clips and then edit them. This way, you can create a high-quality output file and prepare it for printing.

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    • acdsee interface
    • acdsee interface
    • acdsee interface

      ACDSee: Strengths and Weaknesses

      Made Easy Layouts. You can select any object in the frame and indicate the exact place where you want to insert your elements by using the Paste and Place tool. Besides, you can open, download, and use brush files to improve layouts. You may resize, cut, rotate, and edit your images.

      Conversion. When comparing Luminar vs ACDSee, we can conclude that the latter is the best free image converter. It can convert graphic files into a range of formats, like BMP, GIF, IFF, JPEG, PNG, PSD, TIFF, TGA, etc. When saving a file in the JPG format, you can choose the compression method and other parameters, including progressive compression, Huffman's Code optimization, etc.

      Wide array of filters. ACDSee has 34 filters divided into categories. There are Artistic, Color Effects, Distort, Edges, Light, Painting and other filters. Using the User Defiled Convolution Filter, you can create your own filters. Each filter has several adjustable parameters. Moreover, you can adjust filters on the presets list on the upper panel.

      Lighting tool. Using this tool, you can correct images that are too bright and too dark. It can turn a photograph into an HDR shot. The patented Lighting and Contrast Enhancement technology allows removing the flash effect and adjusting colors to raise sharpness without affecting natural colors.

      Face recognition. You can easily mark and sort images by an object or person. Besides, you can quickly add geotags to your images and search for them later by the location. This software is also perfect for organizing your files and adding keywords.

      Not suitable for working with layers. The program is worse than some ACDSee alternatives when it comes to layers. Output files are saved in the native ACDC format which can be opened only in the exact version it was created in. Plus, ACDSee doesn’t have correction layers that might significantly simplify the working process. Besides, the software has high technical requirements. 

      Not for working with GIF files. ACDSee saves images in GIF format almost without losses so output files are quite large. There are no tools for adjusting settings for GIF files. Thus, for this format, it’s better to use Photoshop, SmartSaver or Macromedia Fireworks

      Luminar vs ACDSee: Price

      luminar vs acdsee price

      When comparing Luminar vs ACDSee, decide what tool suits your budget. If you opt for Luminar, it has three subscription plans. You will get a discount on a license for a second device. The one-device license costs $79, while the license for two devices costs $99. Luminar plus Aurora HDR will cost you $178 for one device and $198 for two devices.

      To use Luminar, Aurora HDR, and Luminar X, you will need to pay $277 for one device (the annual subscription for Luminar X costs $99). Luminar has a user-friendly pricing policy. You can purchase a lifetime license for the basic program and pay for a subscription to use additional packages.

      To use ACDSee, you need to pay from $59.99 in a single payment. However, you can also use an ACDSee free trial version for 30 days.

      Luminar vs ACDSee: Who Wins?

      When comparing Luminar vs ACDSee, we should mention that both programs are developed to work with images and have a set of basic post-processing tools. Moreover, both options support RAW files. As they have a lot of filters, they are suitable not only for beginners but also for professional users.

      Luminar is an AI program designed that can be used for color correction. It has a great number of automatic tools, starting with auto cutting and ending with automatic sky replacement options. It is constantly being updated with more professional features that make it similar to Photoshop.

      ACDSee is a multifunctional tool for experienced photographers. It supports advanced image retouching. You can use adjustable brushes, layers, and masks. ACDSee also allows you to work with text, apply filters and various special effects. The program has templates created by world-known photo designers, which allows you to use modern creative photography ideas.

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