The argument between Lightroom and Capture One has been going on for almost as long as digital photography has existed., so we've decided to solve it (or highlight the differences between photo editors, at least) in this in-depth comparison.
It was in 2006 when the photographic community was divided into 2. On one side of the software division, Capture One, an all-in-one photography application that offers cataloging, editing, management and export tools in one package that can be used by both passionate and professional photographers. On the other hand, Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, an all-in-one photography application that offers cataloging, editing, management and export tools in one bundle that can be used by both passionate and professional photographers. You can see the downside.
With the 2 apps offering similar sets of tools, features, and performance, but in very, very different places, the choice between Capture One and Lightroom has always been Sophie's choice. Not only that, but by the time you decide on any of them, the transition between them can be difficult, which means that even if you make the wrong decision, you could find yourself stuck with software you really don't like. Thank God for us, because here we have gathered certain
most significant differences between the 2 applications to assist you. Read on to find out what works for you and your particular software. Although there are 2 versions of Lightroom these days; here we talk about Lightroom Classic.
What are Lightroom and Capture One?
In their respective hearts,
Lightroom and Capture One are meant to be single windows for your images, from ingest (in other words, importing an image to your computer) to export.
This means that they do a bit of everything.: Stitch your images together in one convenient app so you never have to worry about your folder structure again, and lets you refine and strengthen your organization by adding searchable keywords and captions.
Lightroom and Capture One leave a very deep edition; both have added complex color grading tools in recent times and both can do things like color correction, cropping, dust removal and sharpening.
usefully, both can apply adjustments to a set of images with a single click, letting you choose a style for your photos without busily making the exact same edits for each one.
Side panels of Lightroom and Capture One on a green background (Image credit: Avenir)
However, the applications are not interchangeable. Lightroom is a standalone app, but it's available at an affordable cost as a Creative Cloud subscription that includes Photoshop. Perhaps for this reason, its editing tools are somewhat less complete than those of Capture One. Capture One offers more editing tools, as a general rule, they are more complex. Needless to say, there's not much to it, but if you're looking for a full-fledged pixel editor and don't want to Photoshop your images like you never have before, Capture One might be the one you need. On the other hand, Lightroom's cataloging and searching tools have to be seen to be believed. If you're a photographer with a decade of digital files numbering a hundred or more and tired of endlessly searching for thumbnails in the Windows Explorer view or Mac Finder, Lightroom will shake things up. However, it's no slouch when it comes to editing, and most hobby photographers and perhaps all editorial professionals, like many commercial photographers, can find that it does everything they need.
What can you do in Lightroom that you can't with Capture One?
Let's start at the beginning: import images.
Capture One and Lightroom are catalog applications, allowing you to import large batches of images, then browse your thumbnails, rate, delete, tag and sort on the fly. But Capture One's main strength is its powerful editorial; Lightroom is a bit more versatile. If Lightroom only included its catalog module, the cost of entry would still be worth it. Want to sort a hundred images by the focal length at which they were taken? Finished. Or by ISO? Good. Lightroom does an impressively efficient job of returning the images you are looking for quickly, on the spot, and with some frequency.
Our Lightroom library covers 130 images and you really have to see the search performance to believe it.
A laptop screen displaying Lightroom (Image credit: Avenir) Lightroom also offers a slightly softer landing for newcomers.
Capture One offers incredible power, but that power is often hidden behind rather difficult dialogs and tools with names only a professional could want. Although Lightroom is undoubtedly a powerful application with a decent learning curve, Capture One arguably offers the least attainable experience. Then there is the question of broader support.
Capture One has an army of ardent fans, but Lightroom is probably the most popular. This means a better selection of presets (one-click editing files to style your images), plugins, and, for those still learning, YouTube tutorials. Capture One is by no means without support, but if you're looking for a bit of help, Lightroom's shallower learning curve and increasing number of tutorials certainly count as an advantage. Lastly, there is the Photoshop integration. Unsurprisingly, Photoshop and Lightroom are close friends: you can't just open an edited image in the granddaddy of editing apps; You can also open an image as a Smart Object, which means that
any changes you have applied in Lightroom are going to be editable in Photoshop. There's a tight integration that allows for in-depth editing sessions without losing any of Lightroom's organizational benefits.
At what point should I use Capture One instead of Lightroom?
If you're using Lightroom and Photoshop together, there's practically nothing you can't do with an image. If you want to do your editing rigorously in an app, you'll want to stick with Capture One, which has even more comprehensive editing capabilities than Lightroom. There are layers, for one thing. Lightroom lacked speed in its quest for speed, but it had been a while since we remembered running a session that didn't contain at least one image with twelve layers. Capture One's layers don't work quite like they do in Photoshop, but they're a bit more powerful than Lightroom's—a good mid-range solution, so to speak. Using the Clone or Fix brushes in Capture One creates a new layer that can be turned on or off, or have different amounts of opacity applied to it. Actually, the actual effect you can achieve is very similar to using a clone brush in Lightroom; You might not get a whole new layer with Lightroom, but you can always adjust the opacity of your brush. 'A brush after a modification. It's similar, but Capture One is probably the more "professional" approach.
A laptop screen showing Capture One photo editing software (Image credit: Avenir)
You also get adjustment layers in Capture One, which work just like Photoshop: create an adjustment layer and adjust the sliders on it, then you can disguise your effects with a brush, just like in Photoshop. Unlike Photoshop, you can't change a mask's blend mode, but layers aren't noticeable in Lightroom, which is a huge plus. Although distinguishing the differences in Capture One's editing tools can start to feel a bit like a haircut, it's clear that the on-set workflow is superior to Lightroom. There's a lot of talk about Capture One's connectability - we just recorded our Canon gear while connected in Lightroom and have no complaints - but there's a lot of trivia about Lightroom getting past dropping cameras during recording . In addition
There's Capture One's phenomenal Capture Pilot app, which lets you take pictures connected to a computer while simultaneously sending captured images to a tablet.. It's an absolute dream if you're a pro on a set where you have your user, but you don't want everyone huddled near your laptop. Another big plus for professionals is Capture One's annotation feature that
lets you draw over an image, which lets you annotate parts of the image for your reference or, while exporting, include your annotations on a separate layer, useful if you're only ingesting images from one shot before sending them off to a retoucher for finishing touches.
Lightroom vs Capture One: Which Offers the Best Value for Money?
This is a complicated question:
if you are a professional, the most advantageous application is the one that offers you the best balance between speed (how fast you can get in and out of your computer),
quality (how well can you to get your pictures in the end)
and the cost. If you're a fan, cost is probably a more essential factor. If you don't want to be married to a subscription,
Capture One is the only option. Lightroom hasn't been available with a perpetual license (in other words, a one-time payment) for years. However, Capture One perpetual licenses are not cheap and the costs of the software are generally confusing. For example, if you have a Canon camera, you'll need Capture One Pro, which will cost you $299 / €299 on its own, or $19 / €15 per month as a subscription, whenever you purchase a Subscription with a year in advance. But if you have a Nikon, Sony, or Fuji camera, you can go for Capture One (for Nikon/Sony/Fuji), which will only cost $199/€199 separately, or $14/€12,42 per month, again assuming you buy a year in advance. If you change cameras throughout your subscription, you can always deactivate the particular version of Capture One for your camera and reactivate it for a different brand of camera.
Two laptops showing Lightroom and Capture One editing software on a green background (Image credit: Avenir)